10. The Girl That Looked Like Marion

"You're on a deet", said the bartender, while she was pouring my Peroni. I recognized the New Zealand accent, but didn't want to give up so easily to a more understandable version of English, so I gave her a flirty look and asked: "Sorry, love, I'm on a what?". "On a deet, you know, when you go out with a girl, do stuff...". I laughed, cockily. "Oh, a date," I said, making a special emphasis on the "a" sound. "Yes, love, I'm definitely on a date". I grabbed the two pints of Peroni and went back to my table, where Paula was waiting for me.
She reminded me to someone I use to date a few years ago, Marion. They both did had the same skin colour, but not the same eyes... Anyway, it wasn't so much of a physical resemblance, but that confidence and correct-girl attitude. It's specially the nice and impeccable way of dressing what reminded me of Marion. The girls I usually date are not so much Versace but more of a charity-shop-style. Anyway, she was hot and interesting, in her conventional way. Besides, she was a bartender, like me, so we had something to talk about for at least a few hours.
When we eventually ran out of things to talk about, we started making out, as the protocol indicates. That's where I knew it wouldn't work. It wasn't because of the kissing itself. Actually, the kissing was exactly what made me go on a date with her on the first place. The night before, I went to her pub. I was sort of drunk, and so were the colleagues from my pub who were with me. She was working, and even though I hadn't keep in touch with her in the past few month -or replied her last texts-, she welcomed me with a wide sexy smile. "Hello, handsome," she said. I talked to her for a few minutes -"How have you been? What's new? Give me free drinks. Etcetera"- and went back to my friends, ignoring her for the rest of the night while I caught up with my tequila shots.
A few hours later, reality was quite blurry. David was absolutely hammered, hitting on random tourists on different corners of the dark flattering ambience. Joe and Blake were involved in a very serious discussions about paper and fabric napkins. I decided a deep metaphysical subject like that was a little bit too much for my a neuronal activity as simple as mine, so I decided to proceed to the gent's to unload some amounts of the liquid my body was so happily receiving.
When I was on my way back from the toilets, she was waiting for me. The bar was busy, but she didn't care. She intercepted me in the dark and started kissing me fiercely. I was surprised. When I met her I didn't imagine she tasted so good. Her lips were simply delicious.
So that's why I decided to go on a date with her. "If that's her lips' flavour," I thought, "we better taste the rest of her body".
So there we were the next day, at a random pub in Stratford, where a charming New Zealand bartender accurately diagnosed me with a deet.
When we started kissing in the box where we were seating, I realised it wouldn't work, not because she had lost her taste from one day to the other, but because her general attitude was just... tasteless. She was pulling my shirt up, touching my nether zone, beginning to moan, while in the box next to ours two little kids were starting their burgers. "I don't think this is the appropriate place or time for that," I said, very seriously, when she blatantly started to unbutton my trousers. She was on fire. "So lets take it to the appropriate place," she said.
Half an hour later, we were at her place, a crappy room in a crappy house in a remote residential neighbourhood of London which name I didn't even remarked in the first place. In a corner of the room, there was a small table with cereal boxes, a jug of water and various kitchen utensils. Then, there were clothes inside and outside an old wooden wardrobe, a mirror, hair products, and more assorted random objects, all within a chaotic mess. Mess is usually a deal-breaker for me, specially that kind of dirty mess. But I was horny too, we were finally there after a long trip, and it was certainly too late to go back home (the tube wasn't working after eleven thirty), so I needed a place to spend the night.
When I finished scanning the room, she was already undressed. She took my clothes off in less than three seconds and next thing I knew we were fucking.
It didn't work at all. First reason: she was biting me non-stop; biting my neck, my chest, my legs. I asked her to stop, but she wouldn't. I have really sensitive skin, and while physical pain might be a turn-on for some people, for me is scary and uncomfortable. The sex itself wasn't working so well either. She didn't seem very happy when I put a condom on, and even if we had fifteen or twenty minutes of tuned, tunned and well-timed humping, then it got boring and uneven. I came once, twice, three times. She wasn't satisfied, she wanted more. After the third time, I was too tired to continue. I started eating her out, to make her come and finish for once and for all. Not only she didn't come, but every time she was about to, she would pull my face away from her fanny and make me penetrate her again. I could barely stick something inside.
"Je ne peux pas jouir si t'utilises un preservatif," she said... or something like that. "Sorry?" I said. I understood what she was saying, but just couldn't believe what she was suggesting. "I can't come if you're wearing a condom," she repeated. I laughed -trying to play it cool- and replied: "Sorry, love, but that stays on". I kept on trying to make her come for twenty more minutes, or so, and then I just surrendered to my lack of sleep and my drunkenness of the past four days, and fell on the bed like a log. I fell asleep immediately. My dick didn't work any more, it was absolutely sore after more than one hour of bad-friction sex.
Even when I called it off and went flying to the lands of slumber, the Marion look-alike -I can't even recall her name any more- just wouldn't give up. She rubbed her ass against my crotch the whole night. Every now and then, she would even start to bite me again. I would pretend I was sleeping, but she continued, firmly and strongly, trying to wake me up. Finally, furious, I had to tell her to stop it, to let me sleep, not once, but four times.
By eight in the morning I escaped. I told her I had to work, even if that "work" I so badly had to do was going to my own bed to finally be allowed to sleep for a few hours without someone attempting to antropophagate me. I left in such a rush that we couldn't even find my pants. "Keep them," I said after looking for them for almost eight minutes, "I don't need them, anyway". So I went commando and left as fast as I could.
It took me two hours in two crowded smelly trains -which I refused to pay for, after such a disappointment of a night- to get back home. When I saw my bed, I was so happy I almost cried.
Today, five days later, she texted me. " I found your pants", said the message, "They were under the bed".
"Disgusting," I thought, and never replied.

9. Atheism

If I ever believe in art, I should tattoo "I dreamt that my mother and grandmother were rapists" in my forehead.
Life is a metaphor of itself.

8. The best

It's hard to have low self-esteem. Sincerely.
There are so many people more fucked-up than me, that I have barely time of those who are more successful and sexier. It's not supposed to be a competition. But it is, obviously. We all know it. I'm not particularly interested in the competition, but it relieves me to know that I'm winning.
Even though, I don't really enjoy it when people acts like they're inferior next to me. I prefer it when they're cocky and vain... at least I can laugh at them, and pretend I'm submissive, but letting them know I'm not. But when it's the other way around, it's only funny for a couple of hours. After that, you realize you can never really be friends with someone who feels inferior.


7. Blackout

It all started with a towel.
I knew the feeling very well. It was the feeling you have within dreams, when something doesn't make sense at all, so you start suspecting you're not in the waking life. The difference, this time, was that it wasn't a dream at all. It was my first blackout, and a really sober one.

I was in my father house, so it must have been seven or eight years ago. I was going to take a shower. Not many times in my childhood I was alone with my mother. Once, we went to the supermarket to buy her some tampons. We were inside the car, in the parking lot. She told me: "You don't realize, but you are a person with rituals". I didn't agree right away, but I always do what my mother says, so I took that as a part of my personality -a major one.
A few years later, I was following my pre-shower ritual, that included grabbing a towel and hanging it in the bathroom while the water got hot. That day I couldn't find my towel anywhere. I looked in my room, in my brothers' room, in the laundry room. Then, I just went into the bathroom again, hot water still running, and filling every corner of the mirrored room with steam. The blue towel was there, hanging. I knew it wasn't there before. I knew I'd taken it, but I had absolutely no memory of it.
I know, it doesn't sound so special, but imagine me, there, with the same face you pull in your dreams when you question if it's normal or not that you can fly, but in real life.
So I stood there, I started to laugh. What else could I do? It was the first sign of insanity, the one I was waiting for.

6. Potomania

Poto was a fish. Poto was a happy fish until he realized that the world he was watching from his crystal-walled palace was nothing but a tiny fragment of the known universe. Luckily for Poto, his memory didn't last enough to be worried more that a few minutes. After that, Poto was a happy fish again.

If I knew I was pregnant right now, I wouldn't be worried about many things. I wouldn't be worried about all the weed I smoked in Amsterdam, one month after the last time I had sex. I would worry about all the tobacco, it honestly wasn't that much in comparison to what I used to smoke when I lived in my planet. If I found out, right this instant about me having a four-month foetus jamming my guts I wouldn't even be worried about that late night in Joe's about a month ago, when I thought it was a good idea to share a few lines of Magical Powder of Bolivia with two total strangers on top of the toilet paper dispenser. I wouldn't care at all that the father would be a French guy whose name I barely remember -and if I do remember it, it's actually because it reminds me of an historical character whom I admire. I guess I always dreamt about being a single mom, like Jenny Fields, with nobody to disagree about the raising of my progeny. I wouldn't mind about the money. I have money now, not a lot but enough to not be in a very sad position with a baby in my arms.
What I would worry about, if I found out I was pregnant right now, is that in the past month I have consumed enough coffee to fill an Olympic swimming pool. And yes, I write this while I'm having a coffee.
Anyway, I'm not pregnant. I thought I was for a few day, but only because I haven't had my period in a few month and I'm insanely fat, but apparently that's for other reasons... Now that I think about it, coffee might have stopped my hormonal cycle, that wouldn't surprise me at all, not after the amounts I've been injecting in my blood.
Having a coffee is not a reason to be ashamed these days... It's actually quite fashionable. Alcoholism, on the other hand, is so out. Cocaine is very "nineties" but, as you know, everything comes back and the nineties are starting to be cool again. I don't really mind being addicted to coffee, but it's starting to cost me a lot of money. It would be easier if I was just addicted to water, like that stupid arsehole was.
Daniel was addicted to water. Apparently the doctors told him it was called potomania, what he had, accompanied by an acute anorexia. This was before his homeless period, and after his cocaine period. He was laughing about it when he told me, of course. He told me one day he decided he wanted to drink a lot of water and for a few month from that, he couldn't stop drinking. He was always carrying a bottle with him and, of course, he wouldn't want to eat, but only drink water.
"The funny thing," he said, "is that my parents were happy for me. They kept on having cold water specially for me on the fridge, since they always saw me drinking it... we never kept water on the fridge before that. They thought I was being healthy, that it was a good thing."
He could have died.
Like so many other times... It's quite impressive that he's still alive, now that I think about it, specially after that time his brother tried to kill him.

5. Montage

Like lots of people is this ultra-visual world, I like to think of my life in cinematographic terms. An ingenious remark makes me immediately think "Lovely dialogues"; a boring and undefined person makes me feel like their character has not been quite well constructed; a heart-breaking sunset is a mental applause for the Art Director. Regarding the script, the meaning of life, and etcetera, my theory is that the most annoying and decisive parts -those slow processes that really take your story where you want it to be-, are never properly shown in films. Yes, I am talking about the '80s montage sequence: sports training, studying for the big test, getting organized and getting a job in a Survivor's track time. In the real world with the real humans -stupid humans, I hate them-, we are not prepared to actually do those things.
Whatever genre we choose, we are still in a movie. For what we know, getting fit only takes a strong resolution after a moment of crisis -lets say eating a three-thousand-calorie Swiss chocolate bar... not that I have ever done that, specially not last night while watching Archer (season five)- and three to five minutes of sandwiched shots and catchy rock music to reach destination.
Trying to figure out what really happens in between shots would be an accurate description of my life right now. I'm in the employment decisions moment. Until now, I thought this moment didn't even existed. I blame London.
What Daniel and my lovely hippie life in Silver City taught me, was that there was no decision point, that you could change your mind as much as you wanted, that there wasn't much in the bet anyway, and that having any job is good enough... as long as you have time to enjoy your life, drink your beer, friend your friends, do your art, and smoke your weed. I still feel that way, I feel it strongly. But, I also must admit London is having an effect on me, and all that competitive, non-rewarding and ass-raping system is making me truly afraid of not having money, not having a job, not having enough education (meaning academic education). Since Daniel is gone, I'm having a hard time balancing my socially-fit side with my fuck-the-system side. I'm lacking a little bit of the latter. I am ashamed to admit that I have been thinking long and much about money: the money I'm saving, the money I don't have yet, and the things I could do with it. Of course, they are Felix-like things to do with money, like opening a coffee shop, or raising a baby, or dedicating myself to write.
I reached a point in my concern when I desperately needed robot-mum advice. Should I continue to study? I don't even think that's possible, even if I wanted to, not without the money and references. Should I find another job? I'm not sure I could afford a rent and continue to save money. Should I travel? First I should solve that problem with my credit cards, probably -I promise I will call today-. What should I do, Mamma?
She was, as usual, kind of neutral, kind of directive. I think she would prefer me to study, but I don't think she actually knows the variety of impediments on my way for that. She tells me I can be a writer, work in magazines and publishers. Thank you! That's what I wanted to hear. That's what I've actually been saying for the past year or so: "What I really like to do is writing for magazines". So, I had already decided what I wanted to do... I just didn't remember.
On our last weeks of friendship, Daniel was convinced he wanted to go to Bolivia to live with and defend a local community of people. I say "local" in order to avoid terms as "aboriginal" or "Indian". After all, I don't hear people around here saying things like "I'm going to Amsterdam to smoke ganja with the aboriginal Dutch", or "This aboriginal English peoples sure know how to enjoy a greasy breakfast!".
He was more like a radical character, always extremist, always wanting the big change, always wanting to be completely different from everybody. Daniel couldn't just bare the idea of being normal. He wasn't normal, except for that strong urge of being abnormal, which is actually very normal... specially these days. I hate to admit, even I have it, and the smartest way I found of being abnormal is pretending I don't mind being normal. You can find it all over my speech, for example in the first sentence of this chapter "Like lots of people...". I just find it fake and "normal" to say "Hey, I'm different, am I the only one who feels his life is like a movie?". I don't think anyone older than fifteen falls for that.
I am writing this to understand the characters in my movie. Eventually, my character. Who am I? What do I want to... etcetera.
When I see some interesting catch phrase in the characters around, me, I take it, I make it mine. For example, the "etcetera" thing. That's Daniel's, of course. Most people use it to avoid listing obvious and boring things, after they've made their point clear. Daniel used it when he was saying something really important.
I can tell where most of my expressions come from. I have many from Julia, lots from Daniel, some from Harry... all above a base that's basically my mother's way of communicating my father's way of thinking. That's good for a start, for defining myself. I really don't feel like a have a core concept, a centre of feelings that are only mine. I think I'm more like a permeable robot, who's been programmed by different people surrounding me. And I am totally OK with that. I don't feel empty. I feel full, of cookies. And that's all that matters to me.

4. Dog Days

My theory is that the mystery of Daniel's unusual mind relied on the fact that he was a dog.
He wasn't, of course, a proper dog, with a happy tail and furry skin. He was, in fact, the hairless person I ever met, male or female. Daniel was technically a human being, with two eyes, a nose, a mouth and a belly button. But I know he was canine.
Myself, I am a four-eyed monster with tentacles instead of legs, one anxious right hand and a horrendously-drawn left hand, covered in glitter, with honey earrings hanging from my carrot ears and a titi monkey as a tie.
Daniel was a dog. He actually liked to bark, specially to police officers.
One day he told me about the occasions in which he got arrested. He's not my only friend who got arrested. In a beautiful summer night in Cordoba city around a fire, my friend Cortés told me and the rest of the travellers of that time he spent a night in jail being a nerdy seventeen-years-old, for hacking public telephones with an even nerdier friend, in order to make free phone calls. Police made the two of them spend the night inside a shit-hole where they barely had place to stand, surrounded by old dirty drunk dudes that were in for robbing or murder. Next to them there was a cell were some guys were threatening them with raping their asses and killing them, just for the laughs.
Another friend of mine, El Don, was also one night in jail with three other friends. They were driving to a David Guetta show, outside Buenos Aires. Of course, they were carrying drugs. The police knew how it was going to be, so they were waiting in the road and stopped my friends, and two other cars. The car in front of them -blond tall botox-filled woman and rich guy- had LSD, ketamine, pills, weed and cocaine. My friends had only five joints... a normal healthy breakfast. Obviously, they had only five joint because they couldn't get any more drugs. Otherwise, they would have had more than that. But they didn't. Not only they had five pitiful joints for the four of them, but also they got arrested for that. They spent the night in jails and -again- sharing the room with people that was in for murder. One of my friends got actually robbed inside the cell (a brand new jacket specially bought for the show). The funniest part is that, in all those hours when they were waiting alone in the cell, they actually managed to smoke some weed some other guys had on them.
For Daniel it was different. Every time he was in jail, it was because he was "walking shirtless in the street" or something like that... and if you are a non-white young guy with dirty clothes and no shirt, you are definitely a danger to society. And if you try to ask the police why they are taking you to jail, they will beat the shit out of you.
"What do you do when they start beating you?," I ask.
"Well... there's not a lot to do, really," he says calmly. "Just shouting them to fuck off and biting them until they get tired of kicking the shit out of me".
When I met Daniel he was convinced he was an angel.
Before starting to write about him, this morning, I thought of using a different name, but I couldn't think of one that would fit his personality appropriately, so I googled "Daniel" to find the meaning and maybe get some ideas from that.
"God is my judge". No way to change that.
During all the years I knew him, during his cocaine addiction, his homeless period, his weed-smoking in public, his psychopath laughing for no reason, his barking... In all that time, other human's judgement never affected him. Not a little bit. Not in the outside or the inside. He knew human judgement existed, he could try to analyse that. He knew the basic stuff to be allowed to walk in the street (like wearing trousers) and to be -kind of- accepted in society, but there's no way he cared about other people's judgement other than that.
He wasn't like that because he was "oh, so independent and careless and free!", but because he was a dog, a winged dog. And he believed in God. At first, at least.

Aceite

-Al contrario -dijo sonriendo-, creo que las personas felices pensamos en la muerte mucho más que las personas tristes. Tiene sentido. La muerte no nos asusta, el suicidio parece una situación práctica y fácil ante los problemas cotidianos. Nada es tan dramático.
-Yo diría que sos un tipo muy particular de persona feliz, entonces.
-Quizá tengas razón, sí.
-De todas formas, no veo cómo un "problema cotidiano" puede afectar a alguien al punto del suicidio...
-¡No! No al punto del suicidio. Sólo digo que a la gente como yo no le da miedo pensar en eso. Y cuando hay una pila de platos para lavar, el dulce anhelo del descanso eterno es una imagen innegablemente dulce.
Los autos marcaban patrones imperceptibles. Rojo, azul, azul, rojo, gris, celeste, gris, azul. Alguien, en ese mismo momento, en otra esquina del universo, estaba inventando una máquina que generaba automáticamente fórmulas determinando la series generada por los colores de los autos transitantes un miércoles a la mañana.
-¿Qué fue lo que pasó? ¿Qué te hizo pensar en la muerte hoy?
-Nada, sólo salí a tomar aire.
-Jaja... Vamos, Miranda. No creo que sea el momento más adecuado para ese tipo de chistes.
-Bueno, si de verdad querés saber, fue el aceite.
-¿El aceite?
-Sí. Quería hacer papas fritas. Pelé las papas, las corté. Exactamente siete centímetros y medio de largo por dos de alto por uno coma siete de profundidad; ochenta y cinco papas. Cuando las quise hacer, me di cuenta que no había aceite.
Rodolfo sonrió. Era verdad que eran el uno para el otro.
-Adiviná de dónde vengo.
-¿De dónde? -preguntó Miranda ya apunto de saltar.
-Del súper -dijo Rodolfo. Miranda soltó una carcajada.
Se tomaron de las manos y abandonaron la cornisa por la ventana detrás de la cual los esperaba su viejo y querido departamento. En el suelo, junto a la puerta que Rodolfo había dejado abierta en el apuro de salvar a Miranda de saltar del séptimo piso, estaban las bolsas del súper, donde dos grandes botellas de aceite mezcla sobresalían con esplendor.
-Nadie me entiende como vos -dije Miranda abrazando el aceite.

3. Little Meetbag in Plumberland

I like it when someone like a plumber comes to work where I live and we tacitly decide to ignore each other in our own lack of comfortableness. It's always better that way... unless the plumber is hot. In that case, I think we've all watched enough porn to know what happens next... Anyway, it's not the case now. He's ugly and old. I can cope with ugly, I can cope with old, but not both at the same time, that's my policy.

I'm going to Germany soon. I was going to go to Berlin, but honestly spending five days drunk in the forest in the unexistent land on Bielefeld sound way more appealing. Actually, it sounds like the most brilliant plan ever. I'm so lucky I'm me. I have the greatest ideas.
Last night I found an amazing way to sleep. I had totally forgotten about it, but it came back to me and it worked immediately. Maybe it worked because I was dead tired, or maybe because I'm amazing.
The thing is you have to lay down looking up. Relax your body and start thinking of your toes. You have to start feeling them until you are really focus on what your toes are feeling. When you're done with the toes, you move up to the rest of your feet, ankles, legs, tights, etcetera. The thing is, as soon as you can focus on a body area, you start feeling the specific pains you have in there, and you are also able to really relax the muscles. To really relax, you need to make the same mental process you make when you are masturbating and you are about to reach an orgasm. It's that exact point when you clear your mind of everything and you lose yourself to the tactile sensations of your body. If you can do that with your toes, legs, back, shoulders, and every part of your body, you will find it's like a resting orgasm. You don't even have to follow a specific order, the different part of the body will call you until you go with them and relax them.
Now, the best part is when you reach the brain. Then, your mind goes immediately blank and, unless you are thinking about how fast you will fall asleep, you will fall asleep really fast.
Of course, it's not the magical cure for anything. My right foot still hurts like shit and my back has new pains that even weren't there yesterday. But I know that if I do that and continue to exercise my poor beaten meatbag, someday I might feel better.

I hope there's a train to take me really early to the airport.
I hope there's a train to the magical fields of Slumberland.
I hope that little animal in the garden is a squirrel and not a rat (both equally possible in Furry City).

Je suis en train de lire Le Petit Prince. Je pense que je l'ai déjà lu en français, mais je ne suis pas sure. J'ai faim. Je crois que je vais prendre le déjeuner maintenant. Je suis sure que j'ai eu un rêve merveilleuse mais je ne me souviens pas du tout qu'est que c’était.
Tout ce que je me souviens c'est en me réveiller et penser "Fuck, fuck life, fuck this, fuck that, I want to sleep"... Je sais, c'est pas normale en moi. Normalement, je n'ai pas de problèmes pour me lever.

2. The Importance of Being Bananas



I think I might be going a little tiny bit Bananas.
How do you actually know? How do you realize when are you going crazy? I always assumed that the kind of craziness that would eventually invade my last pieces of brain would be highly self-conscious. And so it appears to be, now.
Maybe it's because I've been working so much that month, weeks, days and hours start to lose their structure. I don't know what a weekend is, any more, or if an eight hour shift serving tables is too much or too little.
I like it, being Bananas. It makes everything more interesting. It's in these particular moments where I lose all short term memory or capacity to understand basic human behaviour. Xavier just came home. I opened the door.
“Are you alone?” he asked. “Where are Cecile and the kids?”.
I was confused. “Maybe they went to the park,” I said. He laughed, of course. It was almost nine in the evening, close winter night, five degrees with all luck. The park...
Watching so much Futurama is nice. I liked Archer better, but Futurama gives me better dreams. I am dreaming a lot about living in the future. I like that. Of course, we already live in the future. And now that I came to the futuristic city of London, I can certainly say so. What's so funny about the future is that it's so technological and dirty at the same time... it's a little bit cyberpunk in a way, like in a Blade Runner way. But London is not really like Blade Runner. Now Tokyo, that must be it. London is a little bit more like... The Clockwork Orange, yes. Nineteen Eighty-four, of course.
I, on the other hand, am a little bit like a little lost puppy. I am a ball of sweet rice, a crab in a circus show. I am a robot's best friend. I am a Banana, I am the Banana.
Today I saw Ilka, outside school. She asked if I could store her big suitcase for a few days; I asked if I could stay four days instead of two in her house in Germany. We both politely said yes, and we really meant it.
I still have to find the reason why I get along so well with misanthropist even though they're the opposite of me. Or why I get along so well with negative people when I'm so optimistic. Why are my best friends always depressive while I'm clinically joyful? Maybe my old theory about the happiness/misery curve was right, maybe it is the same: both states reach zero, nihilism, only through a different path.
Whatever the reason is, the real question should be “Why do I always attach to a blond girl?”. I don't recall a moment of my life where I wasn't stuck to a blondie like a butterfly to a windshield.
Now I'm the blonde. And -tell nobody-, it's a fake blond.
Fake banana blond.
But with time, just like the banana, I'm turning brown.

:::

No Internet for a few hours and I've read five books, and written words flow through my fingers like flying lollipops.
The big Christmas tree in the kitchen is hurting my brain. “How” and “why”, I would ask if I didn't know the answer already. Of course Chiara was right, my kids will be so lucky. Not just because I would let them play videogames and watch cartoons, but also because I would even let them have a Christmas tree, even it would hurt my brain. Of course, I wouldn't spend a penny on it, but I wouldn't mind them decorating one in the little garden we would have. I would have to be a cannabis plant, I suppose, and that Christmas tree I could certainly like... it wouldn't hurt my brain, at least.

I think I had an epiphany some days ago, or was it today? But I can't remember what it was about. Was I drunk? Was I tired?
I remember hating humanity yesterday. But before that? Or just while I was falling asleep, maybe.
I think the big pile of paper clips is hurting my brain too. I must kill it, transform it into collages.
I know, I know... I said I would, long ago. But this time I mean it.
Maybe tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow (which, from now on, for the lack of simplicity that in this particular occasion the English language presents, I am going to call “postomorrow”).
Some money just fell straight into my ear. I like the money for the simple reason that I am proving myself what I could never do before: I can save money. The same with exercising every day (though I'm eating more than what I'm actually burning). So far I could save more money than what I thought I would. Well, not really. I saved more that what I honestly though, but not what I ideally thought I could save. That's what high ideal standards are for: not being achieved. I don't know what would happen to me if I ever achieved one of those. I would probably explode as confetti into outer space.

The little green eye kid is starting to grow a feeling on me. I don't know if he's interesting enough, or not-sexist enough, my only two non-negociables, specially since chocolate-is-for-girls guy. I can't believe how my generation is behaving. Seriously, this is the future, the XXI century. Perhaps Futurama is right, after all: not even in the year 3000 we will be free of sexism... and owls.

Reading Tintin is like watching a movie. But I think that's likely because I actually watched all Tintin movies when I was a kid... and the stories are the same. So, maybe I'm just remembering them. Anyway, reading, watching, remembering, all the fucking same to banana brain here. A few days ago I watched The Meaning of Life again. Unluckily for me, hats don't suit me at all. People don't wear enough hats. How much is enough? Forty-two, of course.

I think I might be dreaming right now, because the Internet only worked on the webpage that I thought it would work on, and not on the rest (where I was just plainly hopeless). Maybe all this money that came to me is all dream money and the Tintin story I just read is a vague memory of a movie I watched as a child. The dream feeling is strong. After all, all the things that I thing are about to happen, are just happening, like my fingertips falling on the keys, like the sounds from the kitchen, like the Queen staring at me with her fabric-eyes down from the fiver that rests on the bed.

Everything is going to be allright. Don't panic.
When the Internet comes back, everything is going to be allright.

:::

Ok, normality NOT restored. Internet is still away. I think he might have fallen in love with some Internet chic and ran off to a place where they could love eachother without being judged, because he is poor, but she comes from a well educated and respected family, but he own a very big dong.

I need to find the way to actually make Cafélix happen without having my brain exploding. I need someone to take care of the paperwork, someone I can pay and rely on. I know who that is, of course, the sexiest muthafocka in town. But let us not ruin the surprise. Let's be cautious... for now. I need to earn all this money and more to make Cafélix happen without the stress of not having enough money to make it happen or -the worst possible nightmare- making it half-way through.

Brain, as yourself I command you not to explode.
Not quite yet.

1. The Dead Body

A few days ago I saw, for the first time, a dead body.
I didn't intend to look at it, not because I wasn't curious, but because I somehow expected my first time watching a dead body to be a little bit more... glamorous, whatever that means.
Once I dreamt I was in a wooden cabin in the forest. There was a lovely old man. The cabin was very very tall, and inside there was a mezzanine, from which the old man jumped killing himself because the ceilings were so high that it was impossible to clean them. Since then, I never quite liked very high ceilings: they're out of reach, which can obviously lead into suicidal behaviours. Last night I dreamt that I was in a beautiful Mediterranean island. All my friends were there with me, in the high-ceiling wooden hostel, but they wouldn't wait for me while I went to the room to change into my swimming suite, and they went to the beach without me.
I started crying. I wanted to go with them but I didn't know where they were. So, I started walking through a nice sunny garden, where there were turtles hiding behind the flowers, probably. Waking through the garden I reached the main street, the one next to the ocean, and I sat on an outdoor table of a nice coffee shop. I could have been Italy, or Spain. The outside tables were small and round, made of a metal structure that supported a round decorated tiled stone.
As usual, I had my guitar with me, so I started playing. All the people inside the coffee shop were old and they looked like they were from the neighbourhood, definitely not tourists. The door was open, so they could hear me playing, which made me a little nervous and insecure. In addition, my guitar was out of tune. I never knew how to tune it properly... I should definitely learn. I tried to do it, in the dream, but the instrument started bending and breaking apart, which made it extra difficult.

Anyway... the dead body.
I knew there was a dead body even before looking at it. I was walking down Kentish Town Road, going to the restaurant, as usual. I saw the ambulance. I saw the people stopping to look. I heard the sights. So I knew.
I don't like being the kind of people that stops and stares at an accident, so I just kept on walking... but I couldn't help it. I took a squint.
There they were. The two paramedics were putting the dead body of the young woman on the stretcher. There was no question she was dead. Her face was so grotesque as one could possibly imagine the face of a dead person: eyes and mouth wide open, tongue out.
I only saw it for an instant, it was literally less that one second. Even tough, the impression still remains. I never stopped walking. Next to me, the big Jamaican man was walking at the same pace.
"I am starting to believe I am the Angel of Death," he was saying. "Everywhere I go there's a person ran over, an accident, a stroke...". He wasn't talking to anyone in particular, but I turned to him and said: "Well, mate, you're starting to scare me a little bit...".
We talked for a little bit, walking down Regent's Canal to our respective jobs. He worked at the Camden food Market, of course. I don't remember his name. I didn't find him interesting at all. One minute he was talking about death, next minute he was telling me how much he would like to be my boyfriend, without even knowing my name.

Lucía

Lucía era una nena muy chiquita. En vez de salir de una mamá de humano, o de una mamá de cualquier otro animal, Lucía salió de una cáscara de maní dentro de la cual, resultaba ser, se habían concentrado todas las energías residuales del universo, generando una bola de pelusa de ombligo color gris azulado que, tras siete meses y medio de gestación, lanzó al mundo a esta pequeña niña con olor a cereza.
Lucía sabía que no era igual al resto, para empezar, porque todos le sacaban más de un metro y medio de altura. Además, ella era color escarlata, y tenía cuatro brazos, y sólo sabía hablar en el idioma de los grillos. Sin embargo, Lucía supo encontrar una gran cantidad de aventuras en el mundo de los humanoides... y también en el planeta de los velocirraptors, pero eso mejor lo dejamos para otro día.

Una noche de agosto, Lucía estaba durmiendo una dulce siesta de miel en el pétalo de un cactus. La luna nueva brillaba por su ausencia. Los teros ya no se preocupaban por sus pichones. Entre ronquidito y ronquidito, la nena soñaba que medía treinta y ocho metros de alto, y aplastaba la ciudad con sus enormes puños de acero. En el sueño, un tsunami despechado intentaba tumbarla con su enorme fuerza, mojando el vestido que había especialmente elegido para el día de la primavera. El susto la despertó. No había tsunami, era el rocío que practicaba su acto de magia condensándose en altas horas de la madrigada.
Con la visión todavía empañada, Lucía vio algo extraño en la distancia. Parecían dos estrellas verdosas, dos bolas de vidrio que no pestañaban. La adrenalina la detuvo. Su oído se agudizó hasta chillar. Y entonces lo oyó, la respiración felina que la saboreaba a unos metros, acechando desde detrás de los tachos de basura; las glándulas salivales que activaban su oxidado mecanismo; los ojos que, fijos y serenos, se clavaban en los tres o cuatro gramos de deliciosa mermelada que componían su cuerpecito insectomorfo; los músculos de la espalda que se tensaban y acomodaban para saltar en cualquier instante.
-¡Pido gancho! -gritó Lucía saltando sobre sus patas traseras- ¡El que me toca es un chancho!
-¡La puta madre! -gritó el gato Rogelio, indignado. Se subió a su bicicleta y se fue, recordando con amargura esas dos semanas que había tenido que ser cerdo y vivir en un chiquero después de que un mosquito que había sido capturado pidiera "pido" justo antes de ser tragado.
Cuando vio que Rogelio se alejaba pedaleando en la distancia, Lucía decidió que quizá sería mejor construir un refugio un tanto más seguro que su hamaca de pétalos de cactus. Entonces salió a caminar, con su machete, abriendo un pequeño senderito en el césped.
Lo primero que encontró fue una lata vacía de gaseosa, pero se negó a utilizarla como refugio porque, si bien era un pequeño ente sobrenatural, estaba categóricamente en contra de las grandes empresas capitalistas... y ni hablar de que el aluminio había pasado de moda hacía ya dos temporadas. Unos metros y media hora más adelante, encontró una zapatilla, pero si bien el tamaño era apropiado y los cordones podían ser útiles para ahorcar a sus enemigos, no se imaginaba pasando la primavera en un monoambiente sin ventanas. Finalmente, después de deambular unas horas más, Lucía encontró una lujosa mansión con diecisiete habitaciones, sirvientes, vajilla de plata y un tobogán que iba directamente desde la habitación hasta una pileta climatizada.
"Creo que este lugar podría ser apropiado", pensó Lucía. Así que, finalmente, decidió instalarse allí. Tres semanas después, murió de aburrimiento.

0. The King of Brydges Place


One day, when I was a young man, I found myself walking down the rainy streets of London, trying to think of a new story to write.
“Another sunny day,” I thought, sarcastically, looking up.
The clouds seemed to have read my thoughts. Offended, they started to throw marbles and cheese cubes in my direction, so I had no choice than to refuge myself in the first spot I could fit in. It turned out to be Brydges Place, the narrowest alley in the city. Actually, the alley was so narrow, that the clouds had lost me, they couldn't see me any more.
I started walking down the alley... or at least trying to. The space between the walls was so narrow and so packed of boxes, trash and other unknown objects that I could barely put my feet one in front of the other. I was lucky that my career as a writer had not bloomed yet, so I was considerably skinnier than I am now. I don’t really know it would be physically possible for me to get inside Brydges Place again in the present. Even if I could, I would not do it for all the money in the world. What I found that day in its very end was so terrifying that I promised I would not put a foot in there again.
"Those two pieces of meat you have down there look inviting, to say the least," said a deep voice, echoing around the place like a bouncing ball. I stopped walking and looked around. All I could hear now was my own heartbeat.
"He… hello?" I said. "Is there someone there?".
No one answered. I started walking again, cautiously slowly.
"I sure like visitors," said the voice, "especially if they carry big smelly feet like yours".
I could not realize who was speaking. I looked around again and all I could see was piles of smelly rubbish and empty boxes. Suddenly, I heard an insane laughter at my right. There was an empty flower pot hanging from the brick wall. Inside it, a rat the size of a small dog was sitting comfortably. On top of its head, an empty bean can was being wear as a crown. On his right hand, it was holding a teaspoon like a sceptre. One of his big front teeth was covered in metallic foil. At sight of the big rodent, I jumped back in disgust. He laughed again.
"I am Gerald the King," said Gerald the King. "I am owner and master of Brydges Place".
"Oh," I said, confused, "I am most sorry. I will be leaving immediately, Your Majesty".
"You shall not do such thing," he replied.
I looked around and I found myself surrounded. All kind of rats and mice were around me, holding  forks, knives and napkins. I tried to run, but I tripped on a watermelon rind and fell on the wet pavement. Suddenly, they were all over me. Following the Lilliputians' way, they tied me down with rubber bands and rotting pieces of string. I looked up to see Gerald standing on my chest.
"Like I said, I really like visitors, especially with large smelly feet like yours," he repeated. He started to walk around me, goading my face and body with his teaspoon. "Of course we would love to eat cheese for once in a while, but since not so many pieces of parmesan come walking down the alley, we usually have to settle with little kid’s feet".
"Are you saying you mean to eat my feet?!" I shouted. I was about to pass out. The rodents were getting closer and closer to my rain boots. Drops of sweat were coming down my forehead heavier than the angry rain the clouds had thrown at me some minutes ago... “That’s it!” I thought.
"Cheese!" I screamed."CHEESE!".
The rats and mice stopped, confused. Gerald addressed me:
”Cheese, you say?"
"Yes!" I replied. "I can get you lots and lots of cheese in less than a minute!".
The rodents seemed interested. They all looked at their king, expectant. "And where is that cheese right now?" he asked. "It’s up there. You have to trust me. If you let me go, I promise you I’ll get you a ton of cheese this instant".
Gerald looked doubtful. Of course he was unsure to trust me, but his subjects seemed more aroused by the idea of having real cheese than by having to eat my skinny dirty wet writer’s feet. Slightly moving his head, he gave the order, and in less that three seconds I was free. I got up and quickly moved towards the wall, where I started climbing boxes to reach a ladder that was hanging two meters from the ground.
"Where do you think you are going?" asked Gerald in a suspicious tone. "Trust me," I said, "I’ll get you your cheese".
When I reached the fire escape, I started going up as fast as I could. Rats were following every move I made, and from a short distance. When I reached the highest level, I looked up and shouted at the skies.
"Hey, you! I’m here! Is that sweet dizzle the best you have? Come and show me a real storm you pathetic balls of vapour!". As soon as the clouds could see me, they rushed over me. Five seconds later, a real tempest of cheese cubes and marbles was falling right into Brydges Place alley.
The rodents were happier than ever, except for one or two who swallowed a few marbles in the rush of their voracity. As my promise had been met, I decided it was time to go as far as I could and never again come back, so I went up the roof and ran away.
While I was jumping from roof to roof, I looked back one more time just to see Brydges Place almost completely filled. Surfing the long pool of cheese and glass on a bin lid, I could see Gerald the Rat King one more time, stuffing his cheeks and his can-crown with cheese cubes, while using his teaspoon as a bow.

Powerless ultramagnetic pie


The secret pop art lovers



No me baño hace una semana. Bañarse es para los débiles. Si tuviera una poronga sabría re mal en este momento.
El gato estornudó. Creo que lo hace para molestarme, siempre cuando no estoy mirando. Me molesta porque se oye sospechosamente humano -"achús"- y, cuando miro, sigue siendo un gato. No me deja ver la cara que pone; quiero saber si se le transforma para estornudar.
Una política local sube una imagen a Facebook que dice "mujer, platense y peronsita": promoción de granfalloons, tres por uno.
Me gusta leer penurias ajenas. No, no me hace sentir mejor con mi vida, sino que me tiene bastante preparada.


Varieté (Gaviota Punk)



Después de tantos días caminando en el desierto, empiezo a preguntarme qué pasó con la gente que venía caminando al lado mío. A Gabriel se lo intentó comer un cocodrilo; de eso me acuerdo. Pero, ¿no salió volando? ¿Qué pasó con sus alpargatas? Me las había prometido cuando lo ayudé a activar el home banking. No se puede confiar en nadie.

No importa, ya voy a llegar a la falta de expectativas. Sólo tengo que olvidarme de pensar el tiempo suficiente. Por ahí si me concentro en los sonidos va a ser más fácil. ¡Ahí va una gaviota! Dependiendo de la postura de las estrellas, las cosas salen más o menos delicadas. Delicado es cortar pasto húmedo con los dedos de los pies, mientras pensás en lo poco aprovechado que está ese dulce patio inclinado, y una procesión de hormigas negra transporta cincuenta veces su peso en forma de trozos de hoja de ginkgo.

Pero basta. No es hora de ponerse cursi. No compartas tus emociones, compartí sánguches de milanesa, que hacen feliz a todo el mundo.

Había una vez una persona tan pero tan particular, que llamaba la atención de todo el mundo. ¿Qué era tan particular en esa persona? Nada en particular, simplemente sus múltiples particularidades. Tenía una forma particular de hablar, una forma particular de caminar, una forma particular de jugar al ajedrez. Todo en su vida, desde su particular nacimiento (en medio de un campo de batalla entre humanos y marcianos) hasta su particular muerte (decapitado por un hacha en el día de su coronación como presidente de la galaxia), estuvo signado por una extremada rareza y sobrenaturalidades inexplicables.
Sin embargo, su postura sobre el peronismo era bastante cliché.

Sólo estoy precalentando, no te angusties.
Ya va a venir, todo cargado el caudal de ideas.
Fluyendo entre grafismos virtuales,
por las eternas redes.