The ZID Chapters, Part II

[Palinka (RIP)]

...Taken from my own ceiling...

I think that you may have grounds for a rent rebate.

[booznik]

for some reason there is a bumper spider season in the UK. They should be the biggest ever. I found a couple in the car, saw a giant one scurry across the tv. Some stupid fucker even set fire to his house trying to burn one with a deodorant can

[oettinger]

Hey they eat the roaches atleast

[The Urbane Spaceman]

To be fair, we all have a bugbear that hails to us in our nightmares, from the dark quadrants of our mentalscape. Perhaps it was from there that this one time, via telephony, Joey had nailed it when he freaked Sean out.

“Boris the spider.”


Much like an elephant to a mouse or any other small, hopping rodent that scurries underfoot, it was the consideration of a spider that led to Sean’s temporary state of “losing his shit.”


Well, also, it should be factored in that ZID chamfered the hole that allowed spiders to enter his brain.


And yet, we damned punks arrived there simply because Sean had:


1. Stolen from us
2. Intaken an unknown substance he’d pilfered form us
3. Phoned us to help him, after he’d done the two items above.


Yup. He got his just deserts. Bastard.


Joey stepped between them two burly, angry men and looked up from one red, sweaty face to the other. He said, “Enough! Stop busting up shit here! Jerry, you go out to Urb. Go into the kitchen.”


Jerry nodded and did as he was told. No one fucked with the little Lion Man. I took my hint and we went to the kitchen. I looked around for some snacks and didn’t see much of anything at all. Sean always ate everything in sight because he was always shmoking.


I knew Sean. He hid snacks from himself. But I knew where to find them. He was a creature of many habits. Now, I was not as tall as Sean nor Fat Jerry, so that was why I winked at Jerry and pointed to the top of the cupboards by the stove.


Jerry went over and reached up with one hand and grabbed about, then he brought down a bag of Doritos. He smirked and ripped it open on the counter and dumped the whole bag out. He was a pig like that. He was a flibbertigibbet of the demon sort. He would eat.
The smoky drive over had made us both a wee bit peckish, and also a mighty bit parched. Yes, there were some frosty cold bevvies in the fridge. What, pray tell (might you ask) was Sean’s choice of frosty cold beverage?



Yeah, it was weak. Bottyls and Jaymes wine coolers.


Yup. Piss poor wine mixed with piss poor soda pop.



Of course, we chugged that shit. A true Drunkard never refuses free ethyl.



I managed to grab a couple of handfuls of them ground-corn chips in between Fat Jerry pounding his face down on the counter and grabbing a mouthful like a crazy hog mawing Jimson weed. I almost lost a couple fingers at one point, ayuh.



We got done with our rural repast just when Joey led Sean into the kitchen. All of the lights were on, and Joey set about flicking all the lights off except for the one near the stove.


He said, “You bastards, why you faces all orange?”


Jerry chugged the last of his ice cold piss and burped. He said, “I’m looking to clown tonight!”


Well, that was funny and all, but Joey jabbed forward and smacked Jerry like a bitch baby. He said, “No clowning now! We gonna help a brutha out.”


Jerry, well, his face got red on the side where he got bitch slapped, but he only clenched his fat fists into large ingots. His teeth clenched so tight that the orange dust in between them turned into diamonds.


Sean nodded. He said, “Really sorry about stealing. I won’t do it again. Promise.”

Of course, those words would turn out to be yet another pair of a lie and a broken promise.


It was our parlance, our manner of speaking.


“I won’t fuck you ever again until the next time I do.”


But that was our language, and we understood.


Joey pulled out his fatty, which here is not in reference to a penis.



He sparked it up.


Then he slid out his long bottle of wadika.


We would always lie to and steal from each other, but the most important thing was that we understood that. The one thing, the most important thing, was that we would always forgive each other.



For what that was worth, it was the most important thing we each held close. We would never cheat each other.


We shmoked and we drank.


Then we went to church.



.

[mistah willies]

wait, so where the hell is Boris?

i feel cheated

[booznik]

I knew Sean. He hid snacks from himself. But I knew where to find them.

Strange, there's this guy who hides booze from... well, others. And sometimes moose-meat freezers are involved.

Weird, innit.

Never mind that.

URBIE!

[mistah willies]

I knew Sean. He hid snacks from himself. But I knew where to find them.

Strange, there's this guy who hides booze from... well, others. And sometimes moose-meat freezers are involved.

Weird, innit.

Never mind that.

URBIE!

Totally.

That guy should do a spider shot.

[The Urbane Spaceman]

You can see by now that the little lion man was a bit of a diplomat, in his own way. This was why not one of us fucked with him. He could navigate quite well. That was the good part of him.

If you got on his bad side, then you would become quite fucked.

This is what he said:

“You guys need to shut the fuck up and sit your asses down. NOW!”


Yeah, I know, any one of us damned punkers could have taken him down at any moment with our height, weight, fuckedness, and our fists. But there was a simple reason that we did not do such a thing.


It was this: Joey held our bond true.




There were no disdainful looks, nor were there any slow trudging to the table, not even a sideways glance. We understood that we were going to be schooled. And we accepted this new course.



SCHOOL



Joey held court at one end of the table, and he looked me in the eye and then looked to the seat down at the other end. Them two giant dudes took their places across from each other, within handshake distance. You can see what Joey had in mind.


To make his point, he slid out his long bottle of Icelandia wadika and slammed it down on the table. No, there wasn’t a table cloth nor a centerpiece that toppled over, spilling fresh flowers and such. Hey it was in the 80’s, and this was excellent wadika then.
Don’t know much about it now.

There was a dirty ashtray for our focus, or was it, “fuck us” for a welcome?

Joey said, “Pull out your cigs. We gonna have a palaver.”

I looked over at Sean and saw that he was absolutely beaming. He was smiled with intense interest. I guessed that he had been told something by Joey back there in the broken bedroom, that was probably correct.


We four damned bastards sparked up our tobacco as prescribed.


Joey cracked the seal on that tall bottle, and he nodded across the length of the shitty table at me. Its surface was nicked with dents of a game called “Quarters” but that was form a long while ago. We did not need a reason to drink, nor any help to do such a thing.


He said, “No shot glasses here. We ain’t fancy like that. By the way, Sean, you still got any shot glasses left?”
Sean shook his head. He said, “I shat out one of those things a long while ago; took me a week. Fuck them shot glasses.”


Joey wiped the top of the bottle with the sleeve of his leather before he necked it. He was health conscious like that.

Two large fucking glugs bubbled up, and then he passed it to his left.


Indeed.


Always go clockwise. It’s bad luck to run against the grain of the spin of the planet.


It was Sean who sat to his left. Sean was not his right hand man. Sean was frightened of spiders. But Joey was conducive like that. Looking back, armchair warrior-view, this was his plan, and he must have told it to Sean, in order to coax him out of the busted-up bedroom. Joey knew what would happen to the bottle. That was why he did this thing, this palaver.

Sean eyed the bottle for spiders inside, and then he met each of our eyes, starting with Joey, and then around, clockwise, and then he stared into Fat Jerry’s eyes.

He sucked that bottle like a thirsty baby in a dumpster. He guzzled like a Russian. He sipped like an honest Injun would do. It went to the halfway mark.


Sean held the bottle out to me.

I looked at the bottle in my hand, back to Joey, and then to Sean on my right, and Fat Jerry on my left.


Oh hell yes.


I sipped a drip and coughed and the bottle fell on floor and dumped out.
















Just kidneying ya.





Of course, seeing how things were going, I took two large swallows of that wadika, like any proper participant would do. We were patching holes, glazing windows, repairing doorframes, and preparing for an evening at the Punk Church.


This was our chalice. This was the blood of our Lord. This was our penance, our retribution, our salvation, our Savior. We sat at the altar and we prayed like the drunkard bastards that we were.


I took that bottle back up and took the third guzzle. Three is Trinity, and that is a holy number.


I handed the bottle over to the man on my left, and he looked around the table. He looked back at Sean, sitting across from him, and he winked.

Sean laughed.


Fat Jerry nodded and then he finished that bottle.

Now, it must be said that such a thing is not well advised on any count. It can end up with alcohol poisoning and such, and there is no reason to do such a thing at ell, ever. You need to spend more time dancing on the edge of insanity lest you fall of the cliff, and down into the Mariana Trench.


We were toughened, wizened, even.


That being said, Joey nodded at me, and I pulled out the tiny metal envelopes. Joey looked over at Sean, and he got right the fuck up.


He went to his refrigerator and came back with bottyls of wine mixed with soda pop. It would dilute the contents of our stomachs. We would become very thirsty, and such dilution would keep us form losing our grip on the spinning Earth, our minds, and our enjoyment for the festivities that would follow.

Inside the two metal envelopes I opened were a total of ten hits of ZID.

Sean took one more, which left nine.

Nine to three large men.

Three apiece.

Joey, do ya ken, was our navigator.

He would not do us wrong.


Plague Vendor Black Sap





.

[The Urbane Spaceman]

Their handshake was the empty bottle. This was the bond, the glue for our own, sordid little party. It was our imbation of this bottle that cemented our resolve.


We would not steal from each other tonight.

We would not lie to each other.

We would have each other’s back.


“Leave No Drunkard Bastard Behind”


Perhaps that could have been our motto, our totem, our oath.
Sometimes, an oath is not spoken, but instead, drunk.


Now, a Navigator is essential to any new course, isn’t that correct?


One must be mindful of them shoals, those Sirens, the Kraken beast that courses beneath the even keel, and those frightful pirates when embarking upon the mighty seas for an adventure. A good Navigator will help each sailor remain true to the path ahead. If one mate gets a bit out of his head, well, that is when the Navigator steps in and brings one out of a bad trip.
Never leave home without one.


But what good is a Navigator without a Captain?


The Captain sets the destination, and makes the decisions along the way for safety of the crew. He is supposed to remain true to the vessel with an oath that he will go down with the ship.


In other words, he must make certain that all aboard are safe, and if he fails in this, then he has the most bitter of prices to pay.


We should have had a better captain.


But fuck hell. We did the best with what we had. We had each other, and we would go down with the ship, together.


You see, we were the fucking Pirates. We would invade that dastardly punk rock church. I had me armament inside me leather. Always mind your leather.


Wait, let’s not get ahead of the tale here.


zidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzidzid


Calls for a drink. All hands on deck.

*sip*


So, now there were a bunch of us feeling the instant gratification that a burning belly full of Ethyl will lend.


Quick, before we were overtaken by that curious intoxication, a question rose up.


Fat Jerry stood up and stretched his arms. He said, “SEAN! You gonna come with us?!”


Sean smiled big, for he was already under the influence of zid, and Joey had navigated him to the safety of the course, and now his belly burned in the correct manner.


He said, “I will follow you punk bastards wherever you guys lead!”


Fat Jerry said, “Then you need to get out of that beach comber garb and throw on some good clothes. Grab your leather!”


But Sean didn’t have any leather.


At all.


He was a jock, and when off the field, he wore Birkenstocks and long short pants and tank tops. He would make for a very fine target at a punk rock event.


He was the opposite of punk.



Huh.


Here’s a tune for Sean.




.

[oettinger]

If I count correctly this filthy alcoholic ziddo story is covering just a night and the day following into next night? Right?

[mistah willies]

If I count correctly this filthy alcoholic ziddo story is covering just a night and the day following into next night? Right?

I know, right?!


WTF


Let's see.

Day 1: Night. They were wasted from playing chess with gin shots, got picked up by ladies and then dropped off soon after.

Day 2: Morning. They woke up with the door still open with the key still in the lock, then they vomited, slept, then got a visit from a biker with that ZID thing later in that day.

Day 2: Afternoon into night. They took this ZID and they formulated a plan, a map.

Day 2: Night. They went on a walk for cigarettes. They broke the wrong door. One ended up in a pool, washing off his cock roaches.

Then they met Sean.

OK. I lost count.


I think it's taken a half year to write about three days?\\


I'm fcking drink





.

[The Urbane Spaceman]

Yes, it was Sean who now drove that fat Jerry's hearse. My friend, never let an angry large jock (first time high on ZID)

-ever drive an old, rusty behemoth with bad tires at top speed in the desert at night.


Unless it is someone like Sean was at the time.


He would test every limit, and he was quite could at dancing upon the edge of the cliff without falling into the abyss.

Are you could? Are you can? Or do you spend a lot of time with should, or might?

I think that you might and should have a sip with me now, as we explore what happened next.

Me? I got this odd tincture in me flask that i snuck aboard, and it is Evan Williams, Beefeater, and black rum. If that be a cocktail, then you have the best bartender in the world. your bar tender is your flask.


3.

2.

1.


Fucking chug, baby.





Mmmmm





*uuuurrrrp* ('scuse me)




Now, that angry young man,


waitaminnit. Who here did not imbibe?



yes, there was one of you. I can sense it.



OK, unless you do not find something, anythign at all to drink that has the taste of ethyl in it, we won't be going on any further.

Nope.


Stop being a little bitch.


be a big bitch, or a real Drunkard. Maybe even a Modern Drunkard?




here's a tune while we wait.



*ahem*



OK, you finally man up?


let's do this all over again, jeez.



3.


2.


1.



Fucking CHUG!





Ahhhhh.



Yessah. I knew you could do it.

[The Urbane Spaceman]

So, that Sean was quite angry. Can't imagine why, right? I mean, he would have to sleep on the couch now instead of his broken bed, and eat on his dresser instead of his kitchen table that hung from the wall with bent metal legs.

His tub was full of burnt body hair and melted shower curtain, and his answer to the security breach of his smashed bathroom window was to turn the light off and close the door. He tried to lock it, but Joey reminded him that it locked only from the inside.

Sean wanted to lock it and then go out through the window, but Joey reminded him that he was too big to fit through the window, and also, that was where the thief would enter and unlock the door.


I looked at Sean's fraught face, and then i whispered to Joey, (hissing, actually) "Let him have some mental rest! you making him scurry like a rat in a maze!"


Joey frowned. Then he looked up at Sean's big, moony face and said, "Dude. Just turn the light off and no one will see that the window is missing."


Sean's tight shoulders then slumped. he let out his breath. he was relaxed. He said, OK. Than you Joseph. Whew. I was gonna go and tape up the window with duct tape and the shower curtain."



Huh.


Hey, is that the sort of person you want to be speeding you off into the black desert night at 100 MPH to a Punk Church in the middle of nowhere?


Do ya ken, if you follow along here, you might not end up back at the same place that you once called home.


All of the dishes hanging on the walls will be turned inward. The clothes in the armoire will not fit anymore, and there will be strange fruit in the refrigerator. In fact, even the panes in the windows themselves will appear to have been placed in backwards, so that you can see only in, and not out.



You might not be able to get home again.


You know, perhaps it's best if we leave off here for a bit, and let you consider, in your proper frame of mind, before you lose all property of such a thing.


Yes, Let us now pause and then imbibe freely.


Chug! Sip! Sniff! Quaff! Queef! Snort! Pull! Neck! And, of course, DRINK!



See you tomorrow my Fellow and Lady Modern Drunkards.






.

[The Urbane Spaceman]

ARRR!

I been draaaanking all day, staggered off the vessel, jumbling me land legs onto the firmament.

Which means sky, if you enjoyed such an entt-m

entylmo

entymolog

ehtyl ology

Hey,

Here's a tune from ole Capt. Waits

now more rum, less of this typing thing

My apologies, me lasses and lads

Sincd it's taken taking me this long to write a friggin apeology

nothing in memoriam of Fat Jerry would do anyone any good at all.

see you in a few more hours

[oettinger]

How to keep up with all of these?
How about a podcast? Or some tape recording like in the original Evil Dead movies? Instead of the Necronomicon, the Drunkronomicon, when you read it aloud drunk priests of times past appear and party on your costs!