Busted Flat in Baton Rouge
Thursday, Dec. 02, 2004, 9:09 a.m.

Greetings from the afterlife! I guess, by now, that you've figured out what happened to me. How I actually burst into a gabillion tiny stuffing-flecked pieces and then went blissfully into the Great Beyond? Yeah, it's been swell, but frightfully less liquor in the afterlife than I had anticipated. So, like the Phoenix, I will rise from my sausage-ashes and be reborn anew: plus 4 pounds--if that's ok? I hope so, because that's what I'm packing these days. Love me tender, if you will.

In all seriousness, I am attributing this recent bout of overconsumption with the consequence of injury. That is to say, my back has "gone out" because my fragile frame has issued me an ultimatum about The Eating. Something along the lines of Bitch, how much more do you expect me to lug around? Hey! Put down the fucking fork, I'm talking to you! No, I'm serious, Tubby, you better not.... but I always miss that last part because the sound of my own spirited chewing drowns it out. Ah well.

So, I have been MIA these last few days because I've been flat on my back. And not in the good way. In the bedridden-hi-I'm-dying way. Mothertruckerwheeeee. I wish I could offer a proper excuse, like, While carrying around my niece.... or After my fourteenth rep... or even better, During the monster truck pull... but the sad truth is: Amidst hauling my pants over mine own fat Thanksgiving ass.... Yeah, that's as simple as it was but whatever it was, my back said No Comprendo and kept me in bed for the last three days. But then, yesterday, (thinking only of you, really--how we all must suffer for our Art) I dragged my sorry busted self to the doctor where I had the good fortune of a shot of anti-inflammatory in the hinney and a prescription of Demerol in hand. And let me tell you, Happy Days are here again. Maybe they aren't actually, but I'm too drugged to know the difference. Yippee! No, for truth, the shot was what really helped, though not totally better, but I was wildly disappointed in the Demerol. I had to go to 97 pharmacies to find it, and I took one last night for fun's sake, but because the Lord hates me, I got nuthin. I mean, I have BOTTLES (please note: plural) of Vicodin and other painkillers and for some allahforsaken reason, they just don't work on me. I don't even mean that in the get-loopy way, as you might rightly presume, but I don't even get an inkling of pain relief from them. My body is all Return to Sender, Address Unknown so all I get from these painkillers is an upset stomach and a hangover. So it was with Demerol, too. That's why I don't even bother with the painkillers anymore. Give me medicinal marijuana or give me death!

Ok, I've com/ex-plained enough. All of this has really been my way of forcing you to have sympathy for me before I make my first confession. Because it hasn't only been physically that I have been busted flat, it's been morally, spritually, and emotionally, too. See, I've sunk to a new low.

Dear World:

I have been watching The Real Gilligan's Island. I am heartly sorry for having offended thee.

Abashedly,
Michele

cc: God
Allah
Jehovah
Satan
Jesus
Mary
Joseph
All the Saints
Poland

I know. I KNOW. I'm an abomination. My television viewing of the Reality Shows has NOT, in fact, dissipated, like most healthy adults in these United States. It's grown, to more and more absurd programming, and like a crack whore, I just can't help myself. But when there is such ridiculese in America, how can I be expected to avoid it? I welcome it, with open arms. It's my own personal Temptation Island, and more often than not, I succumb to this wickit temptation. I'm weak! Have pity on my immortal soul. The only thing that might get me out of the fires of Hades and into purgatory is that I also watch Lost which is, of course, The. Best. Show. On. Telly. If you're not watching it, I sincerely feel sorry for you. But yeah, The Real Gilligan's Island? I'm here, I'm queer, get used to it.

Second confession: I bought Star magazine this week. I had to! You would have, too, if you had seen it. The link there isn't so great but this Stars Without Makeup cover? T'was brilliant. It had Courtney Cox looking very plain-Janesy, and Pam Anderson looking 101% white trash, and Whitney Houston looking all "Crack is Back!", but sweet fancy Moses, Goldie Hawn? I haven't seen someone looking that busted since Anna Nicole Smith pre-Trim Spa or that time I saw Jesse Jackson at the airport looking like he had just done five cities and seven ladies in four days. Homegad, Goldie, that's no way to reinvent Laugh In. Banged-Out Sister, get thee to a plastic surgeon, stat. Have you heard of this show called The Swan, Goldie? You're a shoe-in. I mean it. It hurts so bad. So you people must understand why I had to buy the filth, yes? C'mon, humor me in my shame. No? WHAT-EVA, IdowhatIwant. Cuz, haven't you heard, Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose?