A New and Improved Blog Experience Brought to you by the one and only Jason Rimbaud

 

The other day or maybe it was the other week, life has a habit of going by faster than the speed of light and sometimes I feel like I’m being left behind, I was at work and all I could think about was grubbing on some 4 Alarm Hot Wings from my favorite place in the world, SmokeEaters, in downtown San Jose.

 

For those of you that watch the Food Network Channel, and more importantly, Man Vs Food Nation, you might have watched the episode where SmokeEaters was featured due to their “world” famous Hot Wing Challenge. If you did watch that episode, then you’ll also know that Man defeated Food in a big way. But that really has nothing to do with this new and improved Blog experience I’m bringing you on this day so I’ll continue on my fairy way.

 

Well, I will say, briefly, that if you live in the San Francisco Bay Area and enjoy a good hot wing experience then I urge you to go to San Jose’s SmokeEaters and try them out. Tell them Jason sent you. Though to be truthful, that won’t really do you any good as I have absolutely no pull whatsoever there but maybe if enough people go there saying my name I’ll get a discount. Or better yet, maybe because I’m doing all this “free” advertising they’ll give me free wings for life or something like that.

 

Two years ago when I first started my new job in San Francisco, the very first person I hired was a twenty-three year old kid fresh out of culinary school. He was from a wealthy family and much to their chagrin; he was dead set on becoming a Chef with a dream of one day having his own restaurant. He was fresh from school and had zero experience but I saw something in him I liked so I took a chance.

 

Now before you say that I hired him based solely on his nerd star looks…I want to set the record straight right now and say that I hired him half on his looks and half on my gut feeling. And over the last two years, my gut proved me right once again and he’s turning into a talented line cook and a future that looks mighty promising.

 

I’ll forgo the fact that a few months ago he quit to take a better job with a greater chance at advancement but that’s how life in the service industry goes, you stay only long enough to learn everything you can before moving on to bigger and better things.

 

Six months into his tenure, he started dating one of my hostesses. I know it’s never a good idea to date someone where you work but I couldn’t tell him or her that and I knew they’d have to figure that out on their own. So I set back and waited for the inevitable clusterfuck that was sure to ensue.

 

For more than a while things between the two of them were proceeding at somewhat of a boring pace and if I were to be truthful, they lasted way longer than I ever thought they would. But once he left our restaurant to pursue his new opportunity with one of his old teachers from culinary school, things started heading south quickly. And much to my dismay, she feels like I’m the one person at work she can trust enough to tell her relationship woes too. I know more about their relationship then I’d care to and some of it is quite disturbing in a dysfunctional kind of way.

 

Oh really, what’s so disturbing about it, you might ask.

 

For an instance, they had a three-some with one of the other line cooks after a hard nights drinking. Apparently one of her turn-ons is to watch two dudes getting it on. Though on the other side of that coin, one of her turn-off’s is coming home from work early and catching her boyfriend and this same line cook in bed without her. I guess it’s only sexy if she’s there to watch and I guess participate in some way. Though I must admit I’d be pretty pissed if I came home and saw my boyfriend on his back with his legs in the air screaming out, ‘fuck me, fuck me harder you son of a bitch’. But then I might join in, it all depends on my frame of mind on that day.

 

So I’m busy at work, busy running around in my new shoes that aren’t quite broken in as of yet and starvin like a marvin. For ten hours straight all I can think or focus on is leaving my restaurant and rushing down to SmokeEaters in San Jose to purchase my favorite flavor 4 Alarm Hot Wings.

 

Of course I pretend to pay attention to the eight hundred guests I saw that day. You bet your ass I pretend to care about my employee’s and their numerous personal problems that always seem to crop throughout any given day at our very busy eating establishment in downtown San Francisco. But it’s all a show, my mind is firmly fixated on that burning sensation that is the only thing that can calm the ache that I harbor deep down my insides.

 

If the above paragraph seems like a cry for help for a very unhealthy addiction…it’s not. I am fully aware that 4 Alarm Hot Wings from SmokeEaters isn’t necessarily the healthiest of choices when it comes to nutrition but none of that matters. I fully realize that I have this addiction and I actually control it through moderation.

 

This practice of moderation is why I am so fixated on 4 Alarm Hot Wings from SmokeEaters on this particular day. At the time of this writing, it had been over two weeks since I had last indulged my addiction and I was starting to get the itch. I’m not quite to the point where I’ll blow some random stranger to get the time to head towards San Jose but I am at the place where I’ll give a Handy J to some random stranger to get the time to go to San Jose.

 

Don’t judge me until you ate a million 4 Alarm Hot Wings in my shoes!

 

I have been working more than a few hours over the last few weeks, though to be truthful; it’s been over a month since I started writing this Blog Entry. And even now I’m sitting at a bar in the beautiful Luxor Casino in Vegas drinking Absinthe and wondering why I’m sitting alone typing on my laptop.

 

It’s 11:00 pm on Thanksgiving Eve and I’m feeling particularly lonely. Maybe it’s because I found one of my ex-friends on FaceBook earlier today and I realized I missed him. Or maybe it’s because I’ve been connecting less and less with real people and withdrawing behind the walls I’ve created over the years. But enough of my pity party, let’s resume the Blog.

 

Let’s go back a few weeks. A day that I had decided the time was right to drive the forty minutes to San Jose for several reasons.

 

Reason One: we had no late reservations so I figured that I’d leave San Francisco around 10:30PM giving me over an hour and half before SmokeEaters closed. And that was more than enough time to get there and back to my apartment at a decant time before going to bed.

 

Reason Two: we have a new Chef and he swears by all that is holy that if I get him some of the 4 Alarm sauce he’ll be able to reproduce it so I can it so I can make it myself alleviating the need to drive to San Jose twice a month.

 

And Reason Three (and probably the most important): I’m a full blown junkie and I needed my fix.

 

And this is where things get fucked…because I only wanted my 4 Alarm Hot Wings but from the very beginning anything that could go wrong started to go wrong. A couple who were on a first blind date just would not take the hint that we were closed and I had to practically pick them up by the scruff of their necks and throw them out into the street much like you would a cat. And my bartender, beautiful but not very bright, somehow entered the wrong amount for one of his transactions that took me almost an hour to find and correct. Small unrelated instances but I didn’t get to leave the restaurant until 11:25PM.

 

By this time I’m frustrated at all straight people and yes, I was judging the whole based on a few, pissed off at my bartender for not taking the time to enter the numbers correctly and seriously thinking that I’d blow Satan himself if there was a way to go back in time so I could go to SmokeEaters in San Jose.

 

I arrive at my car at 11:30PM and start the engine. I am at war with myself as I stare into the mirror. Should I point my car south and drive like a bat out of hell or should I admit defeat and make plans to go to SmokeEaters in San Jose another time?

 

I know the next day’s reservations are such that leaving before midnight is a pipe dream that only a Republican could believe. So the question is; should I wait three more days to head out at a leisurely pace on my next day off and really take the time to enjoy my 4 Alarm Hot Wings from SmokeEaters?

 

I pointed my car south and floored the fucking thing.

 

Over the course of my life, I’ve had numerous liaisons with guys that their first names start with the letter J. I don’t know if there is significance or just un-luck. But remember that guy I hired right out of Culinary School, his name was James. And since his girlfriend, my hostess, caught him getting fucked in the ass he is now newly single. And a few weeks ago (as of right now it’s been six weeks) I met him out for a few drinks after work.

 

It started out harmless enough, he was bitching about losing his girl and yet excited about the new possibilities of exploring his newfound “bisexualism”. Apparently, with the exception of some mutual wanking in his youth, that was his first time with a guy. And newsflash, he loved it.

 

Normally I’m a very defensive driver; I give others the right of way, I use my blinkers, I never tailgate and I always drive the speed limit. So I figured I was due for some more aggressive style of driving than usual. And since I always respect the law of the road, what are the odds of me getting caught driving like some kind of lunatic on a werewolf bender?

 

Anybody care to give me the odds on this thinking? Anyone, anyone, Bueller, Bueller?

 

So a few other days ago, I’m at my local gas station and I see this large red machine with Coke plastered all over the side of it in the place where the usual fountain soda machine normally sits. I walked over and peered at the screen.

 

You read right, I said peered at the screen.

 

In the top portion of this Coke machine was a touch screen menu that gave you the options of what type of drink you’d like to purchase in a cup, Coke, Diet Coke, Cherry Coke, etc etc. It was the coolest fucking thing I’ve ever seen.

 

Well, it was until I watched this twink getting fisted at a sex club in Vegas last night but that’s another story for another Blog.

 

I actually bought a Dr Pepper just so I could play around with this amazing machine.

 

But then it got me thinking, we can’t fix the budget, our homeless rate is growing faster than a Republican’s debt, our banking system is on the verge of collapse but hey everyone, we have a touch screen soda machine. I’m glad to see that we have our fucking priorities well in hand. I mean, really, do we have to have a touch screen soda machine?

 

There is a restaurant in San Francisco that has an I-Pad on every table. The I-Pad is the menu and you scroll through the food, wine, and cocktail options. When you find what you want, you order it and then someone brings it to your table.

 

What’s fucking next? We already have less and less human contact via the internet, now we don’t even have to talk to servers. In ten years, are we even going to remember how to communicate face to face anymore?

 

And while I’m on the subject, doesn’t anyone use a fucking phone anymore? Think about it, when’s the last time you actually made a call on your smart device. We use texting (sexting) emails and FaceBook, Twitter, and all the other social media so we don’t have to actually speak to anyone.

 

Have you ever felt that the world is just out to get you? That’s how I felt that lonely night driving ninety miles an hour down 101 Southbound. I think every stupid driver was on the freeway that night. From the grandma’s doing forty miles an hour in the fast lane, to drivers hitting their breaks and slowing down to a crawl to gaze at the accident on the other side of the freeway, to road construction that didn’t seem to be constructing anything other than traffic problems and didn’t seem to have a purpose except to narrow down four lanes into one. The traffic was so bad I actually contemplated believing in a god just so I could lament that he/she hates me.

 

Even with these crazy road conditions, I was actually making really good time. I’ll admit that I had to drive on the shoulder for a few miles but that’s not really illegal…right?

 

At one point in my hyper-motivated journey, I zoomed down an off ramp only to shoot through the intersection and back onto the entrance ramp to get around a large moving van and three buses who thought it was a good idea to drive so slow I could have sworn in open court that they were moving backwards.

 

At 11:40PM I call SmokeEaters and place my food order. I promised that I would be there in twenty minutes and to please not close until I get arrive. The young girl said she’d do her best but they lock the doors promptly at midnight.

 

My poor little car is purring/growling as I push it to speeds that it was never built to achieve. I’m nearing a hundred miles an hour and it’s starting to shake but I don’t care. Nothing is going to keep me from getting my 4 Alarm Hot Wings from SmokeEaters in San Jose. Nothing.

 

Three days ago, I started a fourteen day in a row stretch. I get to the restaurant at 7AM (to get there that early I have to get up at 5AM) and I’ve been leaving the restaurant around 10:30PM while arriving home after midnight. I’m tired, my shoes are now broken in but I’m getting a little bit grumpy.

 

The good news, we hired a new manager that starts on Monday (but by the time you actually read this Blog Entry it could be tomorrow or it could have been two weeks ago) and I couldn’t be happier. I think he’s going to be a great addition to our team but since he’s brand new, he can’t be left on his own which is way I have to work forever in a row.

 

Now the reason I have to work these crazy hours is our General Manager has taken a much needed vacation for two weeks. And I don’t begrudge him the time off but I am however grumpy as a withdrawing Meth addict that I have to work a hundred hours a day so he can get his freak on with all those Spanish hotties.

 

A few weeks ago, I’m pretty sure someone used one of my own poems to tell me to go fuck myself. And if they did, I think that’s pretty fucking cool.

 

So you all remember “A”, my friend with benefits that wanted to take it to the next level. Notice I didn’t type that sentence as a question because I know that everyone is fascinated with my life and they hang on my every word.

 

Apparently the new and improved Jason is an egomaniac and should be punished for his arrogance. Any takers?

 

Anyway, “A” grew tired of my lack of commitment and my neurotic behavior or maybe it was my lack of making time for him and after the both of us were silent for a couple of days, he sends me a text message something to the affect, ‘your poem un-remembered is my favorite one you wrote’. Then he never texted me again.

 

If my supposes are correct, he told me he would be better off when I become un-remembered. Can you believe that? He used my own words against me. A part of me wants to contact him again just to see if I’m right in my assumptions.

 

Oh well, it was fun while it lasted.

 

Update: “A” and I are fucking again.

 

I have enough shit going on in my life at the moment that doesn’t include my heavy work load or friends with benefits being mad at me due to my stupidity.

 

What do you mean? Are you speaking of trying to get to San Jose? Or are you referring to your ex-employee that just found out the pleasures of being a big ole Mo?

 

James and I are at the bar, doing shots and truly having a blast. I’ve gotten him to stop talking about his ex-girlfriend, not for any reason except that I had to hear about their breakup from her and I didn’t want to hear about it again from him. Plus the more I drank the hornier I was getting.

 

James and his Ex had a common problem, they still lived together even though they broke up because neither one could afford to move out alone. I’m not sure if I could do that but they are pretty young and broke as a joke.

 

Throughout the course of the night, James had made the statement it was hard to hook up with anyone because he didn’t have a place to go. And apparently, he was randy as a goat and looking to open up his experiences with guys.

 

The bar closes, we’re drunk, and James starts complaining that he doesn’t want to go home to face her at this moment. So being the nice guy I am, I offer him my couch. And believe it or not, I typed that sentence without cracking a smile once.

 

My car is whining and groaning but I’m not letting up as I fly off the San Jose Airport exit. My car’s up on two wheels as I careen down the exit ramp passing other vehicles as if they’re standing still. I’ve got Breaking Benjamin blasting in my ear buds and I’m chain smoking cigarettes like they are my lifeline to normalcy and I’m speeding like Charlie Sheen on a two week bender.

 

Off in the distance I can see the St James exit looming ahead like a beacon in the wilderness. I glance at the dashboard clock and see I have about eight minutes to make it to SmokeEaters. I grin wildly and step on the accelerator trying to coax every last ounce of speed from my poor little four cylinder car. I’m so close I can taste the sweet taste of victory. Straight people who wouldn’t leave and stupid beautiful bartenders, zero, and Jason the crazy obsessive addict, one.

 

And then I see it, or rather I see a blur…parked on the side of the road like some vengeful angel out of a Clint Eastwood movie. My dreaded nemesis, a CHP officer better known as a California Highway Patrol fuck face.

 

I blow past him at 91 miles an hour in a 65 mile an hour zone. And for a moment I imagine that I’m driving so fast that he can’t see me. Or maybe he was looking down when I screeched by him driving like a man possessed. Or even better, maybe he was one of those lazy CHP officers and he was sleeping off a donut induced high.

 

I mean, really, my exit is just right there, I think maybe if I can get off the exit before he starts chasing me I can lose him in the streets of downtown San Jose.

 

Then I see the lights on top of his car light up and I imagine I can hear the powerful roar of his engine as he lurches forward after me. I know I’m busted. I’m such an addict there is no way that I’d risk going to jail for trying to evade a police officer…or maybe I’m such an addict that I won’t risk going to jail and not being able to have my 4 Alarm Hot Wings ever again.

 

Even as I start slowing down, I refuse to admit defeat when I am this close to achieving my goal. I am forming a plan in my stupid head as I pull off the road and stare longingly at my exit which is only fifty yards away.

 

Surely there is something I can say or do, to or for; this CHP officer that will get me out of what I am sure is a hefty fine and maybe even a loss of my driving privileges.

 

I can hear some of you right now saying, ‘you’ll get what you deserve, driving like some insane person on the shoulder of the road, darting on and off exit ramps just to pass cars, speeding past police officers’.

 

Don’t you worry, I hear you loud and clear, you think I deserve a ticket.

 

Well, fuck you, I don’t. I’m a good person on the inside. It’s the fucking 4 Alarm Hot Wings I tell you.

 

The CHP fuck face pulls up behind my stopped car and I’m frantically trying to come with something, anything to tell this guy when he asks why I was driving so recklessly.

 

‘Really officer, I didn’t know how fast I was going’, ‘I’m sorry I was speeding but I have to go to the bathroom so bad I’m afraid I’ll soil myself any moment,’ ‘I heading for the hospital, my uncle was in a bad accident and he wants to see me one last time before he passes,’ ‘I’ll do anything if you let me go…and I mean anything’.

 

These are just a few of the better scenarios that flashed in y feeble head as fuck face slowly approaches the passenger side of my car (who by the way is quite happy that I finally stopped pushing it so hard I imagine I can hear my car breathing heavily).

 

“Good evening sir, where are you headed tonight in such a hurry?”

 

If I ever needed to be quick on my feet, now was that time. I look over at him, squinting because he’s shining a flashlight (that’s not fleshlight you pervs) on what could only be a dumbfounded look on my face. I open my mouth and this is what fell out…

 

“I know I was speeding and believe me I’m really really sorry. I’ve never even had so much as a single speeding ticket in all my years driving but my wife is pregnant and she had this stupid late night craving for hot wings from SmokeEaters. I tried to tell her that they close at midnight and there was no way I could drive from San Francisco in thirty minutes.”

 

Now as I’m blurting this out in short strangled gasping breaths, I am getting my registration and insurance card from my glove box to give to the fuck face. But I’m not done; I continue spewing forth this shit…

 

“But then she started saying that I didn’t love her because I wouldn’t drive to San Jose and how bad of a husband I am because it was really all my fault that she is now fat and that her ankles have swollen up to the size of grapefruits and no one is going to find her attractive again. And that if I really loved her I would do whatever it took to get her hot wings from SmokeEaters. After all it was my sperms fault that she’s pregnant, right? Like I’m the one that forgot to take her birth control pills? Does this look like it’s my idea?”

 

“Um…”

 

“I know I was speeding but I only have four minutes to make it to SmokeEaters before they close and I’m afraid if I go home without these hot wings my wife is going to hate me for the rest of my life. Is there any way possible that you could follow me to SmokeEaters so I can get her hot wings? Afterwards you can take me to jail or give me a ticket? And believe me, right now I’m not sure which one of those options is more attractive at this moment but anything you could do would be amazing and I’m so sorry but she’s driving me fucking crazy.”

 

I finally take a breath and stare at fuck face with what I hope is a broken face.

 

No we all know the internet is no place for truth but I swear this CHP officer stare at me for a good minute before he asks this question, ‘how much of what you just told me is true?’

 

I grin, “not very much.”

 

James and I ended up back at my apartment watching American Dad on Adult Swim. And me being the good host, I offered him a beverage. We settled on cognac and cigars on the patio. I was regaling him with some of my funnier stories from my past exploits and he was filling me in on growing up with a silver spoon in his mouth. Who would’ve known he was so much more than a pretty face. Don’t get me wrong, his face is more than pretty enough but he was easy to talk too.

 

I’m not sure when we decided to call it a night but I do know sometime before the sun came up we were standing in my living room staring at my couch. Apparently my leather couch would give him a rash if he slept on it, and there was no way in hell I was going to sleep on my couch when I have a comfy bed to sleep on/in. So I made him a deal…

 

“You can sleep in my bed but you have to shower first, you stink like last year’s garbage and tonight’s kitchen grease.”

 

Seriously, I didn’t have an ulterior motive for getting him all wet and naked in my room. There really was no freaking way in hell he was sleeping in my bed before scrubbing away the kitchen smell and ball sweat from his working ten hours in a hot kitchen.

 

So we took turns showering and after we were fresh faced scrubbed I turned off the lights and crawled into bed next to him. I’m not sure why he asked for a pair of shorts to sleep in, the lights weren’t turned off for more than a minute before those shorts flew across the room and we got all sweaty again.

 

But after hearing about the time she caught him in bed with another guy so many times, I thought it was pretty ironic that it wasn’t long before his legs were resting on my shoulders and he was screaming out, ‘fuck me, fuck me harder you son of a bitch’.