The reason I had to boob punch Kyle is because when I asked him for the 50,000th time what he wanted for his birthday besides a fucking Utilikilt he gave me the Man Grunt.

If you are currently the wife/girlfriend of a dude, you know exactly what I’m talking about, and it pisses you off just as much as it does me. If you’re not, I’ll explain.

The Man Grunt is a short, one syllable grunt that all men are capable of uttering when they are completely uninterested in what you’re saying, but know that you’re expecting a reaction out of them. Each man has his own unique grunt. Kyle’s sounds, as best I can write it, something like this:

“Ehugh.”

The Man Grunt is usually given as a response when whatever currently capturing his attention is monumentally more interesting to him than whatever it is I am saying. The eye will never leave their primary focus, and the mouth will not actually move from its given state. (Which explains the complete lack of consonant sounds in his grunt.) If asked to repeat what I just said he will usually be able to parrot back the last sentence spoken, but the exact meaning behind that collective of words will generally be lost on him.

What’s particularly fascinating about the Man Grunt is the myriad of definitions that it has. Each man can apply his own grunt to countless situations in an attempt to communicate their point without actually putting any effort into the message. Possible definitions for the Man Grunt include:

“I don’t know.”

“Absolutely, that sounds great,”

“I’m not really into that.”

“I am indifferent.”

“This subject makes me feel uncomfortable.”

“Go away, you’re annoying me.”

“More __insertfoodorbeveragehere__, please.”

“Wonderful dinner, honey, you’re an amazing cook.”

“You look fantastic.”

“That’s nice honey, I don’t care.”

“I love that outfit on you.”

“I’m trying to sleep and if  you turn on the light again I will cut you.”

“I acknowledge that you are right, but I’m going to do my own dumbass thing anyway.”

“Please, tell me more.”

“I don’t like your idea but I’m too lazy to come up with my own.”

“I’m not going to tell you that I don’t want to go out tonight so I’m going to make the process as difficult as possible.”

“That outfit makes you look like the love child between Susan Boyle and a manatee, but you’ve already changed clothes four times and I don’t want to go through that again, so it’s fine.”

“I’m handling it.”

The man relies on the intelligence of the woman and her familiarity with his particular grunt, paired with the situational context, to ensure that his message is being communicated properly. Of course, this can be problematic, as many women (especially this one) have trouble distinguishing the many definitions of the Man Grunt with its most common translation:

“I hear that you’re talking, but I can’t pull my focus away from whatever other dumbass thing I’m doing long enough to give you the attention that you deserve.”

This can cause the woman to feel disrespected and marginalized, often attempting to battle the man grunt with raised voice, fingers snapping in front of his face, hands on the hips, increased frequency of the phrases such as ‘r-tard’ and ‘dumbass’, verbal threats of consequences to be carried out or privileges withheld, and in extreme case, mild violence.

And that’s why I had to boob punch Kyle.

To say that I was in a precarious position was an understatement.

I was in the bathroom, trying desperately to pull my pants up from around my ankles. Made more difficult by the fact that these were my work pants, weighed down with tools and an impressive wad of keys. Made monumentally more difficult by the fact that I was doing all this on one leg while trying not to let anything touch or jar my left foot. All while I’m cursing and Kyle’s standing outside the door yelling, “Are you okay in there?” and a nurse is laughing hysterically.

This is, after all, what happens when one gets a bladder infection and a possibly-broken toe within a 36 hour period.

The bladder infection is bad enough. I’m prone to them, being equally bad about staying hydrated and relieving myself more than once every eight or nine hours. I’ve had some pretty bad ones in my day, and I’m quite familiar with the symptoms. About once a month or so I’ll start to feel the slightest symptoms creep in, so I’ll take a cranberry pill, take it as a warning sign to drink more water, and the symptoms will pass. But not this time. Despite my best preventative efforts, this one barged itself in and unpacked its shit and settled down in my bladder anyway. Right in the middle of a very busy, very long work week.

Awesome. I do not fucking have time for this shit.

Okay, but I could deal with this. I caught it early and got myself on antibiotics as soon as I thought I was past the point of self-medication. I got aggressive with  home-remedies. Yeah, it’s going to mean I was going to have to step off deck more often to go pee. But my body reacts really well to antibiotics, and even after only 24 hours I was feeling decidedly better. The bladder infection was annoying, but it was in no way going to stop me from kicking this busy work week’s ass.

And it didn’t. My toe did.

We were striking Leon Redbone. There wasn’t much to the stage set-up, so it was going to be a quick out. I had grabbed a panel of drum shield to put away in the backline room. Imagine a 1/4″ thick sheet of plexiglass that’s 5ish feet tall and 2ish feet wide. It’s stored in a giant sack on end. I’d lifted the panel up above my head to lower it into its sack when it suddenly slipped from my hands. My initial reaction was not to worry. The shield was going into its bag, it was just going to fall the rest of the way into the bag.

My secondary reaction, however, went more like this:

AAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUGGGGGGHHHHH! FUCKMOTHERFUCKINGCUNTBITCHFUCK! FUUUUUUCK!

That’s because I didn’t realize that the empty part of the bag was right over my left foot. And that 20ish pound panel of drum shield came right down on my left big toe like a fucking guillotine.

At first I thought it would be like when you stub your toe; you know, it hurts like hell at first but you know the worst part’s over so you ride it out for a minute and then you’re okay.  I gave myself a few minutes alone to grab my knees and swear and punch the wall, and when it felt like the worst was over I stood up and went back to strike. Kyle asked me to take the bundle of spare curtain back down to the storage room, so I grabbed it and headed for the elevator. My toe was still pulsing a bit, but I put it to the back of my mind, confident that it would pass.

Except it didn’t. By the time I got downstairs and got the storage room unlocked it was throbbing. I barely managed to get the hamper open before the pain swelled to the point of tears. I stuffed the bundle haphazardly into the hamper and hobbled back to the elevator. As soon as the doors opened our elevator operator Gary could tell something wasn’t right with me. “Take me to 3, please, Gary,” I asked him. He looked worried, surprised that I didn’t want to go to 2 where strike was still going on. The elevator went to 2 anyway, and as the doors opened on the lobby I said, “You know what, this is fine,” and hobbled towards the nearest chair.

Other than being red and swollen, the toe looked fine. But it didn’t feel fine. It hurt like a motherfuckingbitch. I’ve never felt pain that bad before. After watching me take my shoe off Gary and our Front-of-House Manager had gone for Kyle, who came with the rest of the crew. When they found me tears were streaming down my face and I was wishing for unconsciousness. Our Buildings Manager, a former EMT, started asking me to wiggle my toe and all I could do was shake my head furiously. Kyle’d come up with an ice pack, and I screamed when he laid it on top of my foot. As the crew left me in my chair to finish closing up the space, I couldn’t help but laugh hysterically between my tears. “I do not fucking have time for this shit,” I giggled manically.

Despite our Buildings Manager’s reassurance that it probably wasn’t broken, Kyle and I decided to go to the ER anyway. I was supposed to go to work today for a maintenance call, and we have a pretty big rock show on Saturday. (The Psychedelic Furs, which I still think sounds like the name of a 60’s porn production company, but turns out to actually be a pretty kick-ass punk band.) The maintenance call can be rescheduled, but I will be damned if I miss that show on Saturday. So unless this thing was going to heal itself in 36 hours, I was going to the ER.

A couple hours later I was sent home with an ugly orthopedic shoe-thing, some impressive drugs, and the news that it wasn’t broken, just bruised to bloody hell and back. Oh, and the order to stay off it as much as humanly possible.

I hate it when they say that.

So instead of going to work today, I’m at home, foot propped up and wrapped in an ice pack. I’m not on deck, experimenting with options for my head-high boom fixtures. I’m not in the genie bucket, tweaking focus on my pipe ends. I’m not even doing laundry or loading the mountain of dirty dishes into the dishwasher. I’m stuck on the couch, watching all eight seasons of Scrubs and accumulating an ever-growing pile of dirty dishes in the hopes that if I take it easy today I’ll be back in the thick of it tomorrow.

Because I do not  fucking have time for this shit.

This is a cautionary tale about writing drunk.

(Not making love to Sriracha. I don’t know what the logistics of that would entail, but let’s assume that we can all agree that’s a terrible and uncomfortable idea, rendering the cautionary tale unnecessary.)

There’s a quote by Ernest Hemingway that’s currently being beaten to death by the internet: “Write drunk, edit sober.” I decided to take this advice to heart and give the inebriated blogging a try. Also, I was drunk and excited about Sriracha. (It really is the shit, you guys.)

The next morning I woke up, refreshed and ready to do my sober editing. I signed into WordPress and read my previous night’s literary offering.

And that’s when I realized that writing drunk is a terrible idea. Drunk me is not insightful or eloquent. Drunk me gets excited about condiments and tries to express myself with run-on sentences and disjointed, meaningless metaphors. Drunk me swears unnecessarily. Remember guys, I write exactly like I talk, which means that drunk me writes exactly like drunk me talks. And drunk me is annoying.

No, the only way that sober me was going to edit this post into anything good was by hitting the Trash button. There was just no rescuing it. But something wouldn’t let me trash it, so I closed out the window and sat on it few days.

Finally, I realized why I’d held on to it. This post has a purpose in life. It wasn’t to amuse or inspire, it was to warn. I love you all too much to watch you kill your own writing careers. This post is the mistake you guys now will never have to make. I take all your drunken literary transgressions onto me with this post, and they are forgiven. I corrected a few spelling mistakes, but otherwise I left it largely unedited in all its rambling ridiculousness. Read it, let the fear trickle down the back of your neck, and tell yourself that you’ll never do something so stupid again.

Friends don’t let friends write drunk. Don’t let this be you.

Enjoy.

I Want to Make Love to Sriracha.

Oh my god, you guys!

You guys.

I just discovered the most amazing thing ever.

Ever.

It’s called Sriracha. And apparently, you can put it on shitty food and it makes it taste delicious.

Okay, so it’s Tuesday night, right? And Kyle and I are drinking. (Don’t ask why, it’s none of your damn business. Besides, what’s wrong with drinking on a Tuesday? And who the fuck are you to judge? Fuck off, we’re awesome.)

So, yeah, we’re drinking. And we decide we want a pizza. So we order a pizza from a local pizza joint. It’s a hole in the wall, but their pizza is usually fucking delicious. Solid decision, right? Except that for whatever reason their pizza sucks tonight. I don’t know, maybe they felt bad for the slow kid that usually puts the pizza boxes together and let him try his hand a making a pie. Or maybe some stoner ordered a cheese pizza and forgot to pick to up, so it was lying around for a while. Whatever the reason, this particular pizza kinda sucked. Which is sad for Stephanie’s.

I tried dumping garlic salt on it, which is my usual method for making lame food awesome. Not so awesome. I mean, it was okay, but not awesome. It was…eh. But then Kyle’s fucking around and the kitchen, and he’s all like, “Oh shit, this shit is the shit!” And I’m like, “What shit’s the shit? Jelly beans?” And he’s like, “No, the Sriracha we bought for tomorrow’s dinner. This shit. It’s the shit.” So I grab me a second slice and sprinkle me some Sriracha on it and plop me down on the couch in front of some Archer.

And you guys? Kyle wasn’t lying. That shit was the shit!

It’s spicy and tangy and sweet all at the same time. This pizza that was previously bland and greasy and somewhat salty was now full of flavor and intrigue and awesome. It was exotic and sassy. It was totally the type of pizza who would seduce me under the moonlight and we’d dance barefoot in the sand and he’d totally call the next day, because he’s a gentleman like that. I tore the shit out of that pizza. I could have eaten half the pizza if my stomach and my dignity didn’t hold me in check.

But now I’m wondering, does Sriracha magic work on everything? Like, if I went to the cupboard right now and got out the saltines, would they taste like delicious with Sriracha? Leftover pasta? Oatmeal? My world is suddenly spilling open with spicy and delicious possibilities, just waiting to be devoured. Where do the limits of Sriracha’s magic lie, and how far to I have to travel to reach them?

I don’t know. But I intend to find out.