P.J. the Yorkie's Shaggy Dog Story
Shagged
Suddenly I hear the sound again, and I start to make some noise. I'm scared. It's only my second time ever in the woods.
Wendy opens her eyes, tells me everything will be okay, and rolls over and begins to snore again.
More rustling sounds. But this time it's closer to the window of the cabin I'm staying in.
"Wake up," I say to Wendy, but somehow it only comes out as a faint whimper.
Then I see them outside.
The eyes of death.
Shimmering in the blankets of darkness. Reflecting the fear that has reached down and seized my soul.
I think it was then I howled in fear.
?
I should have known things were getting strange a few days earlier. I had just finished eating a bowl of rice and beef and drinking ice water. I was drying my face on the side of the couch, as I usually do, when Wendy took out a suitcase. I looked at her and wondered where the hell she thought she was going.
"You want to go on a trip?" she asks me in that high voice she uses when she talks to me like I'm a three-year-old.
I look at her, say nothing, then lie down on my back.
"So you're going to ignore me?" Wendy says.
I yawn and continue to stare at her.
"Fine," she says, and starts to pack up some belongings.
As she does so, I just watch television upside down. It looks better that way.
Finally Wendy finishes filling her bag and asks me what I'd like to take with me.
I tell her to just pack up my toys and some food, and maybe a coat if where we're going is cold.
She looks at me as if she understands what I'm saying. But I know she doesn't, because she starts to pack up my shampoo and various sorts of pills. I take lots of those.
"Anything else?" she asks me as she goes into the bathroom with a stool and takes down some freshly cleaned towels.
I scream at her to get off the fucking stool, that it scares me because her balance, well, sucks, but, as usual, she just ignores me.
Finally she finishes packing, so I go into the bedroom and whine for her to come to bed. She ignores me so I go back out to the living room and whine in her face some more. Eventually she comes to bed, and I curl up into a little ball next to her warm body and fall asleep, dreaming of finding yummy things to eat on the streets of the city.
The next morning is, well, fucked up. To say the least.
Wendy tells me we're going to visit my cousins Elijah, Emily and Loki. Then we get into a car, and the next thing I know she's shoving pills down my throat and I'm falling asleep.
I wake up in complete darkness, what I think is a few hours later. Beneath me I feel heavy rumbling, and I hear Wendy's voice although I can't make out what she's saying.
I feel as though I've been kidnapped, thrown into a bag and taken somewhere against my will.
So I start to whimper.
"Quiet, P.J.," George says. I know it's him because I smell his cheap cologne.
"It's okay, baby," Wendy says. She takes me out of the bag beneath the airplane seat in front of her and cuddles with me.
"What kind of dog is that?" asks this hot-looking woman in a tight blue and red uniform, who seems to be giving out food to everyone but me.
"He's a Yorkie," says George, with his punk rock denim vest over his head, trying to take a nap.
"He's three years old and weighs 8 pounds," adds Wendy, before the next questions can be asked.
The lady nods her head and tells me I'm a good boy. If I'm such a good boy, why doesn't she give me any fucking food?
Eventually we land in someplace called California, and I take the longest and best piss of my life, against the side of some guy's suitcase. Turns out it's my dad's. George's.
A few days later I find myself staying in this small house. Well, smaller than the house that my cousins Elijah, Emily and Loki live in. But still 10 times larger than my house in New York.
"Are you having a good time?" asks Wendy, my mom, as she sunbathes on a plastic chair in front of the small house, reading one of her smelly magazines.
I think about that. If having a good time means running around with no leash, taking shits outside whenever I feel like it, eating off Emily's and Elijah's plates, never mind eating out of Loki's bowl, as well as the bowl of those two cats, then I'm having a great time.
So I bark with joy.
?
Later that night, after taking my final dump of the day, I hop up into bed and settle in for a good night's sleep between my mom and dad.
And I do get some.
For about three hours.
Then I hear it.
The sound.
It wasn't like the noises I hear back at home. It didn't vibrate with those low frequencies like those huge trucks that collect all that yummy stuff in plastic bags. Nor did it go "Wooooo-Woooo!" like those big red trucks and funny blue cars with all the lights.
No.
This sound was different.
It sounded like someone moving.
Right outside the window.
In the dry grass.
So I made the mistake of looking, and it was then I saw the two eyes of Armaggedon.
I began to howl with fear, then bark furiously. Mom or Dad had to wake up.
Finally Wendy speaks.
"What's the matter, honey?" she says, scooping me up in her arms and then falling right back to sleep.
"Screw this," I say to myself. I leap up and bark right in George's face. As loud as I can.
"Huh?" my dad finally says as I wake him out of his little green and little white pill haze.
I scream to George that there's a demon outside the window, staring in, and it's probably here to kill us. And for him to do something.
So my dad does. He gets up, looks out the window I'm barking at, sees the eyes like I do, and screams. Then he runs back into bed, hides under the covers and wakes up Wendy.
"What's all the noise about?" Mom finally asks.
George tells her that he sees huge devil eyes staring at us. And that connected to those devil eyes is a mean long face, and horns!
I bark in agreement.
Wendy tells us that we're both nuts and gets up to look for herself.
And when she does, she doesn't scream. She doesn't even cry. Nope. She just says, "Awwwwwww!"
"What are you 'awwwwwing' about?" screams Dad. "Satan's come to Santa Cruz!"
"Put on your glasses, George," Wendy says as she picks me up and takes us both to the window.
"See?" she says, as we all look at the horned thing with the big eyes. "It's Bambi, all grown up!"
"Doh! A deer!" yells dad.
Mom laughs, and that's the end of my shaggy dog story. And I'm sticking to it.
?
Speak & Destroy is the name of the new CD from My Ruin on Snapper Music/Spitfire. With "I Am a Blasphemous Girl" printed in huge letters on this disc, along with the ultra-heavy instrumentation and "Madonna on crack" vocals, this punk rock chick and friends rock in the sort of way that has me begging for more. Of her music. And her pictures. Hubba-hubba! Wait! That's sexist!
Everyone's favorite overrated pop-punk Chicago band, Screeching Weasel, has a new CD out on Panic Button/Lookout! called Teen Punks in Heat. Besides having some pretty decent tunes like "I'll Stop the Rain" and "Molecule," there's also lots of blathering by Ben about women. Sheesh. As if the guy didn't get enough pussy, he has to stick it in our faces. Yummy. Hey Ben, what happened to the Ramones hairdo?
Speaking of bands that get pussy, local heroes L.E.S. Stitches got a new one out on Ng/Artemis called, um, Lower East Side. Songs like "Desensitize," "Deadline" and "TV Zoned Out" rock, as well as their cover of the Only Ones' "Another Girl Another Planet." These guys are punk rock and cuter than Furious George. At least that's what all the chicks keep telling me when I ask them why we don't have all the groupies like they do.
Lefty is the name of a band on Interscope, as well as the title of the band's first album. Someone at Interscope wanted me to do a whole big write-up on them, saying they were "rock" and "punk" and I'd like them. I told them they had to sign my band first.
You know what's cool? Those BMX bike things. Those guys who ride those doohickeys and do all sorts of tricks seem really cool. That's why when I played Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX for the Sony PlayStation by Akklaim, I felt cool as well. Not only was I able to pull off neat stunts like a double back flip, but when I landed on my head it didn't crush my brain. I think. Anyway, there are 12 fucking levels on this thing, and with tunes by the likes of Rancid and Dropkick Murphys, ya really can't go wrong. So put your pedal to the metal.
Another cool game for PlayStation I recently got was NCAA Gamebreaker 2001 by 989 Studios. A college football game where ya get to play as almost any team ya want. I usually play as the Florida Gators, because that's where I went to college. I usually let the other teams kick my ass, because I hated that place. And that makes me feel good. Also, I like the "Career Mode," where I can assume the duties of a head coach. Now if only I could figure out how to choke my players when they mouth off...
Speaking of football, for the Sega Dreamcast comes Sega Sports NFL 2K1 for the 128-bit system. This shit looks so real that when Nick, my stepfather, was over, he played it for hours on end, giggling like a little boy every time a player would get crunched in a tackle. This is, by far, the best-looking football game ever, for any console. You can also play it online via Sega's SegaNet. I'm not one who usually likes sports, but this game seems so real, I can't help but wanna break some bones. Punk rock!
Also from Sega comes Ecco the Dolphin: Defender of the Future. Here you get to play as a dolphin who fights off time-traveling pirates while solving puzzles and dodging really smart sharks and other mean fish. The game is great for kids and adults, and the only thing I don't like about it is they don't have a level where you have to escape from the tuna net.
Goin' After Pussy: Teasers & Tidbits is the name of a new compilation CD by Junk Records. Besides having a great title, this thing has great bands. Electric Frankenstein, the Humpers, the Candy Snatchers, the Slobs and the Stallions, just to name a few. With 41 tracks on this thing, you get more punk rock than you can handle. Unless you're a real man, like me. Oh yeah, and Zeke's song "Main Line" is on it as well. And a tune by the River City Rapists. Did I mention the Dragons? What about Boris the Sprinkler...
Another compilation I just got is called New Sounds New York. Lots of local bands like Ff, the Kill Van Kull, Ouijipig and tons of other bands who play Continental can be heard here. I like it. A lot. But then again, I love the Continental. Where's my Rolling Rock?
On Norton Records comes some 1973 studio demos by the infamous New York Dolls called A Hard Night's Day. This thing is nothing but hits, bitch. You got "Seven Day Weekend," "Trash," "Who Are the Mystery Girls?" and 18 other cuts! The sound is excellent and Johansen and Thunders are in top form. This is punk rock history you must own.
If 1973 wasn't your year for the New York Dolls, then check out Lipstick Killers, the Dolls' demos from Mercer St. in 1972, on ROIR. Only nine cuts here, but there're some songs even I never heard before. And I'm Mr. Punk Rock. Well, at least that's what my neighbors call me, before they try to kick my dog.