Mehhhhhh-mohhhhh-reeeeeeezzz!!!

[benchilada]

    I don’t think there was ever a cool name for the house.  It was just 806 W. Oregon.  I lived there for three months, subletting from my friend Tim.  The house was a complete pit, as the landlord rarely if ever did repairs, and there were five to six guys living there.  I learned things there, like how to make Scary Pasta Shit™ and why eating spicy food and drinking kool-aid and gin while watching kung-fu, chain-gunning cigarettes, and trying not to melt in the 110 degree heat could be fun.  Oh, and that even Jedi Masters have a hard time fighting off the Dark Side of the Urine.
    Scary Pasta Shit(tm) was a side-effect of being poor, much like boiling your coffee down every time you made it too weak, because you didn't want to waste a pot. It got its name from when Mark looked over my shoulder and asked, "What the hell is that scary pasta shit?" I'd take whatever leftovers we had, lightly stir-fry them -- no matter what they were -- and start boiling some pasta in not-enough water. Before the water boiled, I'd add whatever dry spices we had, from oregano and basil to cayenne pepper and cumin. Then I threw in whatever we had that could make a vague, pasty sauce. Mustard, hoisin sauce, hot sauce, anything. We couldn't afford pasta sauce. It would then be boiled until the pasta absorbed most of the water and the "sauce" thickened. Then I'd mix in whatever I'd sauteed: onion, mushroom, artichoke and sprinkle some generic-brand cheese on it. It was squidgy, stuck together like glue, and was as hot as about eleven curries. But we loved it.
    The landlord, Herschel, once came by and accused one of the tenants of sacrificing animals in the basement.  To be certain, J. had a lot of tattoos, long hair, always wore a leather jacket, and had about three rings on each hand, each a giant silver bat, or a skull with giant spikes on it.  These were not rings meant to be pretty.  These were rings meant to intimidate, and if that failed, to fuck the living hell out of whomever he hit.
    In any event, Herschel claimed that he had found animal hair all over the basement and suspected J. of making offerings to his dark lord.  Herschel was terribly Christian, if that means banging on the door two days after rent was due, threatening to kick us all out.  Herschel came by and J. took him into the basement to see what was going on.  Sure enough, this shit was all over the basement.  The house being populated by some lazy-ass motherfuckers when it came to keeping the place clean, when somebody used the dryer, they just threw the lint from the trap onto the floor.  J. had a good laugh and Herschel got pretty pissed off.
    Herschel then drew the tenants’ attention the a stack of three or four mattresses in the basement.  From what I understand, they were there when the current crew moved in, but their presence was not what had him steamed.  He was furious because they were, as he said, “soaked in urine.”
    “Beg pardon?” we asked.  Let’s pretend for a moment that we DID put these mattresses here.  Why in the living fuck would we PISS on mattresses in the BASEMENT of a house that got over a hundred fucking degrees in the summer?  He never fully explained, but said he wanted it taken care of.
    We didn’t.
    The guys who lived in the house were a bunch of fucking loons, but hysterically funny and cool loons.  There was even a rubber grim reaper puppet – with an inexplicably BROWN cape and hood – named Googly Skull, due to the way his eyes bulged.  His injection-molded skeleton hands were perpetually crossed in front of him, and to put him on was to be possessed by his spirit.  He demanded many things of those around him: booze, women, but most notably that he was the Lord of the Entire Universe.  Which was the house.  I once watched Brendan come by one day when Chad was sitting on the couch with Googly Skull on his hand.  Brendan had just been by the Quickie Mart and had a Super-Big-Gulp-of-FuckDoomSoda in his hand.
    “WHAT IS THAT!?!?” shouted Chad, possessed by Googly Skull.
    “It’s uh, it’s a soda.”
    “WHERE DID YOU GET IT?”
    “At the Amoco.”
    “THERE IS NO AMOCO!”
    “Yeah, it’s about three blocks away.”
    “THERE IS NOTHING THREE BLOCKS AWAY!  YOU LIE!  DO NOT LIE TO GOOGLY SKULL!”
    “Okay, man.  I was wrong.”
    “THEN WHERE DID IT COME FROM?  THERE IS NOTHING LIKE IT IN THIS HOUSE!”
    “I don’t know what to tell you, man.”  Brendan was on the verge of losing it, but he stifled his laughs.
    “DO NOT LAUGH AT ME!  I WILL HAVE YOU DESTROYED!  NOW,” he said, lowering his voice and checking around to make sure nobody was listening, “Tell me more of this land you call...Ah-Moh-Koh.”
    I think I shat myself.
    One of the most fascinating incidents there, however, I was not present for.  At one of the many parties that were hosted by the house, somebody brought an empty water cooler container.
    Somebody decided it would be a good idea to fill it with piss.  It being a party, and piss being abundant, it wasn’t hard to get a good amount of urine in there.  It never got filled all the way, and from what I understand, some cheap-ass booze – we’re talking Thunderbird and Night-Train here – made up for what space they were lacking in piss.
    This, however, was not enough.
    It was decided that the container would be sealed with layer upon layer of Saran Wrap, held in place by about fifty rubber bands.  And that a tiny Yoda figure would be dangling, held in place by one of the rubber bands, over the surface of the solution.  It would then be put on top a cinder block, on top of the garage, and left, to fester, like an enormous jug of Evil Sun Tea.
    And fester it did.  As time passed, the liquid inside became darker and darker, as though the urine had come from somebody with acute kidney failure.  Eventually it turned a sort of brown.  Then we noticed something amiss.
    Yoda was no longer as high up as he once was.  A trip to the roof and a stomach-churning peer inside of the container revealed the sad truth – the horrible qualities of the liquid were doing something to the rubber band, which was deteriorating.
    Over the next many weeks, we watched Yoda sink closer and closer to the liquid.  Arrivals at the house were often punctuated by people shouting at the garage, “Don’t give in to the Dark Side, Master Yoda!  Fight!  Fight!”
    Master Yoda was fighting a loosing battle, I’m afraid.  One day, Chad and I came home and we were frozen in our tracks.  Our little green friend was no more.  We ran to the garage and, through the brown muck, were barely able to make out the shape of Yoda.
    “Poor guy,” said Chad.  “He really put up a fight.”
    A few weeks later I came home from work and Yoda’s resting place was gone.  Not a trace.  I went inside and found Chad, who had a sort of melancholy grin on his face.
    “Dude, where’s Master Yoda?”
    It would have been sad, he explained, if it hadn’t been so damn funny.  He had come home from work that day to find two kids, eighteen maybe, on top of the garage.  They were wearing enormous plastic dishwashing gloves and were picking up the container with a terrified look in their eyes.
    Chad asked them what the fuck they were doing with our…stuff.  They explained that they had been sent by Herschel to remove the container.  Chad laughed and told them it was funny that he would do this but wouldn't fix broken plumbing.  Then he asked a question I wouldn’t have asked.  He asked why they were wearing those gloves.  I would have assumed that they would be standard issue on a mission like this.  But, no.  No, their purpose was far more sinister.
    “Herschel made us wear them,” explained one of the kids, “He said he didn’t want us to get AIDS.”
    Chad had no idea what to say to that, so he just went inside.
    When it was finally time to leave the den of sin, we cleared out all of our shit, did a half-assed job of cleaning the place – making a mound of stuff out of things that previous people who’d lived there hadn’t taken with them in the back yard – and then got the hell out.
    A month later, I got a bill for about 1,200 dollars.  It was from Herschel, and it was itemized.  He was charging us for all many of bizarre things, things which had been broken or filthy when the house had been rented.
    On one line, there was a charge for removing “Urine-stained mattresses from basement.”
    On another line…
    On another line was a $10 dollar charge for, and I quote directly from the paper, “Removal of Devil Pot.”  I think he even capitalized it.
    We never paid and he never tried to get the money from us, probably fearing that if he tried to prove it to the police he’d have to let them into the house, which would be summarily condemned for a million health violations.
    I still have the bill, Tim has Googly Skull, and Master Yoda?  He’s still with us in our hearts.  Or, at the very least, in our bladders.



benjamin sTone
Music: “In the Name of the Father” – Black Grape
Book: FOX VOLANT OF SNOWY MOUNTAIN – Louis “Jin Yong” Cha
Last Movie: THE INCREDIBLES (US, 2005)
Next Movie: 6 a.m. (HK, 2004)