Editors note: I am not sure how this became a 10,000 word essay on mundane details of a moderately eventful random night of my life, but yet it is what it is.  I am not sure it is in your best interest to read the whole thing, but there are some pretty funny photos at the bottom….  

The other night was completely out of hand.  Bars were closing and I had just driven into the city from Brooklyn where I had been shooting the Trashy Trashed party or whatever it was called.  I went to meet with a friend of mine at Max Fish.  While waiting in line to put my stickers in the bathroom she was making fun of this guy who always rides the mechanical horse.  She also happened to be sitting on said horse.  This is one of those horses you see outside of Supermarkets and ACME brand type Wallmart type stores and such places like that.  I feel like there are several of them outside of bodegas on Ave A.  Anyway, she is sitting on this horse so I put in a quarter when she was not looking.  Suddenly she goes from talking shit to smiling and seems to be enjoying said horse greatly.  I decided that I had to try it, but I was out of quarters so I sat on the tail.  And while the pain on this tail mashing itself into my coccyx was not exactly pleasant, I did come to the conclusion that riding one of these horses is far more satisfying that it looks.  This is a very important realization in my life.  I recommend it to everyone.

Moments later I was standing out front when a drunken man on a skateboard did a face plant into the concrete.  No one really knew what to do.  He was just laying on the ground motionless.  I thought he would be missing teeth or something.  People sort of tried to roll him over, and someone went inside to get help.  I was the closest person to him and I just sort of stood there.  There was this girl who I saw taking bad “street photography” photos outside the bar.  She at once started photographing him. Some other people took this as a cue to pull out their cameras.  Now while this is the sort of thing that I might normally find appealing to photograph, but realisticly I was actually more concerned for this man’s well being than I was taking photos.  When he stood up, I pulled out my camera to get a shot of his blood soaked face when I realized that he was just going to walk away without getting help.  I tried to explain to him that he had been unconscious for several minutes and he should just sit down.  He angrily informed me never to talk to him like that again.  His friends then came out, I told them what happened and left.  I think that if when he passed out there would have been missing teeth or a lot more blood I would have taken some shots, but really it just looked like he was drunk and passed out on the sidewalk.  Pretty boring photos probably, and I am not going to wallow in someone’s misery for mediocre shots.

After that I got in touch with my friend Jessica who was having a “Metal Party” at her house.  I asked who was there and she said “Oh, just Alexander and I.”  When I showed up, her friend Skipper was there too, and they were teasing their hair and applying more hair spray than should normally be sprayed in lifetime.  Jessica told me she was trying to look as much like Nikki Sixx as possible.  I found out she had just woken up and decided just to stay in and play dress up.  When I got there it was nearly 5AM and it was light outside by the time they finished getting ready.  Alexander was already dressed supremely metal, but then again, he pretty much dresses like that every day, although this night he was missing his normal top hat.  I wanted to fit in, so I shaved my awful facial hair into a Lemmy-eque handle bar mustache that I put mascara on so it would look less like a prepubescent pedophile working a taco stand.  Skipper decided to fill in my eyebrows too.  At some point they drew an upside down cross on my head, but it was about 175 degrees in Jessica’s apartment and it quickly sweated off.    We then took a lot of pictures.

The important thing to note about this is that we were listening to hair metal the entire time.  They had made a mix.  All these kids are like 5 years younger than me I think… at least Jess is, and it was strangely surprising to me that she had Great White on the play list and stuff.  Like, admittedly Hooked was one of my favorite albums in 1990, but I was 10 and Nirvana had not yet entered my consciousness yet… I am positive that Jess was not a big Great White fan in 1990, but you never know.  I just think it is weird that someone would ever come back to some of these ridiculous metal bands post-Nirvana and be pretty much obsessed with that music.  I mean I was obsessed with it, but I didn’t know any better.  All I listened to before I heard Smells Like Teen Spirt was rap and hair metal.  It was either that or New Kids On The Block, and at least I knew better than that.

Anyway, I knew every single lyric to every song they were playing that night and at one point I started randomly whistling the first few notes of “Wind Of Change” by the Scorpions and the second I finished the bar, that song shuffled on.  It was so insane.  Of the 200 songs on the playlist (which I had never heard) it was a pretty bewildering chance that song would be next (even if I had known it was on the list, which I didn’t).  I cannot possibly explain how amazing this was.  I was sort of flipping out about it all night.  No one else really cared, as I am sure you do not care about it now.  Still, it was one of the most amazing things that has happened to me this calendar year.

After we were done taking photos we decided to get food.  We all looked like lunatics, but I was quite okay with this.  Jessica was not.  She kept apologizing to everyone on the street for our weird looks.  Alex was mildly annoyed by this as he was dressed like he always dresses.  I just didn’t really see the point in acting a fool if you are going to apologize for it.  So as soon as I had ordered my clam chowder and key lime pie Jess decided we were going to a party in Brooklyn.  Keep in mind it is now 630AM.  So we had to get the food to go.  I did not want to take my soup to go, so I ate it as quickly as I could alternating bites of chowder with key lime pie, which was met with strange looks from everyone at the table (which now included a man named Paul). As soon as I finished stuffing the last bite of $6 pie into my mouth I was told that we were no longer going to the party and I could take my time eating.  Fuck. So we left the diner, which is not really a diner because they don’t serve milkshakes (despite having ice cream and milk on the menu, and a blender in full view of the bar).  Neither 7a (home of the $6 pie) nor Sidewalk have milkshakes making that entire block of A between 6th and 7th pretenders to the claim of diner.

Continuing on, before I returned home I tried to convince Jess, who had been topless several times in the last two hours, to let me take a picture of her flashing a small spanish speaking bodega employee who was sweeping up flower petals outside of a corner store.  She was too embarrassed to do it, but thought it would be a great idea to take a picture with him anyway.  I said forget it, but by that time she was already across the street putting her arm around him for a picture.  Right before I took it, I pulled off the bandana that she was wearing as a shirt down, exposing her to this small man, which caused pretty much everyone to fall on the ground laughing.  Everyone high fived me, and even Jess thought it was pretty funny.  I hope when I develop that roll it will be as funny as I think it will be.  A few minutes later I said good bye and walked back up the street towards that bodega, the man was still outside watering flowers with the biggest grin I have ever seen in my life still on his face.  I was glad I could lighten up his life if only for a little while… because after all, isn’t that what pornography is all about?

Let the metal gods bless you all.  Hail Satan.

Enjoy some of the pictures from the Hair Metal Dress Up Party.

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