Bargains

After our celebration over my first presentation to a college class of students who were assigned and read my book, my mother had errands. Of course I was the designated runner and the first stop was Target.

“What do you need, dare I ask?”

“Just some Swiffer stuff.”

When we got to the Swiffer aisle, Mom picked up boxes of Swiffer fillers. She put on her glasses to read the boxes with calculated precision, the way a scientist might examine mitochondria on a slide. Then came the mumbling.

“Oh, uh hunh I don't want to pay this, $8.99, that's crazy, don't they have anything less expensive than that...maybe this box...you know I can go price check it...”

I was impressed to see that she knew not only where the price checker was, but how to scan with it as well. Impressed, and a tad bothered. Disposable time and shopping tolerance had finally met in this 62-year-old's consciousness. She's at that age where winning means she saved fifty cents. The next stage is when winning means she's saved fifty cents on something that she doesn't need. And please know that she demonstrated a better working understanding of this machine than Christine O'Donnell has of the Constitution (not that this is saying much).

“...Oh this IS $8.99. I'm not paying that...ooh, look the $11.49 is a better value, right?”

“Yes,” I confessed. “Are you turning into Grandy?”

“Hmph.”

Not as complete denial. When my mother's mother was only a few years older, she made a habit of going out of her way to find the deal.

When we finished sorting out the Swiffer items, we moseyed to the other side of Target where we could look to see if they have movies worth buying, movie Mom hasn't seen and that can be enjoyed at home.

“You know I stopped renting movies because they're all widescreen.”

“What's wrong with widescreen?”

“I don't like seeing that extra six inches of space on the top and bottom of the screen because that's just a waste of screen space,” she said.

I explained to her that the picture on full screen settings is truncated on the sides in order to fill the screen the way she likes to see it. But she was ahead of me.

"Well maybe you can look at the DVD player and figure out a way to set it differently."

I looked at the two vids I had in my hand and could find a full screen option nowhere on them. I confessed that I hadn't seen many new DVDs with a full screen option.

“I guess I won't be watching any new DVD's then.”

I could only muster a long sigh as the bubbly cashier collected my money for the videos I'd purchased.

“Yeah it sort of sucks," she said, "that they've stopped making DVD's with full screen because they want everybody to buy new televisions."

“I shouldn't have to buy a new television," my mother said.

"You shouldn't," the woman said. Then she changed the mood. “That will be $22.14."

“What??!” Mom was aghast. She looked at the woman as if she'd asked Mom to pay her mortgage in full.

“That makes sense,” I told her. “Only one of those items was a deal, remember?”

“Oh, well that's awful,” Mom said. She stopped and thought, as if taking the time might alter the price of the two items she wanted to purchase. Just when I was about to be embarrassed that we were holding up the line, Mom dug into her purse and grabbed a stack of coupons.

Before I could get cozy in my horror at this, Mom proceeded to hand the stack of coupons to the young woman behind the register.

“Could you go through these and see if any of them work for this stuff, hon?” she said.

Now I was astonished. Who was this woman inhabiting my mother's body? And where was my credit card so that I could eliminate this nonsense right away? Matter of fact, why didn't I just go ahead (against my mother's wishes) and ask the cashier to scan her Swiffer stuff with the two DVD's I bought that Mom probably won't watch...

“I'm sorry,” the cashier said with genuine regret.

“Oh, don't worry about it,” my mother said.

She then pulled out a crisp hundred.

“Really? REALLY??”

She knew she was wrong. She understands why. She has something like three degrees and loads of common sense. She just finished helping me clean up my lecture on a book I wrote. She gets dramatic irony.

“Well, every little bit counts,” the cashier said.

“That's right girl.”

Course she says this. She did not have to spent forty minutes with her mother on two cleaning items at Target that she could not get a deal on. I don't know that. Maybe she did. Maybe all children go through this with their mothers. And if I were to suddenly make zillions of dollars to support her shopping, even gave her a budget, she might still scan items at the price-checker...

She is now ebullient about the 140-point play she just made on Scrabble against the computer. “Yes! 140 points for the word “coasting” which does exactly that across two triple-letter tiles...”

Tight
by Jamal Story on Tuesday, September 28, 2010 at 3:56pm

"Il est toujour bon, sur ma fois d'avoir les femmes avec soi." - Remendado and Dancairo trying to convince Carmen to go with them (Quintet, Bizet: It is always good, upon my word, to have women with you.)


The first thing important to know is this: in exchange for our bottomless offerings of support and willingness to be surrogate boyfriends in times of crisis, gay men get to be polygamous. I have four wives. Three were little sisters who upgraded to wife status when Krisha Marcano came along with the declarative, “I am your wife, you will act accordingly.”

This very humbling scenario does not begin with her, however. It starts with the sunny afternoon when Hollie, another wife, escorted me to the car repair joint down the block so that I could handle the loose ends of my Saturn's demise. Well, no that's not true. I asked Hollie to go with me since she was hanging out at the house and I have always understood the latitude that older men give younger men who have beautiful, upstanding women near us.

It worked. My mechanic was charmed, giving me ample time to sort out the mailing of the title so that the car could be released to a non-profit or church that needed one. “Don't worry about all this,” he said. “You two have a great time in Vegas.”

Of course I hadn't said she was going with me.

A week passed. I returned from Vegas for a few days and this time I confiscated Krisha's entire afternoon, included her in on my madness. A sunny day again, a jaunt to the car repair joint down the block. This time to collect my things out of the trunk. When we walked into the garage, the first thing I did was motion toward the woman I was with.

“Hey man, this is Krisha.”

“Oh yeah, we met before.”

“No," I said, "that was Hollie.”

Um, was there a reason he called me out? Didn't he know better than to ignore my lead? What player handbook was he reading from? I was glad that I'm not actually sleeping with any of my wives.

I asked Krisha to go ahead of me to the adjacent junkyard to see if I'd left the jalopy unlocked yesterday. After she was out of visibility, the mechanic came behind me with the key.

“Man, I hope I didn't mess you up just now. Sorry about that.”

“Nah, it's all good. My game is tight.”

Yeah, I said that. I went with this. It was a man moment, meant to be kept right there, between men.

When I got to the car, Krisha looked at me, her eyes showing me the folded arms she didn't feel like making.

"I know exactly what happened just now. He apologized didn't he?”

“Uh yeah he did,” I said, hoping that she simply applied an amount of common sense to get there.

“Your game is tight? Really?”

Wow. Had I said that loud enough to be heard? What player handbook was I reading from?

“And the extra bass in your voice, really? Where did that come from?”

The fact that she wasn't done made it clear to me that I would never live this one down.

“What extra bass?”

“Don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about,” she said, emptying the glove compartment. “Let me tell you something, you are a gay. A gay, a gay, a gay!”

I pointed to the items she used for emphatic gesticulation.

“Leave the owner's manual in there for the new people.”

“Did you hear me?”

This would be shared with the other wives of course. And although the stakes of my player moment were not Pastor Long high, I still haven't lived down a particular hop over the fence a few years back (no hypocrisy up there, just barbed wire, who knew?). Granted, I can keep both my gay card and my village, but perhaps my game isn't so tight after all.


"Et sans elles, les toutes belles on ne fait jamais rien de bien."
(And without them, the very lovely ones, one never does anything right.)

Stripper
[Names have been changed to protect the innocent]


After the 7 a.m rehearsal for the HP industrial, nothing looked more fetching than the buffet at Mandalay Bay. Don and Sam were sitting at the table while Missy and I waited at the omelet line when a random bald guy, short and muscular, came up to me and started a conversation. He mentioned that he had seen the Cher show last night and that he enjoyed it a lot.

“Thank you. I was in it.” Immediate regret.

“Oh cool, I remember you now. Fantastic show dude." He looked at Missy. "Are you in the show too?”

Missy was quick but skeptical.

“No, I did some other shows on the strip and we're doing a gig together,” she said, pointing at me.

“Cool, I'm a dancer too, just not the same kind.”

My years at SMU subjected me to several conversations with people disappointed that “Which club?” was not an appropriate response to “I'm a dancer.” I fell into no such trap now, this time on the other side of the Q & A.

“What kind of dancer are you?” I asked.

“I'm a stripper.”

As I deflated, his grin grew in mischief and pride.

Missy, whom I'd just met but understood right away was one of the few other professionals on this gig born in the 70's, exited the area. Back during the rehearsals for my first big tour, Mark, one of Mia's assistants, would always encapsulate the odd, insurmountable, absurd or draining with the words, “I can't.”

Right now, Missy couldn't.

But I had to; the eggs had not yet been added to the vegetables...

“Oh cool,” I said, alone and jealous.

“Yeah I have my own company in Houston and we have a whole team of strippers...”

At this point he must have received a text because he began the unsuccessful effort of multi-tasking our talk with Blackberry operations. I stared at the top of his head trying to decide if there was any possible means for escape.

“I mean I can't dance like you but we don't just take our clothes off, we really dance, like give it, hardcore, you know?”

His hips started to move.

“Um, do you have a business card or something?”

“Not on me,” he said. “But you go to Outlaw Entertainment on Myspace. Here, look...”

He slid his phone upward through the air to show me the “website.” The rude texting might have been less obnoxious it turns out.

“Yo, do you mind if I take a picture with you?”

“It's fine.”

He took the picture. He asked where we were sitting and if the rest of our party included dancers. With no real will to lie, I pointed to the table where Don and Sam sat eating in peace. The stripper promised to stop by later.

Stop by he did. He introduced himself to the table, a permanent grin swathed across his face.

“I saw you on So You Think You Can Dance and man, you should have won,” he said to Sam.

In the internal filing drawer called issues-j-needs-to-work-on went the embarrassment about the fact that as much as I strive to keep current I had no idea this whole time that Sam was from the show. Anyway, before Sam could react, the stripper asked if he could take pictures with us. Before we could respond he produced a Canon. The Blackberry would not suffice.

The boys' approaches to posing exposed their reactions. Sam put the fork down and stood up: necessary evil. Don remained seated and worked like Wednesday Addams (a la Cristina Ricci) to make that smile happen: horror.

It went further south.

“Hey I remember that battle between you and the other guy, you should have won,” the stripper began.

There is a breath that happens in the entire body when we posture to discuss that which we have only skimpy (or less) understanding about. The minute he took it, Missy got up and left the table. The stripper did not embrace the cue.

“The other guy was more smooth and had good moves but overall you had a better groove...”

Ready to laugh, I had to exit after Missy. When we convened near the asparagus and cold cuts Missy and I were shameless, casting

ourselves in a full guffaw about the crazy stripper.

Then guilt swam around. I was leaving those kids unattended with the crazy stripper. This was my fault really. I had invited him in a way. Accountability in check, I re-stocked my plate and returned to the table.

The stripper was now cozy in my chair, his whole body leaned toward Sam in an effort to better show him the pictures on his phone.

“Oh sorry man,” the stripper said, getting up. “I'll leave you guys to your meal but listen thanks for the pictures.”

After the Lestat-style disappearance, Sam shared what I'd not rescued him from soon enough. The stripper wanted to show Sam a picture of his beautiful girlfriend.

“Isn't she beautiful?”

“Yeah, sure,” Sam had said.

“She's like the most beautiful girl in the world.”

“Okay, sure.”

“Guess how old she is.”

“I don't know, man.”

“No, no, guess.”

“Um, I really don't know how old she is.”

“Just try.”

“Uh, 28?”

“She's 35!”

“Like I said, I couldn't guess.”

The exchange had continued in this fashion. We sat at the table amazed at Sam's endurance.

By this point Missy was back and I apologized profusely for my crazy-person karma. About five minutes into our story swaps, I told them about my Memphis moment with Sarah Palin/Tweet in the Denny's (“Yes, I was wearing violet” - send me your email address if you didn't read about her). Before the wrap up, a random beaming woman came to the table.

“Hi! I'm so sorry to bother you but could I please have pictures with you guys?”

Why not? Her strategy was less invasive; two of us in each photograph with her vs. just one.

She thanked us and ran off, leaving us confused about whose karma was at work this time.

But then, the stripper returned.

“I had to come back you guys. I just wanted to let you know that, um, well, one more thing...”

Had he developed a speech problem? There were too many pauses and breaks in thought that his previous trip did no prepare us for.

But then our eyes dropped lower. Our new friend had transferred the conversation to his pectorals, which were flexing alternately.

“Wow.” Missy was appalled.

The stripper laughed. “I just wanted to make sure you guys remember me.”

“Oh we will remember. We will never forget as a matter of fact,” I said. “Mission accomplished.”

Our cue to leave was the return of the beaming woman to take pictures again, this time with her and her husband...





Life

It was a 6:45 a.m flight. I was famished and barely awake. Kyle, whom I had hired to be my assistant for this choreography gig in Dallas, whisked the air around with his sprite energy. He is an ego boost for sure. He is ten years my junior only a better version complete with introspection and access to his intuition. He pooh-poohs my assessment: "I am not a better version. We are all individuals and we matter..." he usually says. I chuckle warmly (he's right of course). He even looks a little like me as he elucidates. Environmental responsibility, alternative spiritual contemplation and an abundance of love-creating stuff tops Kyle's priority list.

He had already justified my bringing him, succeeding somehow in getting us into the correct line to avoid the three thousand other people in the check-in area who would see to it that we miss the flight otherwise. We made it past security in time to deal with getting some food.

“What are you doing?” he asked as I got in line.

“Getting breakfast.”

“At McDonald's? You can't. Jamal do you know what they put in the food?”

“Yes, baby but there is no other option and I don't do this all the time.”

“One time is too many. I'm sorry I have to say something. I can't just let you ingest that garbage. It's toxic. You could die.”

The negative space between the line at McDonald's and the line at Dunkin' Donuts was all that separated us. A few people conscious enough at this hour wondered if we knew each other. They missed the parts of the conversation that contained familiarity.

“It's not going to kill me. And besides, you're in the line at Dunkin' Donuts.”

“I'm only having coffee.”

“Flirting with hypocrisy are we?”

“I choose life! You should choose life too," he said.

I laughed at my younger self staring at me with Joan of Arc commitment.

“You should all choose life,” he said louder, so that the folks at the counter could hear and perhaps change their minds.

They were not deterred. Neither was I. When we made it to the plane I uncovered my morning entree and buttered the pancakes.

“I'm judging you,” he said.

“I know.”

His arms were folded in the seat next to me. He's so cute I want to squeeze him.

“You just go ahead and drink your – what is that anyway?”

“It's hot chocolate mixed with french vanilla latte.”

“And how much artificial sugar is in that concoction you're drinking? And you know you're going to starve on this flight.”

“It's not nearly as bad as what you're having.”

It was too early in the morning to recall the information pertinent to the battle with my intrepid young colleague, something about McDonald's Happy Meals containing no more than 600 calories, only 35% of that coming from fat. Granted, those are for kids and I wasn't having one right then, but this would have been the best I could do. Meanwhile, some lattes have enough sugar for 12 Dunkin Donuts. And I did mention that the caffeine in that styrofoam cup was enough to strip his muscles of all the water they need and make him tight and ineffective at rehearsal.

“Whatever. “I'll be at your funeral if that artificial gook you're eating does you in.”

“Thanks.”

And then we laughed. And after he finished cursing me to the cornfield of diet hell, he succumbed to the sleep (on me) that the chocolate/vanilla mix did nothing to prevent.

Just
Jan 6, 2010

It was supposed to be just a routine minor lecture demonstration and I only assigned this mental cataloging because I wanted to make it more meaningful than Christie suggested it would be. Really it could have happened in a studio with kids sitting on the marley poised to ask questions after someone walked over to the boom box to stop the CD after the minor dance.

In the UK the word “just” is flung with the kind of casual ease that shrinks the importance of even things that contain lots.

“Oh yeah, you're still fine with the little performance thing we're going to have you do on Wednesday for the kids right? It's just so that they can see you dance. You can do anything really, it doesn't matter.”

But when the better portion of a lunch talk was devoted to details like the feasibility of the stage surface with no marley, the lighting design__

“I'm sorry the lighting design?” I asked. “This won't be a houselights only situation?”

“Oh, well, we'll still throw some lights on you, something simple. What are you wearing?”

I wondered if the appropriate answer was full hair and make-up and a $2,000 costume. But instead I told Christie I could just throw on a pair of white linen pants and call it a day.

When Kyle (my assistant and adopted little brother) and I made it to what ended up a tech rehearsal, the degree of dupe tracked better. Still it wasn't until the actual performance, when I noticed that nestled cozy in the auditorium was the entire population of high school girls, along with a healthy number of faculty members, it rose to full-scale bamboozlement.

For sure though, it was picking up the microphone and asking the very quiet crowd of mostly young ladies at this exclusive all-girls academy if there were questions__this is when my facial features got shuffled. I'd just danced a solo to an a capella sound byte of Barack Obama discussing the treatment of war veterans in this country. Yet no arms flew upward.

“No questions?”

“Jammaal__” And at this point one of the teachers directed my focus to the aisles that split the middle section of kids. Standing on either side of it was a microphone with its own cue.

This was a symposium, screw a small lec-dem.

I would be whupping my friend's behind when this was over.

The young ladies proceeded to ask questions as if someone had trained them in the art of interview. Was there anyone who pushed you to dance? Do you plan to eventually start your own company? What are the difficulties you find in dancing to spoken word? How did this piece with Obama's voice get created? What is your book about? What do you think about when you're dancing?

This last question caught me on the soft part of my skull. I explained to her that the objective is to get as far away from the cognitive part as possible and engage in the practice of transcending, that the thinking part happens in the rehearsal. The young lady wasn't satisfied with this answer.

“What makes you want to dance?”

It invited a more personal answer rooted in spirituality. They weren't done with me.

Someone asked where have I always wanted to dance and why. Someone else asked the name of my favorite piece to perform and favorite location.

Spain and Italy for sure. It occurred to me to do the prudent thing and ask if anyone had been to Europe. When I did, 90% of the people in the room raised their hands. I had forgotten where I was.

After it was over and I waited backstage, Christie came in and offered in the same casual tone with which she downplayed the entire event, “Good job. I think that went over really well, huh?”

Before I could say anything, another gentleman, probably the director of the high school walked in. He said this:

“I have a compliment. Robbie George, director of the philosophical law from Princeton came and spoke to them and this was better. You blew it out of the water.”

I was relieved, both to have not known sooner the act I was to follow, and that I stood up to that standard, let alone surpassed it.

But it got even better. After I'd changed clothes and Kyle reiterated (as only a little brother can) how proud he is to know me and how tear-jerking the entire hour was for him, we ran into a stately, coiffed blonde with a bubbly spirit. Christie introduced her as the person who funded my being here.

“Hi! It's so nice to meet you. I missed the performance but I heard the talk-back. Great job. My daughter has been enjoying your classes so much.”

I had been debriefed before the week began that the mother of one of the kids put up the ten grand personally. I ended up using her as one of the featured girls in the piece not because she was the best, but because she looked woeful and innocent in what ended up a romp of social commentary about what happens when the mainstream overtake the unique.

“Thank you so much. I'm glad you enjoyed it.”

“I want you to know I have always been such a firm believer that art is the connective tissue that transcends race, creed, gender differences. Of course my daughter is a huge Obama fan so when I walked in she looked over at me as if to say, 'See, this is what it's about!'”

“You sound like you're very involved in the arts. As a patron?”

“Well that too. I was the ambassador for the arts in France under President Bush.”

Blood exited my whole cranium.

Later I would be told that there are copious pictures of her with the Bushes. Did Alanis not include this in “Ironic,” the part about dancing to Obama in the big-haired Texas South where the other side still reigns and just pays your salary? Hm.

I had to thank God in stereo for not letting this be disastrous.

Yes I thanked Christie too. Eventually.

Rectification

I had no illusions about how difficult it was going to be to not eat for a whole day. Extreme measures were taken. There was the assortment of movies I watched with a good friend, who decided that there was no better time to sit me down and twist my hair since I’d be grounded like a punishable child.

“It might take you three or four hours given the number of times I’ll have to run to the bathroom,” I advised.

When I called a nurse about this colonoscopy, she was anxious to tell me about the sour preparation. And somewhere during “The September Issue,” I had finished the second bottle of laxative-spiked Gatorade. Lord knows that because the instructions I half read forbade red and orange liquids, those bottles would have to sit comfy in the fridge next to the egg-nog that tortured me with its sumptuousness.

And really, the egg nog would have done the same thing as this questionable ectoplasmic looking concoction.

But that’s why you have friends. To give you mordant looks of shade when you think you’re gonna do wrong and ruin this one and only opportunity you have to get the procedure that you desperately need.

Of course leave it to the supervising friend to decide you’re going to have the equivalent of major surgery. I had to get cursed out in technicolor for not mentioning it earlier, for not discussing the trips I made to the doctor before, for considering it an imposition to ask him to play chauffeur on his day off (he wanted to be there just in case). The admonishing was on behalf of anyone who echoes his resentment of information neglect (feel free to feel represented). Another friend warned that I would have to work my way up slowly to solid food instead of have the much desired full meal I craved.

"I'm sorry as soon as I get out of the rectum clinic I'm going to stuff my face."

“The gas could kill you.”

“I’ll die a happy death then.”

When we got to the center, I filled out paperwork and then got in my gown. A nurse grabbed the plastic bag with my clothes, sat me in a cushy chair and asked me questions. Soon a woman with district attorney age and demeanor came in and gathered a few needles.

“This is Phyllis, and she’ll be doing your anesthesia," the seated woman said.

“Oh cool. Fentanyl or ativan?”

“Propophyl,” Phyllis said.

Wasn’t this the Michael Jackson drug of choice? I was excited and nervous at once. After the nurse gave me a needle prep for the anesthesia, and then preset the plastic U-tubing for the breathing apparatus, she rolled me into another area. The journey on the gurney felt surreal. Is this what it’s like when the gun shot wound in the ribcage goes to numb and your eyes concentrate on the people pushing your horizontal body? Hm.

Anyway, I hoped that this is was as close as I would get to finding out.

When I got into the procedure room, Dr. Kwok was quite personable. He talked to me asked how the show has been going. I didn’t remember this guy at all, a stretch from the remote curmudgeon I met in the consultation.

“Turn over on your left.”

I did so, for sure it was to make my insides more accessible to the instrument that wold soon violate me. The expensive monitors and other fancy equipment let me know for sure.

Then I realized they were playing music.

“Yeah, we like Pandora in here,” Phyllis said, plugging the propophyl needle into the holster taped to my arm.

“Me too. I love it.” But I was confused about them pushing the gurney out of the room. “Wait, I thought this was going to happen in the room where Dr. Kwok and the monitors were a moment ago. There’s a third room?”

“No it’s over, sweetie.”

“I’m sorry?”

Yes the entire forty minute procedure, complete with a biopsy was complete. I didn’t remember the coma. And then I didn't want to get up out of the gurney. I wanted to pay rent or something so that they could leave me there to get what would surely be the best sleep of my entire 2009. With grudge-ment, I dragged out of the comfy arrangement the propophyl put me in and ambled to what I thought would be the getaway car.

Since sleep wasn't an option, I had two breakfasts.

And no, nothing is wrong. Thankfully, I did not die from gas behind solid foods consumed same day. Nor did the biopsy reveal anything. No cancer, no pollops, no hemmorhoids, nothing. Dr. Kwok (that name still gets me every time) could not explain why there were symptoms in the first place so I simply walk alongside the gift horse instead of look in its mouth. Amen.

I do have a better understanding of Michael Jackson's plight.

Red Need


Sheer impulse. When women get it they do sensible things like go to Sephora or get their nails done.

But you know with us there has to be much more opportunity for disaster.

And I succumbed to ambition.

I would paint my bathroom.

Yes, yes, I ran to the Home Depot before fears of skillessness, laziness, or maybe common sense could distract me. The wall needed to be all the stereotypes - bold, brave, daring , red.

It became even more clear over eggs and bacon. Yes, of course. I would switch out the decor of the master bathroom with the hallway half-bath, this because two weeks home was insufficient to knock down the dividing wall and combine them into one huge masterpiece of slate-surrounded tub/shower to match the floating sink...

Maybe I should just paint. So the black and white sketch of the brickhouse sister in leather pants could join the Egyptian aluminum piece framed in red and maybe sit on the wall across from the scroll I bought in Zurick that has black Mandarin characters that spelled over red some wonderful verse of wisdom I can't remember the translation for. This was exciting!

By the time I got the last plate in the dishwasher the Tuscan burnt sienna wall with orange undertones and melted butter door frames needed consideration. To look beyond that and see a red bathroom could be jarring. Dismal. Disastrous. I would have to seek therapy.

I only have fragments of my homosexual card left (I've had too many typical male moments deny me access and limit my swipes). Realizing my HGTV limitations, I phoned a friend.

"You want to paint the bathroom red?" my Niecy Nash friend suggested.

"Well just one wall. What I figure is, I can paint directly opposite the hallway. This way you won't see the red unless you're in the bathroom with the door closed."

"Still, do you know how hard it is to paint red? You have to do a lot of coats. Maybe you should go with..."

And from this point on I humored him. Why lie? He was not giving me what I was after. I needed him to corroborate the madness, not discourage it. What kind of friend was he anyway?

So I went on ahead and bought the red semi-gloss from Home Depot. Yeah-yeah, the other walls visible from the dining room had to be some other neutral (boring) color but I needed the paint the red for my very soul.

Behr makes a paint/primer in one, and even though I didn't even know how to pronounce primer (wtf??), I stretched tight upper body muscles to their max to get my palm to my back in self-congratulation.

Then another friend, this one a bona fide interior designer whom I'd called before my lunacy gained momentum, called back. He's the real deal, remembered my house from when he'd stayed there in '08 and could visualize details.

"You know you'll be able to see the red reflected in the vanity over the sink," he said.

"If you're walking by the bathroom?"

"No, if you're sitting down at the table."

Womp, womp, womp. He might be right. I'd have to sit down at the table and see.

He suggested I try to get a gray that would match the gray on the floor (which I despise) and be sure to "add more light in the end if you go with a darker gray because it will suck up what's in there."

So supportive. So reasonable. Such a good friend. With great, free advice.

"So, a half gallon of semi-gloss?" I asked.

"Eggshell. Semi-gloss will be too shiny in the bathroom. But you can still wipe dirt off of eggshell."

Oops. I couldn't bring myself to tell him that I'd already bought red semi-gloss. I could not get my money back. we are in a recession. In New York extra closet space to store paint doesn't exist. Enough reason for me to gloss the bathroom.

Then I cheated a little. I dispatched my little brother Kyle to engage his paint sensibilities after I'd blue-taped the borders. He finished the first coat minutes before midnight, at which point we went to the club to celebrate.

The next day I threw on a house CD, tipped around the apartment, did a step or two down my hallway and shook my behind, all in preamble for the painting I was about to undertake. I went to town on the second coat of red, tipping, stepping and shaking in between on breaks.

When I finished, I had a stroke of genius: rather than busy myself with other activity while the red got comfortable, why not begin work on the opposite wall? I obviously couldn't deal with the adjacent side walls because of the tape demands, but I could certainly get busy on the other side.

Great plan. So I got going and for about twenty minutes I was fine. Some no-doubt heavy woman was screaming gospel remixed into a fierce bass line. But then I started to feel a little light headed. My breathing suffered. Legs and booty were moving just a tad too far behind the downbeat hurling from my speakers in the front room.

Dummy, I told myself, perhaps you need to get out of the tiny space consumed with paint fumes.

Later that night, pleased with myself for having saved my loved ones the trauma of a "Final Destination" occasion, I walked in to see the work. The red was brilliant but a little too bright. That supportive, good, no-charging friend was beyond right. Fortunately, I'd had the good sense to run back to Home Depot to buy a quart of red eggshell to do the third coat!

By the next morning I was ready to pull the blue tape off so that I could see my red wall in all its glory. Like professional bikini waxers in slow mo, I unrolled the only thing standing between me and my design genius (???).

But to my horror, the tape would not let go of some of the paint. The gorgeous border, sectioned off with painstaking effort at the top of this HGTV excursion, turned into the jagged edge before my eyes, exposing bites of white that looked crazy. I would deploy little brother Kyle later, with a wave of hand and hurried words, to fix it.

In the meantime, I had painted the other two walls as well, relocated the red, black and white accoutrements into the newly painted bathroom.

After errands in the city, I came home and needed to pee. I went in and closed the door (none of which is really necessary when you are the only person in the house), I turned to face the red ecstacy and noticed that there was a two-inch margin of space between the door frame and the wall that could be seen reflected in the vanity mirror. A saunter down the hallway would still reveal the scarlet shock designed to take your breath away or fill it with fire, passion, etc. And I couldn't stand the haphazard lengthwise strokes of the brush that didn't match the even roller action I'd perfected.

So I pulled out the gray paint and the tape and I got to fixing. Because at the very least, I needed to be able to tell my decor advisor that I did succeed in making sure that the red did not jump into the dining room as he suspected it would.

Then there was the issue of the wooden toilet seat that was now in the back bathroom but got split in the center as if to harmonize with booty cracks that visit. I'd exhausted resources so running all over creation to find a replacement wouldn't work.

This is when the around-the-corner hardware store comes in handy, you know, the place where people will charge ten dollars and do it while you wait. I squeezed the sides of the toilet seat together and the handyman screwed in a thin metal bar. A blemish. And Dana would boycott the bathroom for fears that an alloy-specific form of rust-flavored salmonella would besiege her behind should she sit close to the quick fix.

Whatever, I got my Sephora fix. In RED.