Jesus, will you look at that thing?!

I am possessed by Hank Williams’ "I Hear That Lonesome Whistle Blow." I’ve listened to it for my last 14 waking hours. What little sleep I had was fitful as I strained towards consciousness to resume my haunted vigil. I missed work as I imagined myself its mournful narrator, his aggrieved lover, a jailed horse thief waiting to be hanged and finding a final solace as I watch them ready my gallows. I ignored plaintive pleas for surcease from my neighbors. Somewhere in the final hours, I began to sing, and since then have sung it in alto, tenor and bass, then switching register from line to line and finally word to word, which is no small feat given that I can’t sing at all. I’ve added a snycopated reggae backbeat and the bright rhythms of an oompah band. I went falsetto for my Muppet Show appearance, dropped to a hum when I paid the delivery guy, and then finished it out with a robust baritone as Paul Robeson at a fundraiser for the Scottsboro Boys.

As I finally put away my overspent CD and contemplated both an emergency adjusting of my dosage and the imminence of my firing, I realized that my 14-hour Hank binge is precisely the sort of stuff they should elicit in personal ads -- deeply embarassing patterns of totally whacko, completely entrenched single behavior we have no hope of changing. Because we're not really going to work out or not work out because you love Almadovar while I think he's an overrated Iberian pimp; our love fate does not hang on whether we both think Pastis has the best salmon eggs, or whether our fetishes fall within the same "Time Out" approved constellation. We're going to work out or not work out if you can accept that I once peed in a Poland Spring bottle and bet myself how long it would take for the uric precipitate to settle, and if I think its charming that you unconsciously continue to masturbate while on the phone with your parents. That is the real basis for romance.

In related news, the Mam-O-Gram should really be a way for more forward gals to catch their fella's attention.

Finally, my obligatory, lame-o effort at political humor. I know this stuff sucks, but I'm working on it, and I'm just so pissed off recently:

From today's New York Times:

G.I.'s in Afghanistan on Hunt, but Now for Hearts and Minds:

For the previous hour, American Army medics had doled out free antibiotics, asthma medication and antacids. Lieutenant Finn sipped tea with Muhammad Sani, a wizened village elder, and offered to pay for a new school or well.

"The more they help us find the bad guys," Lieutenant Finn explained, "the more good stuff they get."

"Genius simplicity!," they must have cried as one, late that night in the Situation Room. "Like the thorn in the lion's paw! We will give some Pepcid to people who for millenia have fought all invaders to a standstill, and, in exchange, they will knowingly roll their eyes towards the oversized village cistern. Rummy! You're worth every dime we paid for you, every dime, I tell you!" Of course, it's difficult to imagine GI's in World War II asking nice Norwegian people to pony up relatives in exchange for a plate of creamed herring and some double churned butter. But no matter! Such churlish points are for the small minded! I for one look forward to vacationing where I can predict eclipses and fashion crude batteries from coconuts in order to get upgraded to the God Suite.

Still, as admirable as our intentions are, some naysayers might suggest something tried and true to get people to love us -- something we know white people went just nutso for, like, um, say, a Marshall Plan or Lend-Lease Program, that have paid invaluable dividends in securing decades of European loyatly, instead of resorting to brilliant but arguably less proven tactics like this:

In one village, a brawl broke out over the free American blankets and sewing kits, with one man hitting another with a shovel,

or this:

Visibly angry, the Americans tied the teenager's hands, placed a burlap sack on his head and pushed him down a steep hillside. As an American soldier knelt on the boy's back and pushed his face into the dirt, Sergeant Jarzab demanded to know if there were more hidden weapons.

"He's a liar, and he's going to Cuba," the sergeant shouted, although he later ordered the boy freed. The boy insisted he had found the mortar and planned to sell it.

As watching Afghan women wailed and recited prayers, one sergeant placed the mortar round on the teenager's back, and another held the captured rifles in the air. A soldier snapped a souvenir photo of the Americans and their quarry.

Why, you say? Because, Marshall Plan, Shmarshall Plan, as Dad always taught us, nothing expresses your own deeply held, human need to be loved like stuffing someone's head in a bowling bag, threatening them with kidnap, and then snapping their shit-pantsed pic in front of their mom. Unless it's doing so while bouncing live ammo off their lower lumbar. Which I think is gilding the lily, but really just a matter of taste. But whichever way suits your own personal style, I say: just kick back now and watch the miracle of love unfold.

Although I have no plans on becoming a comedian, it can’t hurt to be prepared in these uncertain times. Accordingly, I have been giving thought to the sort of tag-line I’d like as my trademark, to let audiences know that this was, indeed, J.W.Y. Latt-brand comedy they were enjoying.

For starters, we’ve got “Peel me another one, Pedro.” While its mild absurdity takes the harsh edge off its Dice Clay snottiness, it still feels a bit tight across the shoulders -- it’s got haughty dismissal covered cold, perhaps incredulity, but then what? I feel the electric blue sateen lapels and ruffled shirt just don't match the elegance of my dreams.

More promising is “Crispety-crunchety and it don’t talk back!” With a nice sing-song pattern of clipped consonants and a pleasing whiff of “ghetto lite” in the Jazzy Jeff vein, it’s both hip-hoppingly memorable and helps connect with younger crowds; unfortunately, it suffers from the twin defects of both meaninglessness and stupidity. These severely constrain its usefulness.

Finally, we have the classically tailored “Not the Jews again!” -- always timely, and provides flexibility as subtle tonal shifts can emphasize blame or anxiety. Plus, with the right audience, the word “Jew” is pure comedy flavor crystal. The downside, of course, is that pissing on a fiercely proud heritage to amuse bachelorettes sucking amaretto sours through penis straws may result in a series of uneasy dreams about Judah Maccabee as your wrestling coach.

My call is winding down. The snack machine has set up her high-pitched siren's keen, and I must answer. Your thoughts much appreciated.

They’ve installed these shiny new steel partitions in the office bathrooms, so that whenever I go in there I feel I'm being prepped for some exciting surgery. Each time now, I shave my torso, apply lines that look medically significant with a red wax pencil, and wrap myself tightly in Saran Wrap before I attend to my business. Yes, it’s a baroque ritual to execute midday in a law firm, and more than once I’ve had to explain why I was carrying a tuba case into the men’s room, but guaranteed I walk out feeling like a Gabor sister -- and that is priceless.

In related news:

Current Consecutive Pork Meal Count: 0 (reset due to inadvertent salad bar lapse).
Record To Beat: 7

1. Randomly remembered micro-crush of the day:

Who: Tall elegant Chinese clerk at high-end candy store who gamely translated "May your noodles grow forever long" into Cantonese for a birthday card.
Duration of crush: 38 minutes (contrived lingering).
Duration of memory: 12 seconds
Rating: PG (low neck line; bra seam; may acccount for short duration of recall).
Increased cancer risk: None.

2. Randomly animated bad choice of the day:

What: Opting for nastier pizza place over really good place one block further away. It is in fact not a pizza place at all but a low-rent Spanish chicken-and-rice outfit that serves pizza as a sideline the way a carnival displays its freaks in a blow-off. Weirdly droopy crust. Sauce measured in angstrom units. Cheese that knows cows by rep only. Pepperoni so oncogenic they should simply serve polyps to begin with.
Motivation: Unclear relative proportions of laziness and a literal need to feed the dark side.
Duration: Insufficient to determine whether Diesel tattoo on neck of soul-patched hipster was permanent.
Rating: Unspeakably toothsome.
Increased cancer risk: 1 gallon, pineapple barium.

3. Randomly wrongheaded flirtatious advance of day:

What: "I think its cool that your inappropriateness is scatological while mine is sexual."
Repelled amorous object: Lovely young Haitian woman.
Motivation: Insufficiently repelled by previous advances.
Duration: N/A
Rating: Mild, considering my history.
Increased cancer risk: None, though risk of dying alone spiking momentarily to "wizened pedophile in mobile home" levels.

Links and comments fully operational. Damn I'm good.

I am also appallingly easy, so if anyone wants to get linked from here, just let me know. All rights reserved, however, to be the jackass God made me if or when I make real friends.

1. I have been blogging less than a month and already I've used both "cosmology" and "neuraesthenic" twice -- though in my defense, neuraesthenic was used once in its noun form. So not only am I a pompous jackass, and not only am I a stale pompous jackass, but I have just managed to be a pompous jackass about being a stale pompous jackass. I am the self-sketching Escher hands of pompous jackassery.

2. The "mudslide" reference in the post below is an oblique shout-out -- how hip am I? -- to the obscenely talented Kyria Abrahams, The First Person Ever To Link To My Blog And Who Will Enjoy Reciprocal Treatment As Soon I Learn Some Bazic Tech Skillz Yo.

For the nonce, go here for seriously funny and occasionally touching reading:

http://dura-luxe.diaryland.com

I just want to say that I was a gibbering, hysteria-prone, neuraesthenic, pants-crapping pussy long before all y'all, but -- big hearted lad that I am -- I proudly welcome Doug Perkins and our new southwest Florida chapter into the warm if sometimes lumpy Brotherhood of The Hopelessly Stupid And Pants Crapping Pussies.

For my readers who enjoy the challenge of a Shonee's placemat maze, the CNN story below is the bold text, while my witty commentary is the unbolded interstitial text:

From CNN. com:

Psychic tip prompts bomb search on plane
Saturday, March 27, 2004 Posted: 12:24 PM EST (1724 GMT)

FORT MYERS, Florida (AP) -- A self-described psychic's tip that a bomb might be on a plane prompted a search with bomb-sniffing dogs

By virtue of presidential fiat, in Southwest Florida, it is not necessary to have evidence of actual psychic ability in order to shut down major air terminals. Several flights were in fact delayed out of Ocala earlier this week when Singh Varupasinder, the Cinnabunz manager from Terminal 3, had a particularly vivid and omen-laden dream that culminated in Ganesha the Elephant God mounting Singh's wife from the rear, while Singh, his wife and Ganesha were all juggled like so many watermelons at a Gallagher concert by Gayatri, the deific personification of the Vedic hymn. Air safety officials considered this dream particularly foreboding as Ganesha was heard on several occassions to leave off his servicing of Mrs. Varupasinder and scream "No you DIN'T, I KNOW you DIN'T" at Gayatri who -- rather than stepping on off it, as befits his place in Hindu cosmology -- instead replied with a saucy "pull my finger" gesture. Officials expressed further concern because the head of Ganesha's engorged member bore a stark resemblance to a young Senor Wences and his scrotum emitted the faint whiff of marzipan. To me and you, merely the comic result of too much bad curry at supper; to those schooled in the Upanishads, pure menace.

Fortunately, that too was just a close call. In'shala, we should be saying. Because while security officials have long worried about an emergent Crank Yankers army of the faithful, strict adherence to sharia compels Al Qaeda not only to consign any actual seers in their ranks to the purifying fires of hell, but also to wrap between two carpets those who speak falsehoods, and beat them with bootleg imports of "Tea for the Tillerman" until either Allah drowns them in their own blood for the treachery that is their sins or Cat Stevens finally explains just exactly what *is* his dillyo, um, yo. So while Tom Ridge has been frantically jiggering his color-coded warning system with the ecstatic urgency of an autistic boy who has discovered that penistouchgoodyaaaay!!, it seems that Mohammed's been the one stymying a "Is Mike Hunt There?" jihad of the variety that brought Constantinople to its knees.

that turned up nothing suspicious

Except, of course, for the MTV camera crew and a cackling Ashton Kutcher in the jumpseat.

but forced the cancelation of the flight.

Ok, fine. Score dude! [exaggeratedly insincere high-five]. That one was a total gimme.

American Airlines Flight 1304 at Southwest Florida International Airport was canceled Friday because some crew members had exceeded their work hours by the time the search was finished, officials said.

Let's see: a warm Friday afternoon on the Gulf Coast. Strict union rules that prohibit overtime. The world's stupidest boss. And some sort of vague terror threat "lite," with only half the RICO countsof your regular bomb threat but with a full-sized serving of flight-cancelling yumminess. Why am I guessing that early FBI analysis of the taped call has revealed a bunch of mechanics whispering "keep it the fuck down or he is SO busted," slurred shouts of "another mudslide ferr the lady!" and an off-key chorus of "Cheeseburger in Paradise?"

The purported psychic's call was "unusual," conceded Doug Perkins, local administrator for the federal Transportation Security Administration director.

Now known as Doug "Slop Closet" Perkins in recognition of his new duties.

"But in these times, we can't ignore anything. We want to take the appropriate measures," he said.

Doug, seriously, SERIOUSLY. Stop.

None of the 128 passengers had boarded yet for the flight to Dallas when the search was ordered, Perkins said.

Doug. DOUG. Whatever it is, no one wants to hear it. Really. Let it go.

TSA officials wouldn't say who the call came from or who received it.

Stated more fully, the official TSA position was "Can you people PLEASE find something else to talk about? Haha, hoohoo, heehee, isn't my face just one big fucking omelet. Um, isn't there a WAR on? Isn't FRIENDS ending soon? Hello? Jesus, you fucking people."

The passengers were placed on later flights, American Airlines officials said.

"I saved lives today, people. LIVES, ya hear me? And they reward me with this . . . ," Perkins was heard sobbing at the airport bar as he swept his arm drunkenly towards a pail of rank water and an impressive cart of solvents, before being tenderly led by fellow custodian Manuel Polsky into the dank, ammonia-scented refuge only they share, and taking -- together -- the first tentative steps in the still, cool dawn of Doug's new life.

LEGAL NOTE: The above implicit attribution of alcohol-fueled homosexual airport orgies -- or even the implicit attribution of touching, alcohol-fueled, mid-life, airport homosexual awakenings -- to Doug Perkins, local administrator for the federal Transportation Security dministration director, is based solely on my overheated imagination and is intended as parody in the manner protected under New York Times vs. Sullivan and its progeny, or, for you smuthounds with no sense of history, Larry Flynt vs. Hustler. However, my depiction of Tom Ridge as a biochemically imbalanced compulsive masturbator is based on hard, documented fact. Total terra firma, baby.

(cue Cole Porter's "Bulldog") I am pleased to live in a country where a man can be disgraced and nearly booted from our highest elected office for a misguided blowjob, while squandering our international credibility, ratcheting up the risk of regional instability, painting a nuclear crosshairs on our nation's back for the next 3 generations, draining the treasury faster than a kiddie pool in late November and cooking up Texas-sized servin's o' civilian casualties, all so you can enrich your daddy's golf pals: that, my friends, is the stuff of pratfalls:

From CNN.com today:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush poked fun at his staff, his Democratic challenger and himself Wednesday night at a black-tie dinner where he hobnobbed with the news media.

Bush put on a slide show, calling it the "White House Election-Year Album" at the Radio and Television Correspondents' Association 60th annual dinner, showing himself and his staff in some decidedly unflattering poses.

There was Bush looking under furniture in a fruitless, frustrating search. "Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere," he said.

Thanks to my well placed contacts in the West Wing, I have obtained an excerpted transcript of Bush's full routine:

"Bunker Buster? Hell, you brought 'er, you bunk 'er, or um bust 'er, or um whatever . . . Haw haw haw, anyway folks, know what WMD really stands for over at Haliburton -- "Way Mucho Dinero," am I right? Huh? Like "Waaaaay Mucho Mucho" . . . Hey Saddam: we got a LOT Gomorrah where that came from, know what I'm saying? . . . "Collateral" casualties? Hell, I didn't know I could get a loan on those things, I just thought they were like curly fries -- with tahini sauce!! . . . oh yeah . . . You've been a fantastically obsequious press corps, folks, but the red light is on and you know what THAT means -- Armageddon ouddaheah . . . haw haw haw . . . You brought her, you predat 'er . . . Ha! . . . Seriously, folks, Laura's gonna disarm mah little Predator if I don't get off this stage right now. . . Good night and God bless!!"

Truly, what better says "I am sorry a stray bomb left your child bereft of her limbs" than a zany presidential pantomime and a big Homer-style "doh"? Unless it's a full-on declaration of war made while wearing only a Wisconsin cheesehead hat. Though, for my money, nothing sends a message of hope to people so desperate they use their bodies as anti-tank weapons like a few uptempo Mark Russell parody numbers -- maybe we can commission something to the tune of "Rock the Casbah." God, they'd LOVE that! At any rate, with this sort of comic genius at the helm, I've got nothing but confidence that the light of laughter will guide not just us but the whole world through these dark, dark times. Four more years -- dare I dream?

And now for your listening pleasure (though you do get the feeling that Cole didn't overstrain himself lyrics-wise) . . .

Bulldog
(http://www.yale.edu/yaleband/ypmb/music/bulldog_03.mp3)

Bulldog! Bulldog!
Bow, wow, wow
Eli Yale
Bulldog! Bulldog!
Bow, wow, wow
Our team can never fail

When the sons of Eli
Break through the line
That is the sign we hail
Bulldog! Bulldog!
Bow, wow, wow
Eli Yale!

Below is my correspondence with TH's publicist about his peeing thing. As you will see, I was more restrained in my emails than here -- while this snarky correspondent persona is new to me, even unschooled I knew that "smug bastard" would put the kabosh on my already slim chances of any response. What I admire most is Ms. XXXXXX's attempt to smoke out my home address; while artless and obviously devised in consultation with their security department, I am flattered to play mouse to her cat. I also think that my response will be the last we hear on this, but a boy can dream:

Date: 3/25/2004 11:47:49 AM Eastern Standard Time
From: JWYLATT
To: Ms. XXXXXXX@-------.com


Dear Ms. XXXXXX:

Thank you for agreeing to pass along my request to Mr. Hanks' office. Frankly, I had not expected to hear back at all, or perhaps to have had a visit paid me by whatever lawyers or goons (synonyms? - perhaps!) that Mr. Hanks may or may not maintain on his payroll.

On that last point however: as for my mailing address, let's stick to e-mail. Not only is it easier, cheaper and faster than snail mail -- yes? -- but Mr. Hanks rightfully does not advertise his home address; I only ask for the same consideration (this is still America, am I right?) I could of course rent out a P.O. Box, but really, how overlabored would that be? Agreed? Agreed!

I thank you in advance for your understanding and your further cooperation. In homage to "The Green Mile," you could say I am "burning" to know the answer to my questions.

Sincerely,

J.W.Y. Latt


In a message dated 3/22/2004 10:10:33 AM Eastern Standard Time, Ms. XXXXXXX @ -----------.com writes:


i will be happy to pass it along to Mr. Hanks' office.

Please will you send me your mailing address -- if there is a reply, it will likely come via regular mail.

thank you,
Ms. XXXXXX


From: JWYLATT@aol.com [mailto:JWYLATT@aol.com]
Sent: Friday, March 19, 2004 2:41 PM
To: Ms. XXXXXX@--------.com
Subject: A query for Tom Hanks, or his publicist


Dear Ms. XXXXXX:

I understand that you represent Tom Hanks. Can you please see that he gets this request? Thank you in advance for your help.

Dear Tom:

As a long time fan, I wonder: Why do you pee so much in your films? Before you dismiss me as pure nut-job, I offer the following litany of some of your silver screen micturations:

Forrest Gump: You pee in a tureen while waiting to meet Lyndon Johnson, who then comments on it.

A League of Their Own: You famously whiz in the clubhouse while bickering with a studiously indifferent Geena Davis.

Saving Private Ryan: You relieve yourself on the French countryside after some particularly stressful combat.

Apollo 13: You wryly disengage from some sort of astro-tube while commenting "why don't they show this on TV?"

Castaway: There is an entire scene in which you simply wake up in the middle of the night, befoul the ocean, and then go back to sleep.

The Green Mile: Your bladder infection and the attendant tenesmus are a full fledged plot device.

Even in films where you do not actually urinate on screen (not "on the screen" - HA!), we can still hear the lifting of the seat: In Road to Perdition, for example, you cleverly pretend you have to pee at the diner -- "too much coffee," remember? -- so as to give the slip to the murderous Jude Law. And in Catch Me If You Can, please forgive me, you actually crawl head-first into a toilet while in hot pursuit of an errant Leo DiCaprio.

So, naturally, I wonder, why, and have so wondered for a long time? I have several pet theories, but I am afraid that my sharing them will taint the purity of your response.

Also, please let me know if anyone else has pointed this out.

Thanks for taking the time to respond. It means a lot.

In the interim,

I remain,

Your Observant Fan,

J.W.Y. Latt

I realize this makes my porn obsession look healthy in comparison, but Tom Hanks peeing . . . Whaddafuuh? He does this in virtually every movie, at least since he attained auteur status. America's Whizz Kid. Haha. And while I don't claim encyclopedic familiarity with the Hanks ouevre -- I have been spared the painful humiliations that are "Joe versus The Volcano," "Turner and Hooch" and "The Money Pit" -- the evidence is nonetheless overwhelming: witness the Splash marks on my shoes. In no particular order, then:

Forrest Gump: pees in a government-issue tureen while waiting to meet Lyndon Johnson, who then comments on it.

A League of Their Own: famously whizzes in the clubhouse while bickering with a studiously indifferent Geena Davis.

Saving Private Ryan: relieves himself on la belle pays after some particularly stressful combat.

Apollo 13: wryly disengages Little Tom from some sort of astro-tube while commenting "why don't they show *this* on TV?" (Oh, but Tom, they do!)

The Green Mile: With a bladder infection and the attendant tenesmus at center stage, Hank's stream graduates from conceit to full fledged plot device.

Castaway: In perhaps his apotheosis of micturative self-indulgence, Tom stages an entire scene in which he simply wakes up in the middle of the night, befouls the ocean, and then goes back to sleep.

Even when we aren't subject to such appalling imagery, we can still hear, at least metaphorically and sometime literally, the lifting of the seat: In Road to Perdition, for example, he cleverly pretends he has to pee at the diner -- "too much coffee," doncha know -- so as to give the slip to the murderous Jude Law. And in Catch Me If You Can, in what may be the perfect if bizarre culimination of this little quirk, Hanks literally crawls head-first into a toilet while in hot, foamy pursuit of an errant Leo DiCaprio.

Why does this all stick in my craw like some wind-borne Hanksian pube? First off, because of course no one else notices this. Instead -- predictably -- they patronizingly indulge my rant until it makes them feel uncomfortable, at which point they distance themselves from the whole thing by attributing all manner of kinky, homoerotic motivations for my bringing it up. Not to paint myself like some misunderstood Ibsen hero or, for those not steeped in the canon, some Dickie Dreyfuss in "Jaws," that resented-by-the-townfolk Cassandra of an ichthyologist, but -- hello! -- Hanks is the one polluting the screen: I am just sounding the alarm.

But more to the point, because you can tell that smug bastard is relentlessly positioning himself to be the next Ronald Reagan and so inserts his pissing into these movies to give himself an earthy, Everyguy, voter-appeally touch -- what could be more unquestionably down-to-earth, after all, than taking a leak, whether in the White House, a club house, France, prison or space (it's like following a drunk around a mini-golf course). It's all so contrived; aside from a minor exhibitionist frisson, you get the feeling that, fundamentally, Hanks doesn't give a damn about the evacuative arts. And the whole thing lacks a good pedigree. Freud describes the oral, the -- *ahem* -- anal, the phallic, the latency and the genital phases of development; peeing is relegated at best to some dribbly minor theme, rating only a footnote in "Civilization and Its Discontents." Ever describe anyone as "bladder retentive"? No, and with good reason -- you need to go, you go. Done. No drama, while a good crap -- one really worth taking -- can summon the hysteria and exultation usually reserved for childbirth. Also, as a Jew, it is of course genetically obvious to me that the bowels are a much more worthy object of fascination; for you less GI-centric goyim, I ask rhetorically: did Luther scribe the Edict of Nantes while draining his mead into some monastic trough? To which I answer literally: No, but he *was* passing loaves and fishes much of the time. Perhaps taking a satisfying on-screen dump is just a little earthier, a bit more ochre-toned, than Tom and his handlers are prepared to commit to.

I will shortly be composing an inquiry about this to the Tom Hanks fan club, and look forward a la Lazlo Toth to posting their response. If anyone has any additional movies I can cite -- perhaps there is a hidden golden treasure in "Big," or "Bachelor Party" or "The 'Burbs?" -- please email me at jwylatt@hotmail.com. Seriously, help me out, people -- I already sacrificed 2 1/2 hours of my Friday night to "Catch Me If You Can" (where Spielberg seems to have had only a limited restraining influence on our boy's erratic housetraining, as noted above). So please -- spare me that burning sensation I get from watching Tom's movies, let me know I can Depends on you, and send me enough references so that I can write my entire letter to the THFC in the snow.

Jaundicedly yours,

J.W.Y. Latt

Current top contender for Colleague Line of My Career (Female):

"I guess things could be worse -- you could be cumming on my face for two bucks."

In my incredibly brief time blogging (two days), it's already clear that online dating -- or, more precisely, the lack thereof -- is the same life-destroying obsession among the relentlessly snarky as among the needlepointedly earnest. What was once the lonely province of Daughters of Esther, staring down the barrell of menopause, absently stroking that proud row of hair on their upper lip as they thumbed the back pages of the Village Voice, is now a thrilling new arena of humiliation thrown open for the multiply pierced to enjoy.

A blazing victory for the Internet as engine of democratizing pathos.

Never above tossing my virtual tam o'shanter in the ring, however, below is my actual on-line dating profile. If I lived in any sort of decent culture, those last four words would lead, inexorably, to ritual suicide: a glass of cognac, perhaps, and a Luger, left on the bureau. A quiet, understanding nod from a close friend before the door clicked shut for the last time. So, in some way, I hold it as a point of pride that my ad has not only failed to excite a single response from those on whom I chanced a buck for an overture, but actually managed to terminate -- mid-stride, like some ill-fated Zola Budd of Luv -- all correspondence with those snookered by earlier, more sincere offerings. I think it's pretty bland, actually, so my guess is it's the pony. That, or I just stopped hiding what a pompous asshole I am.

Either way, if any of the below does leave you feeling moved all ovah, don't be shy. The Doctor is IN!


Last great book I read:

Not so much a book, but I thumped my well-groomed chest in victory when I figured out these Ikea instructions.


Most humbling moment:

Being passed up as the incarnation of Gautama Buddha *and* for membership on the Trilateral Commission on the same day -- that is, like, *so* the last time I rush a house.


Favorite on-screen sex scene:

At the launch party for an erotic magazine with which we are all familiar, the poetry editor got serviced by his wife, said act being broadcast on closed circuit TV. Unfortunately, my cries of "Brava!!," "Huzzah!!," and, of course, "Encore!!," went unheeded.


Celebrity I resemble most:

These hotties once told me that I looked *just* *like* Takemiya Masaki -- seven time Honinbo title holder -- but I think they were just flirting, or whatever.


Best or worst lie I've ever told:

Takemiya Masaki won the Honinbo title seven times (haha as if!).


If I could be anywhere at the moment:

In a moonlit stadium, demonstrating virtuosity in any of the innumerable skills that I both envy and lack. The crowd is so moved, so overawed, they must find new media to express their admiration -- howling at the stars, pulling out their hair, burning one another in effigy. Silent, indifferent to the tumult, I stand alone, content in my craft.


Song or album that puts me in the mood:

The music of the spheres, with some serious wah-wah action.


The five items I can't live without:

A finely tuned balance of power, punctuated by titillating daytrips into chaos and despotism.

My extensive holdings in shadowy offshore enterprises.

The release of imported biota into vulnerable domestic ecosystems.

Gum!

Seriously, gum! Any kind!


Fill in the blanks:

A pinata is sexy;
Whacking a real pony is sexier


In my bedroom, you'll find:

an emergency stash of Burmese opium; a chef's toque; a cat so profoundly needy that she is referred to only as "Patient P." in the Annals of Veterinary Psychology.


Why you should get to know me:

Because my cage dancing days are behind me, and I'm ready to move on.


More about what I am looking for:

As Ken Kesey put it, someone on the bus, or, more prosaically, just someone on the bus.

Started in Bangkok, finished in Narita Airport, Tokyo:

1. Farang men who have relationships with Thai women fall into four categories: (1) "Happy Humbert" -- Humbert constantly grins bcause he can finally indulge his tastes without fear of arrest or social approbation. Strictly speaking, he is more a quasi-pedophile than a true child molester -- he has the patience to wait at least for the onset of puberty. Perhaps pathetically, too, more than any of the other types, he wants to be loved by the girls he picks; (2) "Revenge of the Nerds" -- priced sexually out of the market back at home, this is the average guy who is stunned at his good fortune to have such a beautiful, compliant and grateful girlfriend; (3) "White Man's Burden" -- this revolves around a savior complex situated at the juncture of lust and poverty-driven culture shock... Who could ever be THAT dumb?... heh...; (4) "Hertz, Avis, Alamo" -- these guys just want an affordable, reliable ride that is nice to look at and can be returned with a minimum of hassle. The healthiest of the group.

2. I am beyond absurd in Thai clothing. In my puffy pants and Prince-circa-1980 shirt, I suspect I would in short order reach the limits of the much-vaunted Thai tolerance. Sartorial ambitions of going native promptly abandoned.

3. For a country with little or no welfare, there are suprisingly few beggars. But for those you do see, there is no question of need -- shorn stumps, eyeless sockets, and the death-camp emaciation of advanced AIDS are plainly, though not ostentatiously, on display. While a wheezing band of the blind play unrecognizable tunes, I give to the man whose face was simply burnt off.

4. My only successful Thai joke relies on the universal narrative of alcoholism. Pointing to the top of an unopened bottle of Johnny Walker Black, I moved my finger segmentally down to the bottom, intoning "Sao. Sinouk. Bah. Dtai" --"Sad. Fun. Crazy. Dead." It has gotten a lot of play.

5. I have decided to teach Song and her friends useless and outdated slang phrases such as "Man, are my dogs barking!" and "Check out the gams on that dame," and also how to say "A-thank you very much" like Elvis Presley. Understandably, they are wary of being used for my sport.

6. After three weeks here, Thai attitudes towards safety continue to shock, almost literally -- live high voltage lines hang a child's arm's length from apartment windows. On the other hand, on the train at Kanchanburi, I was free to hang 100 feet above the River Kwai from hand-holds outside the car door, so it can be kind of liberating.

7. I have finally stopped being so wrongheadedly democratic with my use of the wai, after having inadvertently exalted about half the busboys in town as Most Benevolent Overlords.

8. Lacking effective local competition in the mini-mart sector, 7-11's flourish here like Australian rabbits.

9. After a weekend spent with Song and her friends in Pattaya, I found a pocketbook that someone had left in my hotel room. Looking through it to see to whom it belonged, I found only some makeup, a change purse with very few coins, and a well-worn copy of a book called "Modern Love Letters in English" in which Song had written her full name on the frontispiece in careful script. The letters, which are absurdly breathless and nakedly artless, are addressed to a hypothetical Richard and trace the arc of an assumed relationship -- "Richard, perhaps you don't remember me but we met at a cafe on Silom Road and had a wonderful conversation," "Richard, did I tell you that I think of you every day and count the days until your next visit? I don't know why this is, but it is true!! I MISS YOU!!"--"Dearest Richard, I have been so worried? Why have you stopped writing and sending money? I might have to go back to work at the bar in Patpong... ." The author -- who included his or her qualifications of B.A. and M.A. presumably to give the work the heft of academic authority -- even includes aphorisms to help the girls explain, for example, why some distance might be a good idea -- "absence makes the heart grow fonder" or why sex might not be forthcoming -- "soon ripe, soon rotten." And while I knew that my money was the reason I had worked my way into this group of friends, I was still angry to think of how explicit Song's scheming was, and then I thought how practiced she was in cooking over a tin can fire on the side of a dusty road, or how she could swipe a spare paper napkin and quickly fashion it into a hair tie; later, when I handed back to her what was literally a cheap handbag full of hopeless dreams, I could not look in those inky and impenetrable eyes, and I could not stop crying.

10. In my final days in Bangkok, I came to realize that it is not a city well served by a Manichean world view, because to view it through the stark bars of bright and dark, right and wrong, pure and sullied, is to miss its fluid and multidetermined nature. Confidence men say that the true mark convinces himself, so perhaps that is what I am doing, but ultimately I stand in awe of Song, who so effortlessly stayed true to her friends, with whom she shared the opportunities made possible by my money, and whom she would neither defend nor say anything ill when I found some of them to be overreaching; to herself, because she never asked for anything from me, except her eyes once lit up at the prospect of a $10 fishtank; and to me, of whom she took very, very good care.

11. The Thai have no real tradition of the napkin as a paper product of distinct texture and weave. This could be a huge marketing opportunity if you could sensitize them to its advantages.

12. A confession: Where, earlier, I said that it took a Big Mac to coax my bowels out of hiding, what I really should have said is that two bites into my burger and I literally crapped my pants in the restaurant.

13. Another confession: Where, earlier, I said that Cosmos was the closest I had to a home in Bangkok, what I really should have said was that sitting drunk in a booth at 1:00 in the morning with three women who speak no English at all, a surly dwarf who begrudgingly lets me buy him drinks, and a transvestite in the middle of a very animated, incomprehensible anecdote, I realized that I had not been this happy or this comfortable in some time. Sad, eh, but true.

See you all soon.

20 random thoughts about Thailand:

1. As per my last email, make no mistake -- I am sorely tempted to indulge my id unfettered in Patpong: strap on a feedbag of Viagra, run naked and priapic through the alleys throwing fistfuls of baht at any slender young thing that pleased me. And there are plenty of them that do. I am just trying this moral restraint thing on for size.

2. In a land of both official censorship and truly draconian drug laws, porn is the Thai ganja. Men seemingly flown in from Washington Square Park hover around the various markets, discretely flashing cards that say "DVD SEX VCD" while muttering the same sad mantra.

3. In Thailand, I am tall. God bless.

4. Upon closer inspection, Thai script looks like a combination of English, Hebrew and Zapf Dingbats. It no longer holds much mystery.

5. Thai bad translations of English have a unique quality of overshooting the mark rather than the expected, "good enough for government work" laxness. Because they take great pride in being "modern," the English signs are stiffbacked, ambitious attempts at emulating native speech; they almost invariably fail -- stray prepositions simply wander off into the ether -- but it is from a noble surfeit of effort, rather than a lack.

6. Judging from Thai television, the average viewer is a woman anxious to the point of neuraesthenia about split-ends and clogged pores; thinks that products promoted by cutesy animated figures will simultaneouly ensure her child's health and his filial piety; can learn to cook a new meal in under ten minutes while humming patriotic songs; and has a boundless appetite for historical melodramas with stagecraft so hammy that it manages to violate all the laws of kashrut (hehehe).

7. What few male viewers it attracts are apparently content to watch lengthy promotions for action programs that never actually air.

8. Bangkok movie theaters rock. You pick your seats when you buy your tickets, and flashlight-toting ushers walk you down comfortably wide aisles where you settle into an ergonomically perfect bucket seat. For more money you can pay to watch from a loveseat, and for even more you get a reclining Barcalounger, complete with throw blanket and pillow. The sound system crawls right inside your ears and reduces Dolby to some cheesy close-and-play number.

9. The Bangkok malls that house the Bangkok movie theaters rock. Huge corruscating temples of spotless glass and chrome, they have cool escelators that lay flat the whole time, spacious comfortable plazas, good food, and apparently no churlish "rats" running rampant with Daddy's card. There are a great number of technoboxes that require full body engagement -- screened booths where you get video pictures taken and laminated onto pocket calendars, soundproof individual karaoke recording studios, video games that you have to mount to play. The Thai don't just like their technology; they want to be enveloped in it.

10. Eminem, Dido and -- strangely -- Creedence Clearwater Revival seem to form the current reigning triumvirate of popular farang music.

11. The ladyboy is a cultural type that defies Western analogy. At once ridiculed and commonly accepted, the phenomenon runs way beyond the popular ladyboy robbery movie or ladyboy entertainers at the discos. A Jackie Chan-esque comedy called "The Bodyguard" has a katoey paramedic in a small comic role; the men's room attendant at the Wat Phrae Kaeow, which houses Thailand's most sacred Buddha, rouges his cheeks and streaks his hair. In a surreal but achingly tender confluence of uniquely Thai phenomena, one early morning I watched an aging ladyboy -- not pretty even when young -- struggle her way so earnestly through the scrolling karoake lyrics of "Who'll Stop The Rain?" The concept of the katoey is embedded not just in their vocabulary but in their very grammar -- where men end a statement or question with the polite participle "kop" and women likewise with "ka," the katoey use "haa," pronounced in a high effeminate tone.

12. The Thai adore their children, always hugging them and very patient with them -- I have not seen one irate mother or heard one tantrum thrown. But their concept of childhood does not map neatly onto ours. Parents routinely zip through Bangkok traffic on scooters with their kids as passengers, wearing shorts, flip flops and no helmets. Kids as young as 6 work the market stalls with their parents directly across from bars called Superpussy; children who look about 10 tout for the sex shows, sometimes alone, sometimes in tow with their grandmothers. This sort of exposure might be chalked up to the tragic necessity of economics, though the easy rapport between the sex club workers and those working the stalls suggests something else is going on, an acceptance of one another as natural and inevitable features of the landscape. And in any event, simply to pass the time, several mothers with a crew of giggly pre-teens made the rounds with me at the Forensics Museum at Sirichai Hospital -- which displays embalmed, naked corpses of notorious criminals, tatooed severed forearms bloated from formaldehyde, and graphic pictures of the "Cranial Trauma - Post Mortem (Hog Bite)" variety. Any of this back home would get a parent onto Oprah, if not arrested.

13. The Thai are more likely to carry or frame a picture of themselves than pictures of their children, spouses or friends.

14. The Thai attitude towards dirt is difficult to guage. Outside, grime settles everywhere undisturbed, filth laps unproblematically right at the edge of their doors, and flies have to reach a nearly nuclear critical mass before they are shooed away from a meal. Nonetheless, they shower and change clothes usually twice a day and can be physically sickened by someone wearing shoes in the house. All I know is that the taxis, buses and Skytrain are blessedly free of the sort of gagging miasma that turns a summer ride on the Paris Metro into a full-dress drill for a ricin attack.

15. The Thai are quite modest about displaying their bodies, generally wearing long pants and long shirts even in the midday sun. But in conversation, it's fat jokes, sex jokes, rape jokes, fecal jokes -- one lovely, elegant woman pantomimed the word "kee" for me by squatting down and grotesquely contorting her features. Friends tease one another in ways that seem arrestingly cruel yet it is somehow all safely subsumed in their notions of "sinouk," an all-purpose word for pleasant, fun, joking. The underlying love and care is mutually assumed and, because mutually assumed, patent and liberating. My kind of country.

16. Thai bathrooms are suprisingly clean and pleasant. Nonetheless, I will subject my intestines to rupture before I squat without toilet paper over a hole in the ground.

17. Thai food is generally delicious but so spicy that my bowels took cover for my first week here; it required a Big Mac to coax them out of hiding. McDonald's here also serves something called a Samurai Pork Burger that even I, devotee of the cult of the Swine, have to pass on.

18. Scams of the farang are rampant. Some are elaborate, like the one with promises of seeing traditional gem handcrafting that landed me at the Royal Lapidary Company, sipping complimentary green Fanta while watching a promotional video about the "beauty forged from the earth's secret power" and the invaluable peace of mind undoubtedly provided by a "Genuine Certificate of Consumer Protection." Others seem invented spur of the moment and are commendably clever, like the old woman at the floating market who charged me 81B for four meals, when etiquette required me to leave her the 19B change; she cornered me neatly. Or the morose girl from Cosmos who implored me to buy her a snack of fried grasshoppers for 50B when they were only 20B; calling her out on it, she just laughed and played it off as "sinouk" (she left with her bag of food anyway, so how successful I was in dodging this scam is debatable). Even the expats get in on the game, like the nice old white guy who gave me directions before sighing about the recent delay of his Social Security check. Oho! Not *this* time, Chico! Smug and smiling, I gave him a sympathetic look and a chuck on the arm before zipping off down Sukhumvit Road.

19. Thai expressions of their faith are ubiquitous, and range in scale from the fantastically baroque and rhapsodic to the most basic and quotidian. Even a roadside wat on the city's outskirts, tucked between a tomato stand and a sewage ditch, will have a roof covered in brand new terra cotta tiles, crowned with a gilded, stylized bird at the apex above the door; the entry way is flanked by similarly gilded snakes, and wreathed in carved bright red flames. There may be an enormous Chinese demon guard posted at an entrance, 30 feet tall, articulated into segments like a totem pole, outfitted with riotous mosaic armor and its face cut in an exaggerated rictus of fierceness. Then there are the major temples, like Wat Phrae Kaeow, home to the Emerald Buddha and which is simply astonishing -- covered in millions of glittering mosaic tiles, the inside doors stretching 20 feet high and painstakingly inlaid with mother of pearl, every inch of the interior walls devoted to frescoes of Buddha's life that culminate in a furious battle as the forces of evil joined together to stop his final ascent into Nirvana. Quite the crowd pleaser. But for all the artistry and craftsmanship harnessed by the Ramas and others to inspire awe and make manifest the sacred, it is the gentle, solitary gestures of belief and respect that leave me undone: the tuk driver giving a deep and silent wai when he passes a wat or memorial to Rama V; Song placing a sipping straw in a fresh glass of tomato juice for Buddha; the gifts of a juice box, sour candy and a toy figurine left for the embalmed encephalitic fetus at the forensics museum. Most beautiful of all, though, is the quiet loving way that Song will simply say "my Buddha" -- so suffused with faith, she expresses effortlessly, in one breath, what all the kings and priests labored so hard -- and, it feels, ultimately failed -- to capture in porcelain, mosaic and gold.

20. As I overheard one of the few American black tourists say while walking on Silom near Patpong: "This is some kind of shit right here."

'Nuff said.

What does it mean to come up for air?

In the last ten days, I have:

** Squatted on the floor of a Bangkok tenement at five in the morning, playing an incomprehensible version of pai gow poker with a toothless grandmother who won and lost her 20B hands with equally unyielding stoicism. Five of us play cards and another five either eat or doze in the dingy single room, its only bed a much-used futon on the floor. I am fed tuna fish salad with hot chilis wrapped in lettuce, given Heineken with ice, and toasted relentlessly -- "okeh-okeh, Jan, okeh, euay?" Clink-clink. I am the bank because they say I am "big money." Terrified of the karmic consequences of winning the old woman's meager baht -- I figure the others have it coming -- I gratefully lose about 300B and make a gift to my hostess of 500B for having me as a guest in her home. As she reaches for the money, she takes my hand, and squeezes.

** Danced maniacally in a Pattaya disco as a renowned "katoey," or ladyboy, delivered a very uptempo "Hava nagila" to a roaring crowd of almost a thousand, after having wowed them with what seemed a very successful comedy set. We are drinking Johnny Walker Black, the drink of choice among the Thai, bought by the bottle with each glass meticulously poured by attendants in bright yellow jumpsuits. Techno beats and rave-style lasers give way to live performances of Thai pop, which consists almost entirely of anthemic ballads that excite emotive, slow-fist-pumping from the very first strains; I may single-handedly be responsible for introducing the Tisted Sister/extended-pinky-and-index-finger "bullhorns" variation into the Thai gestural vocabulary. I am entirely too smug about the Thai obssession with what I conclude are bad imitations of Western boy- and girl-band style choreography, until I later see a Britney Spears concert on TV and realize that it is I who am woefully behind the curve.

** On a blazing late afternoon, eaten tripe while perched on a dusty platform outside a rural row of shanties, surrounded by superannuated tires and dogs with testicles and teats literally dragging on the ground, who chase away the curious stray chickens. A leathery man on a motorcycle delivers the meal, which comes in a clear plastic bag complete meat, greens, cilantro, soup, hot sauce, bark for tinder and cooking charcoal. A tray with a well for the soup is placed over a rusted tin can which holds the hot coals, and lunch is deftly prepared. Although I am largely ignored, as payor for the meal I am pointedly served second after the old woman who owns the house, and the conversation among the Thai is very easy and fluid, despite several of them having never met before. My only guess is that this comes from a consciousnes of status and protocol that provides much of the intimate architecture of the Thai worldview, so that questions of etiquette that might leave us unsettled -- who prepares? who cleans? what do you say to someone's mother? -- are all answered, down into their bones.

** Wandered for three hours through Bangkok's Chinatown, more than 200 years old and so labyrinthine and bizarre that encountering the Minotaur himself would have ocassioned only minor surprise. Small alleys barely the width of two refrigerators turn onto impossibly small alleys that turn on even smaller alleys, all jammed with old women tending to woks full of hot oil, motorbikes making deliveries, and shoppers picking over bin after bin of cheap, indistinguishable goods. Each alley yields up some rough pleasure, some half-formed pearl -- a row of stalls dedicated to pitch-perfect imitation weapons, an elaborate makeshift shrine where saffron-robed monks dip fronds into water and shake them indiscriminately at the faithful, who donate 20B and are rewarded with a necklace thrown onto their lowered necks, hoop-toss style. As I stare, I am flashed a dazzling smile by the novitiate doing the tossing.

** Less spectacularly: negotiated street stall meals in nothing but Thai and was unbearably proud of it for hours afterward; did the same with a tuk, braved the public bus and totally dug the Skytrain, which has about 8 stops but is sleek, silent, spotless and always seems to be gliding into the station from the future itself; went to the Big C Mall and surprisingly laughed for real at the current Thai blockbuster, which is about 4 ladyboys who rob a bank after one of their's lust for David Beckham leads to gambling debt problems with the mob (the film's title is rather oddly translated as "Spicy Beauty Queen In Bangkok"); played guide to an overwhelmed and underprepared British woman who was quite clear about wanting to see ladyboys but who became just as unglued when I suggested to the katoey that s/he prove her unusual status; located the Bangkok Go Club, where I was politely ushered out of the strong player's room and where the manager bought me dinner and regaled me at length with his unique, somewhat understandable theories about the game.

In truth, it is SongDao who is my key to Bangkok, to the extent it will unlock for a white foreigner on a short vacation, which I would wager is not very far at all but which is still plenty for me. With a broad, brown face, and serene eyes so dark they seem to lack irises, Song is 34 years old, with a three year old daughter named Dtang-moh, or "watermelon," who lives with Song's sister upcountry in Petchabun, near Lao. A bit heavy and not conventionally beautiful, she looks almost Mexican, with features equally at home on a pillar at Angkor Wat (think the huge idol face at the end of "Apocalypse Now") as at the center of an Aztec calendar. Despite experience as an office accountant, English courses and two years at university, Song is the cashier at Cosmos, a "girly" bar in Patpong, and I am of course smitten.

Before anyone groans about Patpong, I tell you now that I have not had sex, been serviced by, seen naked, fondled or indeed even kissed Song, or any of the other women who work at Cosmos; even if I could have initially, of which I am not entirely sure, to do so now would be grotesque. If you don't know, Patpong is the seedy red light district made famous by Spaulding Gray's comment in "Swimming to Cambodia" that it's the place to see women "do everything with their vaginas except have babies." I had avoided it in part to guard against my own instincts -- Ulysess binding himself to the mast -- and because I was hoping instead to link up with sympatico farang tourists to share all this weirdness with.

In all honesty, though, perhaps the real reason that I didn't go to Patpong right off is that, sexually, I am a contrarian. Back in New York, I would like nothing better than to find some starchy Wall Street or lawyer type, slap a bit and a bridle on her and ride her around the Vault wearing nothing but assless chaps. Here, where I could easily find that sort of thing and at Costco prices, all I want to do is chat amiably. Go figure. But planning on bailing on the tour and wanting both company and a guide, I headed to Patpong, reasoning that, if I could hire women to do literally unspeakable acts, surely I could find someone willing to show me the local restaurants.

But while Patpong deserves its reputation, it is not monolithic. Yes, there are "blowjob bars," which are aptly named, and bars just like Spaulding Gray described, where women toots horns, write their names, extract terrifically long flower chains, and even manipulate razor blades (!!) with their vaginas; one suspects that birthing could be had for a price, so I would have to say the only thing the women don't do with their privates is vote. It is completely unerotic, and it seems more like something for Stupid Human Tricks if Letterman were subject to cable's more liberal standards.

Except, of course, on Letterman it wouldn't be to eat or to make rent or buy the next fix, which is the simple, inscapable truth of the whole thing. So it astounds me that there are tourists who decline to toss some baht into the can when the girls come around after they perform -- this person not only degraded herself to make ends meet but she must have spent hours *practicing* to do so. Are these guys such conossieurs of gynecological legerdemain that this is somehow amateur hour stuff? I smile at the women, avoid holding their gaze, say thank you, and give them some money. I recognize that I am as grotesque as what I despise -- trust me, I do not exempt myself from any of this analysis -- but in Patpong this is what passes for kindness, and even in the gutter there has to be respect.

By contrast, Song's bar, Cosmos, is basically the Abbey Pub -- with, granted, hookers, though I have thought more than once that that might enliven the Abbey considerably. Dark wood, simple booths lining a square bar, the girls dress in normal street clothes and there are no touts outside beckoning for you. On the center column, facing the door, is a Buddha draped in a fresh garland with offerings of fruit juice; below him is a plate embossed with a faded daguerrotype picture of a mustachioed and serious Rama V, a much-revered king. Rama is offered brandy. When you come in, the women at the door wai as you are handed a cool, lotioned wipe for your hands and face. While of course you are being sized up, and a casual smile can be construed as an invitation, you are not besieged by crotch-rubbing women spewing predictable porn-star nonsense. The women make their money on tips and on the drinks you buy them -- I am later told they take 30B a drink, regardless of its price -- and, if you are both amenable, you can negotiate a price for later.

The atmosphere is just so much more blessedly normal than any other place on the strip, though normal, obivously, is a decidely relative term on Patpong. Maybe it's just more pleasant. In contrast to the deafening bands of the other bars, Cosmos has a turntable at a reasonable volume, manned, so to speak, by an affable flirtatious katoey named Bop, whose selections run anomalously to Theresa Brewer singing "Put Another Nickel In (In the Nickolodeon)," John Denver's "Thank God I'm A Country Boy," and other numbers not frequently heard stateside. The bar is backed by a laconic dwarf named Dt-eea, which simply means "short," and the place is owned by man named Winai but who everyone just calls "Boss" -- grey ponytail, smiling, and as hawk-eyed as you would expect from an ex-cop. As with the Abbey and Henry's, and in getting to know Song, I have become a regular, with simple greetings of recognition and easy idle chat. Song is the closest I have to a friend in Bangkok, and Cosmos the closest I have to a home, and even knowing that the warmth is bought and paid for -- though in fairness it's bought and paid for the world over -- it still feels warm anyway.

(A quick aside about the sex trade: I will leave it to more dedicated social and economic theorists to sort it all out, but the whole thing always lays bare for me the raw nubby tensions of capitalism: to pay is to continue demand, to not pay is to deprive someone of what they need. With my baht, I can vote no to the system or yes to dinner. I suppose I could always just give them my baht -- that is in fact what I did with Brian in Koh Samui, unable to hurl pingpong balls at the go-go dancers -- but that sort of charity is formless and ultimately unsustainable. Sometimes those whose tastes don't run to this sort of thing confuse their aesthetic preferences with moral superiority, but once you recognize the humanity of these women, you can't help but see the desperation and the indignities that hang like Bluebeard's eviscerated wives in some remote and dark closet. That is the reason I do not want to touch Song, because all I would think about is her enduring for her daughter's sake.)

I've been in Bangkok for ten days now, having jettisoned my tour in short order. I did so for several reasons. First, there were only two couples with me on the tour. One was Charlie and Julie, a lovely, easy-going pair from Australia in their 50's who were careful in their comportment and thoughtful in their comments, and who graciously shared a bottle of their wine with me when I made my break from the group. The other was Richard and Janine, your typical pudding-faces from England who wrinkled their post-imperialist noses at everything and who thought it very funny, particularly Richard, to suggest that we call our guide "Boy."

I managed one day with him, on a tour of Wat Po, a large temple compound which, among many other things, houses galleries of Buddhas collected from all over Thailand. Samparng, our wonderfully earnest if underinformed young guide, was doing his level best, in whatever English he could muster, to explain everything for us. He managed surprisingly artfully with the phrase "Buddhist cosmology" but clung to what few facts he was certain of as if they were life-rafts. Richard, however, decided it would be fun to catch Samparng out, humiliate him -- aggressively counting "that's ONLY six, that's only SEVEN" when Samparng explained that there are 32 symbols of the Buddha -- golden skin, long ears, toes of even length, different positions of hands and body, etc. Samparng's pain was as palpable as Richard's delight. As I volunteered that I couldn't remember the Seven Fucking Dwarves, I indulged a brief but satisfying fantasy involving Richard, an unfortunate coconut-and-machete accident, and the royal crematorium. I suspected that when the tour made it to the River Kwai raft trip, I would have to deposit him into the drink in short order.

But the real reason I bailed was Bangkok itself. As crazy as Samui is, you can take it down in one gulp; Bangkok is as wide, deep, strange and, I suspect, as merciless as an ocean. I wanted to swim in it in whatever way I could, in whatever direction I wanted, unfettered by the demands of an itinerary or having my "cha yen" -- my cool heart -- tested by some petulant biscuit-eater. I had suspected this would be the case as soon as I left Koh Samui. The approach to Bangkok from Don Nuang Airport evoked the same nervous anticipation as the long slow ride up the first hill of a rollercoaster. As you drive along the elevated tollroad -- which is ironically built to accomodate a great deal more traffic than the toll, prohibitive by Thai standards, will permit -- there is a blankness to the broad cityscape on either side of you, a seemingly infinite checkerboard of low white buildings, smudged irrevocably grey by the smog, most with articulated facades that look like two unwashed ice cube trays turned on their sides and stacked on top of each other. Here and there, Orwellianly faceless towers pop up, favoring the same ice tray architecture as the tenements just accordioned up and out, also smog grey, listless and wilting,sadly ambitious sandcastles on a dingy beach.

By contrast, just ahead you, there are these enormous billboards, often bearing little more than "SONY" or "FORD" or "OBAYASHI" in letters the size of flying saucers. They are distributed out so that you have not quite recovered from the last one when you have to brace yourself, like against a strong wave, for the next. They are all plainly calculated to arouse, to cow and to awe, in an exhausting demonstration of what seems to be a literal Thai equation of size to wealth: stupendous wealth must stupefy in presentation. The message is plain: keep your eyes straight ahead: this is a city dedicated to commerce and industry and never you mind what you see out the corner of your eye.

But it is what you see out of the corner of the eye that compels exploration. Bangkok has all that Koh Samui has -- the smells and the half-dead dogs, the heat, the raggedly proliferating businesses and shanty homes sharing street space with stately banks and gleaming office buildings -- coupled with a constant furious energy that makes New York seem doped up in comparison. The infamous Bangkok traffic, for example, alternates sudden and complete deadlock for cars and buses with manic bursts of speed, all the while whizzing with brazen motorbikes and "tuk-tuks," three-wheeled open-aired taxis favored by the locals and the more adventurous tourists. Crossing a major street like Silom Road, where my hotel is located, is more an Apache manhood rite than a simple exercise in locomotion. Not even the locals look at all confident that they will see the other side: they cluster together into easily-spotted groups and take, I presume, no small measure of comfort from their belief in reincarnation.

Even when you stand still, the city comes at you. There are smells I hadn't even known were possible, pouring out of street carts selling every conceivable kind of food -- carved papaya, sugared tamarind, seasoned beetles that are deep fried and munched by the handful. A simple turn down a side street yields a go-go bar called "Boy Zone," corrugated tin shanties that look at a glance to be home to families of five or more, one-room storefront salons with three tattered seats and scrupulously clean floors, and dark cavernous warehouses that are impossibly large and that house yet another random market -- flipflops and barettes and plastic guns and stalls hawking meals to the locals for 20B a go. Compact policemen in brown uniforms and filter masks patrol the streets, occasionally jumping in to sort out a bad traffic cluster fuck.

But unlike Koh Samui, where everything is limited essentially to one strip and where tourist culture predominates so the obsequiousness of the locals can generally be presumed, Bangkok seems to go on forever in every direction, and for the locals both the quality and the very fact of my existence are plainly a matter of indifference. My first night here I was overwhelmed, the finishing touch being the "Official Hacked To Death" headline on my complimentary copy of the Bangkok Post. My native New Yorker pride at being able to handle anything still winces.

But as I sat in my hotel room that night, listening to the whine of the tuks and taking comfort in the now familiar rhythyms of Thai television, I realized that, like an ocean, Bangkok must be approached with respect and courage, and with healthy measures of both. I slept well that night, and decided to jump in with both feet the next day. I have only just come up for air.

Chaweng Road is the heart of Chaweng Beach, on the island of Koh Samui, and Brian understands it perfectly. I had met Brian earlier in the day, at the hotel, as I went around offering glasses of champagne from the bottle that the hotel gave me on the mistaken impression -- propitious? malicious? -- that I was on my honeymoon. 30 years old, an American working in construction management in Saudi Arabia, Brian has lived outside the US since graduating from RPI eight years ago, and is an expat's expat -- clear-eyed and perceptive in understanding the local culture, ruthlessly pragmatic in exploiting it, able to do so without conscience. My reluctance to bargain with the locals and my reflexive overtipping offend him, in part because he winces at the rube impression I am making, but more so because it strikes him as unnecessary and stupid. Brian says "Everyone says they want to find the real Thailand. The real Thailand is poor people crouched in a dirt hut hoping that today the electricity will work. You don't want the real Thailand, that's why you come here. Trust me, these people are *hungry* for your baht." I find his logic more compelling than I am willing to admit. Back home, I would find him at best uninteresting, more likely offensive; at night on Chaweng Road, he delights in playing the knowing guide, and I am happy to be led.

Because you need a night guide on Chaweng Road. It is an absolute riot of low-rent commerce, miles of weedy businesses shoved cheek by jowl with no logic except the irresistible logic of dollars abhorring a vacuum, a hypertrophic, aggressive chain of money in an overheated cycle of birth and decay. Visually, think St. Marks Place, stretching across Manhattan and racked up on steroids, pockmarked with dusty construction sites, smelling like Chinatown and baked continuously under a shadeless sun. There is a Starbucks, McDonalds, Burger King, a Swensens, Nautica, Cerruti jeans, numerous Boots chemists, a Baskins Robbins, and a Cheers Bar with the apparently improvised slogan "Where Sports Meet." There is a sad little restaurant called Captain Kirk with a faded pink sign bearing the Federation symbol and advertising for Coke when it really should say Tab. There are high tech, futuro bars like "Sound Sound Sound," where a rail-thin female singer fronts a two-guitar band, young Thai kids in identikit heavy metal haircuts churning out serviceable covers of the Doors and Thin Lizzie. Right next to it is a row of corrugated tin huts, the walls and tables coated in grease and hawking the sorriest collection of meats on a stick. There are endless tailors, all of which advertise in German -- I am sitting across from "Exzellent Tailors -- Der Erster Schneider Auf Koh Samui" -- and twice as many storefront outfits selling t-shirts with improbable slogans like "Same Same But Different," "It's My Birthday -- Don't Tell," and of course, "Fuck You," the basic black of international counterculture gear. Poverty and luxe literally sit on top of each other with total indifference -- high end boutique hotels have second floor entrances above storefront foot massage parlors where women in bright orange coats smilingly eke out 100B by rubbing Teva-blistered tourist feet for an hour. Luxury spas share retaining walls with whorehouses. The road is a blur of motor bikes carrying Thai mothers and their babies, fat farangs and their rented girlfriends, or serving as taxis for anyone who wants. For transport, there are numerous other choices -- you can rent motorbikes or jeeps, metered taxis honk for fares, and pick-up trucks with caged beds, so bedecked with gaudy advertising that they look like paddy wagons come screaming out of the closet, cruise the streets. There is a sound truck that drives up and down, blaring advertising for "muay Thai" -- Thai boxing -- in cheesy reverb. According to Brian, there is also shemale fighting, which seems like a decidely niche taste but which he says is packed every night. There are internet stores that make travel arrangements, travel agents that offer HIV tests, children who press cheap leis on you, offer to play tic-tac-toe for 20B, and angrily call you a "ladyboy" if you decline. The place has an astonishing ability to conjure dollars from the air, the way Balinese shamen can make fire simply by rubbing together their hands.

Just off the main road there are deadend little loopy streets, housing bars that open up into large, outdoor rave spaces packed with sweaty tourists, or open air carnival stalls where women take turns go-go dancing and playing you in Connect 4 for the price of a drink as you sound each other out about possible future dealings. There are indoor go-go bars where you buy ping-pong balls for 20B a pop and pelt them at the women you like -- Brian seems to have a real passion for this. The readily accessible sex seems at once to distort and relieve the tourist culture. On the hand, I cannot make conversation with tourist women, all of whom plainly regard me as yet another contemptible white guy who came for the cheap and abundant pussy. On the other hand, the place is suprisingly testosterone-free, most of it probably being literally flushed down the drain; for all the alcohol and partying and horny white guys, the possibility of a fist fight seems impossibly remote. On this score, Brian advises "NEVER get in a fight with a Thai guy. They will fucking kill you, fucking kick your chest open. If anything starts, just ..." and he breaks into a repeated, exaggeratedly obsequious "wai." I will bear this in mind.

By day, Chaweng Road is a different story. Like the girls who work the bars, it loses its luster in broad daylight. It is staggeringly hot, the smells can gag you, and the world's ugliest stray dogs are seemingly dead on the sidewalks. In deference to its night heart, nothing opens early -- I was lucky to find air-conditioned refuge here in My Friend Travel Agency, where the front window assures the patrons that "You Are a Very Important Person Here." Nothing about the place excites any interest in seeing the other beach towns, like Lamai -- something tells me quite certainly that it will only be more of the same. The day is for lying on the beach, the beautiful, warm beach.

Tomorrow I am back to Bangkok, and somehow I am vaguely relieved.

Ola, chums! Welcome to "Jesus, will you look at that thing!", a fledgling website for which -- as I am sure you guessed -- the merchandising wheels have already begun to spin in earnest. Indeed, commemorative steins are being embossed as we speak, and I've just greenlighted a "JWYLATT" temp tattoo that is a guaranteed hoot at Jewish funerals. Start saving your shekels.

But that is neither here nor there. I started this thing to find a good home for the dense, overlong and occasionally overwrought emails that I recently posted from Thailand. If that's why you are here, and you are inclined to skip the yadda-yadda preamble, skip away -- the first one is immediately below. For my more patient readers, I invite any and all comments, particularly the ones that heap praise on my burnished prose, and I promise more and better weirdness as I get the hang of this thing.

*****

After endless strategizing about the 19 hour flight on JAL from New York to Bangkok -- ranging from the purchase of a chess computer, state-of-the-art prescription sedatives, and current copies of every slightly-left glossy (figuring that terrorists would be less apt to off a Democrat), to very deliberate fashion choices I thought might get me a "bump" to business class (I still cannot fathom my own reasoning)... after all this, the flight was nothing. One Ambien and a split of complimentary house wine took care of the lion's share of flight time. The Japanese ability to coax comfort from a small space, plus an elderly seatmate with the Asian good grace to mind her business, meant waking time passed pleasantly, both chess- and terrorist-free.

The two stand-outs from the flight: first, the meals came with real silverware, which I took as a conspicuous jab at both the lengths of America's obsession with airline security, and at the foreign policies that have made such an obsession tragically necessary. The other was that the Japanese -- with the unflagging invention of true voyeurs -- have mounted cameras both on the belly and the nose of their planes; I relived my childhood thrills of riding in the front subway car as we sped down the runway. The cameras even seem to be equipped with some sort of infrared device, so that the nighttime cloudscapes have the eery quality of CNN's broadcasts of midnight raids on Kabul. Pretty groovy.

Narita Airport was disappointing [NOTE: I later discovered that I had, in fact, missed the entire main terminal. Which is quite hard to do, actually]. I had high hopes for all manner of Japanese weirdness -- supersized video screens blaring unlistenable pop with titles like "Shape of Love Go On Forever," irredemeably hip teenagers jacked into seventh generation iPods. Instead you get Teeterboro with salted cod snacks. Drab, flat, dull. Still, I cannot completely condemn an airport with the good sense to sell not only travel Go but travel shogi, as well as Kishigure landscape postcards and pointedly svelte Sumo keychains.

I passed my few hours' layover losing at "five-in-a-row" on my go set to a hefty kid from Beijing, who vigorously shook his lanky punk-red hair as he warned me about the health risks of Ambien, and who, along with his girlfriend, seemed for some reason to have relieved every sundry shop in the Guangzhou province of foil wrapped soaps and aromatic wood balls. I also spoke to Maggie, a young Chinese law student travelling to Auckland, who interrupted the stories of her successes in the real estate market to tell me -- with the erratic and pregnant "r"s of the Chinese just learning English -- that "rrrreh-cently I rrruh-ead that sixty puhrr-cent of Amerrricans arrr-eh obese." She then added that I was "ok except for big tummy." After answering her questions about my American salary and my impressions of Japanese girls -- ok and nice, respectively -- I gave her a Sumo keychain -- "tummy not so big," she accurately and sadly noted -- before catching my connection to Bangkok.

I have in fact seen very little of Bangkok, having booked a hotel near the airport as I was flying early this morning to Koh Samui. So bearing in mind that I may have only seen the Rego Park of Thailand, I am holding off judgment, but I suspect my incipient captivation will blossom into full-on bewitchment. The myth of the smiling beautiful Thai is in fact true, from the hotel workers to the civil servants -- indeed, never have I dawdled so longingly at passport control. It is easy to feel both grounded and disoriented at once. All the store and street signs are both in English and in Thai script, even McDonalds; like an order for pork fried rice in slapdash Cantonese, it somehow manages to infuse even the most banal jottings with the magic of cave-opening runes. Elaborate homemade Buddhist shrines pop up randomly -- inside construction sights, outside of barber shops -- multi-tiered things with bright paint and garish lights, like Staten Island creches that somehow got way too into Hendrix.

Of course there is that smell of heavy smog which, ever since I went to Athens at 14 and couldn't open my eyes for an hour, has been for me the distilled smell of foreignness -- inviting, hinting vaguely of danger, ceasing to notice it the first mark of acculturation. The traffic itself drives home that I am not home: for all the familiar makes and models, there is the lithe-limbed honey riding helmetless on her dark red motorbike at the airport, all sleeveless white frill top and black stretch pants, pulling into the passenger unloading area of Terminal 1 with serious kick-ass swagger; a brace of teenage boys wedged, along with a dirtbike, into the back of a dusty Datsun, mindlessly caressing each other's arms and necks as they swallow the exhaust. There are the usual billboards in English with the usual badly translated slogans.

My hotel -- the TK Palace -- was mildly grim, the listless, middlebrow sort of place Albert Brooks stayed at in purgatory in "Defending Your Life," that played host to the Kiwanis Dead. Prostitution seemed to be fairly abundant. A leering Indian man with an astonishingly robust toupee noisily ushered a giggling, teetering, hobble-skirted young woman into the room next to mine. My in-room masseuse, cursedly exempt from the ubiquity of Thai beauty and whose few remaining teeth were making a valiant if doomed last stand, offered "love-making" for a mere 1000B extra (roughly $25).

However, the line between prostitution and something else -- extreme friendliness? remote hopes of financial rescue? -- seems blurry. After easily declining my opportunity for orthodontically unique congress, I went down to the hotel restaurant, which had the ambience of a Charlie O's, outsized speakers blasting synthetic international pop and a loaded-for-bear karaoke set-up that was mercifully dormant. As I passed on the "Serpent Head Fish Soup with Mimosa" in favor of a simple beef with noodles, I traded typical phrase-book laughs with three young, attractive and stylish women who drifted over to talk. All three worked for the hotel, all three asked if my meal was "delicious," all three told me how handsome I was, all three declined my offers for drinks and no one asked to come upstairs. So either I am a pathetically hopeless john or the whole thing is decidedly more complicated than my addled "farang" brain can comprehend. In any event, I enjoyed the company of three gloriously attentive and quite lovely women -- think Rapper Fantasy Camp -- and went to bed alone.

One last point. Thai TV. First, GOD BLESS THEM, they have a Japanese channel with Go lessons!! The one I caught, however, had a variation of the "small avalanche" joseki that I've seen, like, a gazillion times. The other, and this is too weird even for me: I had read in Lonely Planet that there is an expression among jealous Thai women that "if you don't watch out, I'll cut it off and feed it to the ducks." Also as per Lonely Planet, this is no idle threat, as Thailand leads the world in penile severings and in fact has several hospitals that excel at microsurgical reattachment. So, imagine my surprise, when on comes a popular music video featuring a series of comically recoiling men, cleaver-wielding women with maniacally bulging eyes, and flocks of putatively famished waterfowl. Along with AIDS, Hep B and the prospect of complicity in international flesh peddling, then, I have found perhaps the most compelling reason to keep my um hands in the cart at all times.

I write this from Koh Samui. It is close to 8:30 in the evening, cooling off now from a high in the sunny 90's. The white beaches and warm opaline waters defy novel description, so I won't even try -- it would only sound like pure travel poster hucksterism. I am using the computational difficulty posed by the international date line as cover for the fact that I really don't give a damn what time it is in New York. I'm off to dinner.