"I'm still out here in the wind and rain, look a little older
but I feel no pain," - Warren Zevon, "Lord Byron's Luggage"
Whether it's at a blackjack table in Vegas or with a transexual hooker in Amsterdam, we all push our luck too far sometimes.
These situations create a sense of intense urgency, and how one copes with the pressure can double your bankroll or leave you vaguely ashamed and standing alone in a back alley somewhere near the Red Light District.
But while today happens to be my 29th birthday, I made a vow last year to curtail my encounters with transexual hookers and the last gamble I took was ordering Vietnamese food out of the phone book.
What I do have in common with the above scenarios, however, is a great sense of urgency for the next year.
The main catalyst is the realization that I have only one year remaining before I turn 30, and then it becomes increasingly more difficult to categorize embarrassing escapades as "youthful indiscretions."
This is a bitter pill to swallow my friend, and I plan to cut a deep path across Austin this year to combat this oncoming train of responsibility.
I've got a new job to contend with, two screenplays that need an audience and a potential modeling gig with a bunch of New York queens that might lead to more stories than Caligula at his weekly orgy.
That is a full year for anyone, so I'll save the hookers for my next birthday because right now I need the rest and there's no time in my hectic schedule for Tranny-strumpets - at least until early May.
-BDS
My life shifted again this past Friday when I received an early morning full-time job offer in Austin, and then by the late evening, I also had a future gig lined up in New York City which just might be filled with fortune and fame.
Life tends to run in ebbs and flows, and this past weekend the juices were hearty and delicious and my cup runneth over with a combination of luck, skill and a healthy dose of protein shakes.
My offer to return to Austin on a regular basis was the result of 2 phone screenings followed by a 4-hour interview session and then topped off with another 3 1/2 hour meeting with the company VPs as well as the Founder/CEO.
By the end of the process, I was tired of talking about myself, which was a new feeling that I didn't entirely deserve.
But I was a charming bastard, and the position is a step up from my original job in Austin because this one affords me a $10,000 raise plus better benefits and more paid vacation days.
It is another desk job, but the bills must be paid and I'm sick of driving up and down I-35 every week where I stare at vast stretches of flat concrete and daydream about moving to St. John where I would write in-demand screenplays while eating pinneaples on the white sands of Cinnamon Bay.
Being forced to use a public restroom in Waco always snaps me back to reality, however, and the putrid smells only reinforce the fact that I need hard work and a little luck to make this happen.
Friday night might have started the lucky train rolling as I met with a New York modeling agent who was in town to speak at a convention.
The convention was at a nice hotel in downtown Dallas, and our meeting took place in his hotel room. This scenario sounded like the typical "take your pants off and I'll make you a star" come-on, and I'm sure that's exactly what it looked like to one member of housekeeping staff who walked into the room to deliver extra pillows during the middle of our meeting.
The scene she witnessed was me standing shirtless and wearing only a pair of small, red athletic shorts while a rotound man in his early 50s sat in a chair and watched.
I can only guess at what she told the other staff members when she fled the room smirking like a hyena.
After my shirtless critique, the agent said he saw money in me if I gained 10 pounds of muscle. If this happens he will pay for me to come to New York and live what I consider to be the "Zoolander" life for one week.
The week would consist of photo shoots, casting calls, acting lessons and generally behaving and living like a full-time model - all on somebody else's tab.
I assume that the snorting of cocaine off the buttocks of a 6 ft. tall blonde swimsuit model is also included somewhere in the itenerary.
The agent said he wants to put me on the cover of "Men's Health" and for commercials like "Bowflex" or "Chevy" or something else that would run nationally because that's "where the real money lies."
It sounds far-fetched, but the guy is legit as he's been around for nearly 30 years and has clients in ads ranging from Polo to JC Penney and others doing national TV spots and some acting in movies like the upcoming De Niro/Jolie/Damon flick "The Good Shepard."
At the very least, I should get some good networking opportunities for our scripts and at best I could end up on the magazine stand at a grocery store near you or maybe filling up your television in some erectile disfuntion ad (I have no pride as long as the pay is good and those ads run ALL THE TIME).
Although it sounds great in theory, this money and fame grab is far from certain as 10 lbs of muscle is no easy feat.
But I've got several things to motivate me as I'll be attempting the task with a return to Austin and the other potential benefits like money, fame and asses laced with cocaine will spur me onward when the brain is fuzzy and the body is weak.
-BDS
Dreams are important.
I refuse to categorize them as useless bits of psychological hooey because I do think they can be a valuable tool for creativity as well as the only chance most of us will have to sleep with someone famous.
That being said, however, I don't feel any need to search for the meaning of a dream where I'm standing on some sort of Sun-God road with thousands of naked women screaming and throwing tiny pickles at me.
I've simply got more pressing issues to deal with and trying to decipher the symbolism behind the pickles doesn't rate highly on that list.
Since I have neither the time nor inclination to ponder my own pyschosis, it stands to reason that I could care less about other people's dreams. Over the years, however, I've had dozens of people start out a conversation with the words "I had the strangest dream last night."
And it always starts in that exact manner.
I've never once had someone begin with "I had the most normal and relevant dream last night. Please allow me to share it with you."
That might be refreshing, but instead the person will babble for several minutes about a dream which prominently features them in an unusual situation that generally make absolutely no sense.
The conversation nearly always finishes with the person uttering "Isn't that bizarre?"
And I want to grab them by the shoulders and shake them back and forth while screaming "Not really because it happened to you in a dream you dumbass."
If the situation had occurred while you were awake, it would have been strange and unsettling if a fruitcake was delivered to you via UPS by a giant sausage creature. But as it stands, the story doesn't count for shit because it all happened while you were asleep.
Wake up and tell me something that I actually care about because the only dreams I will actively listen to must involve:
1) A female telling the story
2) I need a major role in the dream and
3) Preferably I'm doing something erotic
If your dream doesn't meet these rigid criteria, please keep it to yourself or share it with a pyschiatrist because they get paid good money to listen to worthless crap.
I, on the other hand, do not.
-BDS
There are few things that can compare to the euphoria one feels after witnessing one of the greatest sports games in history - especially when your team comes out on top.
UT 41 USC 38
UT football is the only sports team that causes me to experience a roller coaster of emotions nearly every week during the season.
Doubt, delirium, and anger get replaced by pride and extreme prejudice in the Longhorns favor when they suck it up and beat what the mainstream press had dubbed "the greatest team in college football history."
But Vince Young and an opportunistic defense ruined the Trojans party on a night where the stars were aligned and a shaggy-looking Matthew McCaughney roamed the sidelines.
Young's performance was the greatest single effort in a major contest EVER, and the guy will never have to pay for food, lodging or women for the rest of his life inside the city of Austin.
To prepare for the game, I invited my brother and a few select rabid UT fans over to watch the game on my Hi-Def TV and stocked the place with Rudy's barbecue and Shiner Boch.
The barbecue tasted great going down, but then it repeatedly threatened to come back up in an ugly way during a game that went back and forth more times than the sexual orientation of Anne Heche.
By the end of the night, my adrenal glands were fried and my emotions were spent.
The drama made the victory all the sweeter, however, and for at least one night everything was right in the universe.
That is a feeling to savor because it doesn't occur very often, and for that reason as well as many others I can honestly say that I love Vince Young and the entire 2006 UT football team.
But Vince will forever hold a special place in my heart.
-BDS
