Everyone wants to be a Barker

Got called into admin at work yesterday. Day is going fine, I’m hoping the hoopla is behind me, that I’ll survive my many fuck-ups, when: “Could Josh Ramsey please come into Dispatch?” Fuck-shit-damn. Like when I first started swearing on the tennis courts, the words releasing endorphins I would need.

I was sent upstairs to see the boss. The boss is actually upstairs. I like that. She had a very severe tone, and I thought I was in trouble. “You did the barker shift on Good Friday, riiight?”

The Barker shift is where you cruise Hollywood Boulevard with just your voice, no amplification, and try and get fish in the net. A direct descendent to “step right up folks!” It’s brutal, but can be fun, interacting with the teeming humanity, riffing, impoving, making moments outta the mamen. You’re supposed to be trained for it, but they were short on Friday, so I got my first nod.

We had a little director’s chair to sit in, so I kept getting up and seeing if someone would sit down. When they would I’d say “Cut&Color 50 bucks,” and start touching their hair. “We could do highlights …” This was a good gag. I would also tell people “There’s no food allowed on Hollywood Boulevard, new city ordinance, here, let me just store your food in the handy compartment,” and then pat my belly. Or, “90 years of film stars dying: 45 minutes to tour their demise!” “Come see the stars crash and burn! Hollywood Death Cab, where the meter has stopped for the stars!” All-in-all, our attendance was up 60 percent. Some of it was the holiday, but they felt that I was responsible too. Not to mention I walked with $125 cash-money in comissions. Everyone wants to be a Barker.

So I got a nice dinner coupon for Boozerelli’s. Boozerelli’s is the mausoleum on Hollywood Boulevard all the guides go to drink at. It’s close, it’s dank, it’s dark, you know all the rats on a first name basis. Italian food outta can, they never heard of a pomadori sauce. The waiters are all ex-felons, the owner was a felon himself, and runs an out-reach program with the state. My gay lover is a foodie of the highest order, so I can’t wait to foist this place on him. Taking him to bad restaurants is my sneaky way to get him to cook good meals. If we go to bad Italian joint on Friday, rest assured on Sunday, he’ll cook Italian, to show me what good Italian should taste like. Some bad restaurants aren’t as painful to me. You have to fuck up spaghetti pretty good for me to be offended. Meanwhile, I’m much pickier about Sushi. Will only eat at high-end.

I coulda worked today, but my lover’s schedule has been crazy lately, and it was our first day to hang out, so I wanted to do so. The Easter vacation rush is over, so it’s gonna be harder getting shifts now. That gave me pause, but fuck it, I wanted my lover all day.

I was hung-fucking-over yesterday at work. Remind me not to do that again. You’re riding backward in a giant-extended-yellow-death-cab, flying around Hollywood, regurgitating much information, and hoping not to regurgitate or deficate until you can get to a toilet. A friend’s band played on Friday night, and I was there forgetting that I had to work in the morning. Plus, there was some sort of pub crawl organized, gay lover has a house near a bus stop, so peeps were coming off the bus to go to all these different bars. Upped the drinking atmosphere. Next thing I know, it’s a bad buzzy morning, I’m taking folks around Hollywood, telling them about the star’s deaths, and wondering if mine’s next.

I film my death scene tomorrow afternoon for the slash and gash film I’m in. No “gash,” actually, just jug love, boobies, I’m talking texas titties. It’s me, a shower, and a knife. Getting killed in the shower feels like being tied up to a train track by a guy twirling his mustache. A scene that’s been hammered into Sir Reality’s Liar, by it’s over exposure and repetition. Has anyone ever been killed in the shower I wonder?