Corrections to this entry appear at the end of this article in red, while the entry has been left as it was when it was written. Make sure you read ’em!
(I’m going to interrupt the sci-fi convention stories for this entry. Part 3 — Saturday night — will be the next entry.)
My friend and former coworker John Henson has described our house as “the best-fed bachelors I’ve ever seen”. The fridge is generally full, and it contains actual ingredients as opposed to frozen TV dinners, and the crisper actually has vegetables that have not liquefied into grey goo. As a result, I can usually take items from the fridge, confident in the knowledge that they are reasonably fresh.
With the exception of yesteday afternoon.
At around 4:30, I boiled a couple of eggs, sliced them up, and tossed them into a salad and cracked open a new bottle of Brianna’s honey mustard dressing that I’d taken from the cupboard.
At 5:00, I felt a little woozy and decided to lie down.
At 5:30, I was hugging the toilet bowl and retching effluently. As I regurgitated, it struck me that it’s been years since I’ve had to do this, and the last time involved drinking. I made a weak “rock and roll devil” sign with my right hand, even though there was nobody to see it.
At 6:00, I crawled into bed and passed out.
At 11:00, my phone rang. The display read “Meryle cell”.
“Muh?”
“Joey?”
“Sorry. Just pulling myself together.”
“Why aren’t you at Kickass Karaoke?”
“Argh. I ate some bad egg salad earlier, puked my guts out and the passed out.” I sat up in bed and noticed that aside from the inside-of-a-linebacker’s-shoe taste in my mouth, I was feeling much better.
“Get your ass over here. You’re not going to believe who’s here tonight: Milla Jovovich! Or she was here earlier, anyway. I suggest you get down here fast.”
I went to the bathroom and gave me teeth a very thorough brushing to eliminate all traces of pukey-breath, downed a glass of water, threw on a dressy shirt and one of my new pairs of shoes, and made tracks for The Rivoli.
I climbed up the stairs into one of the most busy Kickass Karaoke nights I’d ever seen. The place was packed solid with people. I worked my way to the bar to fill out a request sheet, saying “hi” to a lot of people on the way there.
Among the many birthday celebrants at Kickass Karaoke was host and karaoke impresario Carson’s brother Zack, whom you might remember from Almost Famous as “The Legendary Red Dog” and from the Fox sitcom Titus as Chris Titus’ adopted younger brother “Dave”. Zack brought Milla Jovovich along, presumably because they’re both in Resident Evil: Apocalypse which is filming somewhere in Accordion City right now.
After my number (Billy Joel’s It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me; I learned the how to play the solo on accordion by downloading it from Kazaa Lite), Carson and Zack did one, followed by a number with Zack, his girllfriend and Milla. Zack motioned for me to play backup during the verses and chorus and held the mic to the accordion for the instrumentals and solo.
Milla left shortly after the number and I didn’t have enough time to talk her into posing with the accordion. That would’ve been a keeper.
I’m going to go over to my checklist of “things to do before I die”. Ah, there it is: share karaoke stage with “Leeloo”. Check.
Don’t tell the fanboys at WorldCon, a mere five-minute cab ride away from The Rivoli. It’ll break their hearts.
Corrections
Carson informs me that:
a) The woman whom we were led to believe was Milla Jovovich was actuallyanother actress named Siena, who also is in Resident Evil: Apocalypse. Okay, she’s not as big a star, but she’s still gorgeous in that elfin way.
b) Zack doesn’t doesn’t have a girlfriend. Ladies, start your engines!
So “share karaoke stage with Leeloo” goes back on the “things to do before I die” list. Easy go, easy come back.
I still shared the karaoke stage with “Dave” from Titus, which was a hilarious if underappreciated comedy. That counts for something, doesn’t it?
Thanks for the heads-up, Carson!
