A Horrible Gonzo New Year: Part 1
Every so often, I take time and ask myself if I still have my journalistic instincts. I used to have them, some years previous, and I knew it too. I reveled in them, like Scrooge McDuck in a money bin of pure caustic thought. They're a bit like herpes, I suppose. You forget you have them until an episode flares up.

I didn't think I knew it at the time, but I was going out to do a piece on sexuality and the holidays for you tawdry lil' monkeys on New Years Eve. Working on a webcomic with a humorous Objectivist protagonist and reviewing movies is all well and good, but you always come back to your roots. For me, those roots stretched back into the humble world of the college newspaper. I had only one dream as a column writer in those volunteer days of yore, and that was to vomit the vitriol of my brain onto the readers at our ramshackle community college. I doubt any of the people attending there were capable of reading, much less cohesive thought, but I blew my chunks at them all the same. I was a firm believer that after 30 years on the major scene, our good friend Mr. Duke should not be the sole commentator on the steady Ragnarok of human culture. Granted, Mr. Warren Ellis has stepped up to the plate, but he has a lot on said plate already. This is the global warming or journalism. We must all pitch in.

I'd gathered my usual cabal of ne'er-do-wells some days previous, commenting that none of them got out of the goddamn house very much any more. They grumbled, though most eventually caved. They are not people naturally social by nature. These are men who shy away from the club scene, to slink away to all night diners and dive bars, where people act like people and not models, a sentiment I usually share. However, the New Year requires a certain amount of celebration not consistent with such places, and I was bound and determined to frog march them into such harmony with me.

Only one did escape my grasp, who we shall call Wynken. He made the damn fool mistake of getting to bed early the night before, something counterproductive to the club scene, New Years or not. Via phone, I apprised the situation.

Me: I didn't know Beef's mom was a meth whore. (Note: I never say "hello", when calling him, preferring to get right to the conversation wherever my caffeine and insomnia-addled brain takes me.)
W: He addressed it pretty early on.
Me: You sound like death fresh out of tupperware. Did you just wake up?
W: (Mildly annoyed) Up yours, sir. Up yours with great fortitude. I woke up at nine this fucking morning.
Me: That sounds like it'll require some Red Bull if you wanna be in form tonight.
W: Nah, I'm too tired. Think I'm gonna pass.
Me: It's the New Year! You can't pass it, It passes you! It's pure temporal mechanics.
W: Not according to the Theory of Relativity.
Me: Unless that couch of yours is doing Mach 8,000,000, you have no ground to stand on. Put on your pants.
W: Make me.

After that it devolved into an argument about Rosario Dawson, Maggie Gyllenhall, and a kiddy pool of vegetable oil, so I deemed it a conversation to be continued at another time. Besides, Blynken and Nod were already en-route.

The San Jose club scene has had its ups and downs of late. The most notorious of these is the increased police presence, a perpetual sort of big brother giving the stink eye to college students looking to wind up then down over a few kamikazes from SJ State. A patrol car or two and maybe a few patrolmen somebody can understand, but a full brigade of mounted police and squad cars to tamp down twenty-somethings at Mardi Gras is a bit much. The hypocrisy of it came when we actually arrived on New Years, the heaviest drinking holiday in the entire Western world since Saturnalia, and I see a grand total of four cops between eight and last call. It continues to validate my point that cops secretly want a riot to brake out, either by being present or absent. It must be something special the brass check for in the interview.

We had a damn fair amount of time to booze ourselves silly, the Light Rail running for free until four in the morning. I had been most concerned about Blynken wanting to bug out early, the man so keen to isolation that I'm almost certain his shits come with "No Trespassing" signs. My skepticism was thrown a curve ball when he announced that he actually wanted to partake of the scummy dance floors and watered-down drinks. It was a sign, and I'd have been a fool to ignore it.

Nod was something of a harder sell, as he had been party to what I had come to refer to as The New Year's That Wasn't some two years prior. We had taken along a third party, who had filibustered his way into joining us, only to be deluged by his requests for specific fast food and to go home out of boredom an hour before the ball dropped. I actually had to miss the arrival of an entire year in wine and song because he had complained me into a coma that I awoke from at home several hours later. I had only gotten Nod to come back by promising him strong drink and the illusion that we'd stay for an hour then go home to watch the Dick Clark's Decaying New Year's Eve Bash.

And so, wallets packed with meager cash and pockets lined with "hell, you never know" condoms, we set out to witness the fetid speakeasies that passed themselves off as great temples to debauchery on that night of nights....