Category: Motley Kruse

I first heard of Colorado mountain climber Aron Ralston’s daring self-rescue on the radio. I thought: “Wow! What an adventurer!” I stood daydreaming in the kitchen, up to my elbows in dishwater, and let my imagination fly. It was the fifth day… pinned to the north face of a brutal cliff… my water—gone. My hopes that someone might happen along, someone within earshot even—dashed. Listed among my assets: rope, the clothes on my back, and perhaps the most important ingredient of all—steely resolve.

I never got to the part where I sawed off my arm with a jackknife and rappelled down the cliff only to walk five miles before finding help, because I know myself too well. I’d never have made it. Once pinned by the 800-pound boulder, I’d have faced a toss up—how to expel fluids fast enough to pass out from dehydration and welcome sweet death? Crying or wetting my pants? Could I do both at the same time? Probably, yes.

As for the DIY surgery, forget it. I can’t even cut my own bangs. Even mall-walking is too risky for me. I’m smack dab in my mid-30s, and I’ll tell you—I’ve got my limitations pretty well categorized. What’s intriguing to me about this hike gone wrong are the other little bits of the story that get lost in the shuffle. Time magazine headlined their chronicle of his ordeal, “Survival of the Fittest.” I’d call it “Lucky Fool Cheats Death—Again!”

Here’s the timeline. In the late 90s, Ralston saw the movie Everest, the one about the climb gone fatally wrong. It spurred him on to quit his day job and devote his life to exploration and following the jam bands Phish and String Cheese Incident. (After reading this, I could give Ralston the benefit of the doubt and assume he is not also a fan of illegal herb, but I won’t. I mean, come on.)

So, for me, the next part makes total sense—the part where he forgets/neglects to leave an itinerary. (Do you think Ashton Kutcher will star in the movie version of Ralston’s hike? Dude! Where’s My Arm?) The more you know about it, the more the story degenerates into a Super Dave Osborne fiasco. Ralston’s made a habit of climbing with nothing more than water, candy bars, and an ice axe. No cell phone, no global positioning system, no rope. When I’m walking on the treadmill at the Y, I’ve got a 20-oz. Cherry Gatorade, the latest Jackie Collins potboiler on tape, and if I didn’t think people would look sideways at me, I’d bring caramel corn.

I know I shouldn’t blame all of this guy’s irresponsible behavior on the demon weed. Scientists say there’s an internal chemical reason folks like Ralston skate the edge. They call it the thrill-seeking gene. Boy, when you hear it described that way, don’t you just get visions of handsome Chuck Yeager breaking the sound barrier? Plane disintegrating around him? His broad rugged shoulders seared by his flaming jumpsuit as he plummets to Earth? But the same gene must then include Houdini. And Evel Knievel. The guys on Jackass (who have, incidentally, elevated that word to an entirely new level of disrepute). And that goofy kid I knew in third grade who thought he’d be able to jump off his garage roof, Wile E. Coyote-style, and scare the skittles out of us girls. (Sure, we felt bad, but it didn’t stop us from laughing before we ran to get help.)

So when thrill seekers are out for information or money, the rewards seem pretty well explained. But how about those rambunctious few who venture outside the fence of science or show business? Are they merely threats to themselves and others, or could they be valuable research subjects? Could we harness their brain chemistry to create an elite force of rodeo clowns? Should we have volunteers from the Raptor Center ear-tag them like other endangered species? Or should we do what we’ve always done—let these guys roam free to inflate our rates on life, health, and casualty insurance? I’m glad to hear that Ralston is on the mend, but I still worry about him. He doesn’t strike me as a quitter. And there’s a lot of mountains left out there.

“ST. PAUL — A lawmaker who had hoped to stop Minnesota prisoners from getting desserts met with an unexpected problem this week: Turns out it would cost the state an extra half million dollars to stop.” —Associated Press, April 5

I’m kind of sorry that Rep. Marty Seiferts’ no-dessert proposal for state prisoners wasn’t taken more seriously. I mean, hey — you can see where he was going with it. Just trying to save a few bucks here and there. Even though our hoosegows are closer to Super 8s than Hiltons, you can always squeeze another few pennies out of the budget. Put the money to better use than tossing chocolate parfaits down the necks of evildoers.

And if it weren’t for those outdated feel-good nutritional guidelines gumming up the process, we might have had something here. But no, if we deny our prisoners dessert ($), we then have to replace it with an item of comparable caloric value. Like fruit or cheese ($$$).

I say we get rid of the guidelines and just send them to bed without any supper. I mean, they’ve been bad, right? And instead of rehabilitation programs, let’s just get my mom to go over there, and she’ll give ’em a good talking to. Hey, it worked for me. Well, mostly, anyway. And, for the super tough cases, I’ve got a friend who’d love to go over there on Saturday nights to dole out spankings, free of charge, just because he’s into that kind of thing.

Another scheme that got the kibosh before the House Judiciary Committee was a plan to hire private companies to house state prisoners. Jury’s still out on that one, and considering the troubling number of Minnesota-based businesses wallowing in red ink, perhaps this is one proposal we should think about carefully. Do you think Musicland could re-organize in time? They could put Lifers in the Oldies section. Assault and Battery convicts in World Beat? All they have to do is snap those magnetic shoplifting tags on the prisoners and they’ll never get past the Cinnabon before the guards open fire.

And how about Northwest Airlines? They’ve got some awfully big hangars out at the airport, and loads of high visibility zip-up jumpsuits. Plus, the staff is already adept at maintaining the discipline of large unruly groups, performing cavity searches, and dishing up cheap food.

My favorite recommendation for thrifty incarceration, however—even better than Gov. Pawlenty’s brainwave of charging political protesters for their luxurious accommodations in the klink—is Rep. Seifert’s plan to serve brunch on weekends and holidays. By adopting the program already in place at St. Cloud State Prison, the state will save almost $250,000 each year. And brunch sounds so festive! I can just see the inmates rioting if there’s not enough whipped almond butter for their scones. Since Martha Stewart may soon be joining the ranks of Cellblock H, perhaps she can lend her special touch to planning the repast. It’s a different kind of state dinner than she’s used to, but I’m sure her classic good taste is appropriate for any occasion. And I imagine we’ll have far fewer escape attempts with Martha designing the Big House menu. Instead of The Shawshank Redemption, it’ll be The Lamb Shank Reduction. (Slice thinly with shiv and serve warm.)

Still, maybe we don’t need to get rid of the nutritional guidelines altogether to make this thing work. I mean, if ketchup is a vegetable why couldn’t water be classified as a thin soup? We haven’t exhausted our options. What about road kill? Make it into jerky and nobody’d know the difference. How about putting all the prisoners whose height/weight ratio doesn’t match up on Slim Fast? A delicious shake for breakfast, a delicious shake for lunch … a case of the shakes by dinnertime. Like I said, I don’t blame Seifert for trying. He wanted the money saved to go into funding areas of public service that are doomed to be cut this year. Meals on Wheels for one. And if that gets cut, maybe we can just serve the inmates a new Hormel product… Soylent Green!

The sun is peeking out, the snowman who stood sentry in my neighbors’ front lawn has surrendered, and though some of us will get itchy eyeballs and stuffy noses, we’re all going to get a present soon: an extra hour of daylight. I can’t help but get mushy like Mr. Snowman this time of year. I’m springing ahead.

This surge of goodwill usually bubbles inside me until I’m compelled to do something nice. Last year, that meant volunteering to help at the annual Ladies Aid spring salad luncheon fundraiser held in my church’s basement. You might be thinking, “Hey, church basements are usually the most un-spring like environments in the world!” Well, gotcha! Because when I showed up ready to be put to good use, Nettie and Helen had already made and hung the construction-paper daisy decorations.

Now, I don’t know Nettie and Helen. I’d seen them before, of course, but not in a social situation outside of chapel. And I’m sure that one doesn’t just step off the mean streets into her first guild event and snag the plum decorating job either. So I marched off to the back kitchen, where I met the head lady, Adele. Silver flip ’do, steely green eyes, and a fuchsia stain on her lips, cheeks, and nails. Ninety pounds of will, and at least 20 pounds of that had to come from the shoulder pads that were sewn into her sequined, exotic animal-print cardigan sweater. Think “Cher’s Grandma.” She was too small to be a tackle, but definitely could be a tight end.

“You!” she commanded, looking up at me as though I weren’t fit to spit-shine her rhinestone mules. “Get over to the prep table and start cutting squares and plating the salads.” In the distance, I saw a trembling mass of jewel-like blocks, molds, and towers. A skyline, for all its rubbery backbone, that shouted “Doubt!” And “Hope!” Some slabs were plain, but I could tell in a glance that others held petrified chunks of sugared pineapple, and various canned fruits. Some were mysterious, boasting tiny celery smiles. And—egads!—some even had pink chunks of what could only be described as meat, lurking in Kool-Aid tinged psychedelic freak out, man, daring you to guess fish or fowl, beef or pork.

If we were downtown, Adele would have been awarded a Bush grant and been the toast of the avant-garde community. Note to Matthew Barney: To hell with sculpting in tapioca and Vaseline. Gelatin is the new (old) medium.

The glistening molds were a Mondrian-style feast, more of a commentary on food than actual food. Genius. When fruits and vegetables have been manipulated that way, can you still call them “salad”? The only unsullied vegetation in the room was a head of romaine lettuce, which was to be arranged around the chunks and blocks and slices to soften the edges—a little like lingerie for Jell-O.

I smiled to introduce myself, and suggested that, with my extensive service-industry background, I might be better suited to rolling the coffee cart and pouring. Adele shot me a withering glance. “Not dressed like that, you won’t. You’ll stay in the back.”

I looked down at my T-shirt and Indiana Jones cargo pants. Not my best effort, but honestly, not my worst. Peeking out to the dining room, however, I saw that Adele was right. A thousand twinkling lights bounced and scattered off the overhead fluorescent tubes. The ladies from the guild wore their sweaters like armor. Scaled with doodads and ditsys. Floating slowly and regally past the cafeteria tables like great exotic Technicolor fish. Peaceful as prayers, offering napkins to sticky sweet fingers. Murmuring low and husky reassurances to the congregants.

Next to them, I was no lady. I would have looked fine handing out samples at Home Depot, but this was a feast of celebration. Good intentions notwithstanding, I would have been as jarring as arugula in a bowl of shredded iceberg. Sometimes you’ve got to do a little extra work to make things easier to swallow. Call it the Parable of Jell-O.

Lesson learned, I turned to the prep table and tried to slice the particolored salads as perfectly as possible. My internship with polite society had begun.

Enough tension-building hysteria. Yes! The polar ice-caps are melting! Yes! Migration habits are disturbed! Yes! The ozone layer has more holes in it than I-94 after the spring thaw! (Rim shot, please.)

Environmentally, politically, socially, morally—we’re screwed. As humans, I believe this state of events is our natural habitat. That doesn’t make it right; it just is what it is. And I pledge to do my part. I hereby swear not to jump into my luxury mink-seated SUV, late to pick the kids up from school, and go barreling into traffic among those tiny, pious, Toyota Tsk’s, with half an eye on the road, as I yammer on to my stockbroker, making secret insider trades while cell-phone cancer eats through the last brain-stem inhibitor I have left that keeps me from shouting at the TV, Fat Elvis-style, whenever regularly scheduled programming is on.

I have gladly quit smoking, my lawn is free of pesticides, and my ten-dollar-a-week Aqua Net habit is a thing of the past. But it’s not enough. Nor will it ever be. I subscribe to the notion that human lives could never ever be cruelty free. Even the best of us, or even the best parts of us, are woefully fallible. We are doomed to repeat the same selfish, sinful mistakes of our ancestors, only as each generation goes on, more stylishly, and more efficiently then ever before.

Well, a clean heart, mind, and conscience might well begin with a clean colon, so I looked up a friend who espouses the virtues of clean living. For the sake of this story, I’ll call her Megan the Vegan Pagan. Her body is a temple and it only accepts certain offerings. She dragged me to the co-op, and lectured me on the error of my ways, which she diagnosed as partly dietary, but mostly a species of moral failure. In her worldview, eating clean is only somewhat about health. It’s more about feeling ethical. I decided to accept her counsel. After all, I’ve got my wellness to think about.

As we first strolled into the meat aisle, Megan dismissively pointed out the free-range chicken, ostrich steaks, and fresh fish, stating that she “never eats food with a face.” “Even Gummi Bears?” I kidded. But this was no laughing matter. Did you know that Gummi Bears are made with gelatin? Which is derived from bone marrow? Me neither. Since Gummi bears are not on the generally accepted food pyramid, I decided this was not such a great loss.

We went on to produce, where I couldn’t help but notice that, while the fruits and veggies resembled the fruits and veggies I usually buy, they were, on average, smaller, dirtier, and more expensive than what I’m used to. How European! Megan explained that these fruits were organically grown, without scientific hocus-pocus and therefore they looked like what real produce should look like, not like those hormone-injected Pamela Anderson cantaloupes like they have in the supermarket. (By this reasoning, if Moby ate hamburgers addled with Bovine Growth Hormone, he’d look like Vin Diesel.)

In personal care products, I picked up a baking soda tooth powder, which tasted like penance for all my sins, but got my teeth so clean they squeaked when I smiled. Plus a natural deodorant crystal the size and texture of those ice formations that you get under your wheel well this time of year. It said on the back of the box that the rock had a street value of $5.99 and that it was a year’s supply, but I wasn’t sure if I should crush it and snort it, or cook it on a spoon and mainline it into the affected stinky areas.

Later, over dinner and—what else?—organic red wine, Megan admitted to me that progress is the goal, not perfection, when it comes to living the virtuous life. She said new information comes out every day, and it would be impossible to stay on top of what was ethically acceptable to shop for and where to shop for it. I let this sink in. “You mean, I could be offending Mothership Earth right now and not even know it?” She nodded sadly, and then excused herself to have a smoke out on my back porch. I grabbed her pack of butts and shook them in the air, pointing out to her that this was a perfect example of human incongruity. She snatched the pale blue pack back and snapped: “They’re American Spirits. They don’t have any additives.”

I have a clock radio from 1978. It has two volumes, “Way Up” or “Silent.” The alarm is stuck between KQRS and buzzer, and after the Exxon Valdez coffee/hairspray spill of 1989, the on/off button is gunked up and doesn’t work. So I either plug it in, or I don’t. But it still does the job. It’s more like a time bomb I set for myself every night, so I can be assured of dragging my can out of bed when it’s absolutely necessary.

But this is a story about a morning when I didn’t have to get up. A day off. I got up anyway. Because I forgot to unplug my alarm. One moment, I’m dead to the world. The next, the alarm goes off. I was shocked into Bachman-Turner Overdrive. With so much adrenaline coursing through my body, I had no choice but to stay awake. Because it was my day off, I was at loose ends. I decided to call my mother, who is the only person I know personally who is up early in the morning every day for no other reason than that “it’s the best part of the day.”

My mother is old. And I’ll let you in on a little secret about old people. They don’t sleep. They put on their pajamas like you or me, but it’s all for show. If you called my mother at 2 a.m., she’d answer on the first ring and conduct a lucid discussion on the subject of the Marie Osmond doll collection versus the Precious Moments figurines. (Just an aside here: I don’t like how, at a certain age, dolls become socially acceptable collectibles again. My grandmother has an entire roomful of two-foot tall Victorian villagers. Not one of them has kung fu grip, or can wet their knickers. Inaction figures. If this weren’t bad enough, she also has a “shame baby.” This is a doll who is perpetually in a “time out” position, standing in a corner, hands shielding its eyes in eternal disgrace. I couldn’t understand why anybody would want to immortalize this particular childhood rite of passage, and then I figured out that maybe my grandmother is nostalgic for yelling at children. At any rate, the last time I was there, when Nana wasn’t looking, I carefully posed a steak knife in the dolls’ little foam hand, so it could at least look like she had done something worth being yelled at for.)

Back to the story. I looked at the clock. It was around 5 a.m. I dialed the number, and to my horror, my father answered. My father is the original strong silent type. He distrusts the telephone. When the telephone rings, it’s either trouble, or somebody who wants to talk. And either way, that’s trouble. Small talk is out of the question, because it implies a weakness of intent in life that my dad finds unsettling. Quickly, I decided to talk to him about something that I had recently purchased, because the one thing that is sure to engage Dad is the threat of expenditure.

Right down to lunchbox apples, no purchase is too mundane for my dad to wrestle over. He’s got a system, and it’s served him well. The Four W’s. If you want to buy something, ask yourself, why, why, why, and why. If you find that you can answer all four questions clearly, wait three weeks and see if you’ve forgotten what you wanted in the first place. And if you must spend, before you crack open your wallet, think “double duty.” Two years ago, my dad bought each of his kids a case of Jimmie Dean Lambrusco, an amber vintage the color of iodine, with a sausage-y afterthought. He proudly read from the back of the box: “Says right here this wine goes with beef, chicken, and fish!” My Mom interjected, “I’m pretty sure it would go with franks and beans, too, Hon.” Still high from his splurge, my father replied, “You know, it doesn’t say anything about pork, but let’s try that tonight!”

Anyway, as soon as Dad answered, I launched into a filibuster about my broken clock radio, hoping to either trick him into conversation, or trick him into handing the telephone to my mother. In record time, he handed the phone to my mother, who, hearing my voice, breathed a sigh of relief. “Oh, I thought it was your grandmother.”
“Why? Is there anything wrong?”
“I think she’s going batty. She called us up at 3 a.m. last week because one of her dolls pulled a knife on her.”

Forget road rage. I love my car. It is my pod of sanity. A micro-community I control. Yes, I understand when I slide behind the wheel and I survey all that is out in the great beyond through my windshield that I have no control of what goes on out there. Traffic jams, crazy drivers, construction. These things are to be expected. Inside my car, the music is perfect. My seat is positioned exactly for me. The temperature, ideal. Driving in my car is often the only quiet time I get during the week. The problems start when I have to get out of my car to pilot a smaller vehicle through an obstacle course where there is no right of way. There are no rules. There are no state troopers keeping an eagle eye for wrongdoers. There is no limit on blood alcohol level, no rearview mirrors, and no brakes. This is the Thunderdome. I am speaking of course, about shopping carts.

Cart Rage. Anybody who’s ever plopped a feverish toddler into a seventy-pound metal cage with a sticky front wheel knows what I’m talking about. Trying desperately to maneuver through the fluorescent labyrinth of a warehouse grocery store, accumulating a week’s worth of groceries before the child in your cart is old enough to require braces. Personally, I prefer to shop with a screaming toddler. It turns my cart into something akin to an emergency vehicle. Like a siren, little Billy will alert fellow shoppers of my approach and let them know to pull off to the side. If you’re not careful, tempers can run short. In the interest of public safety, I have taken it upon myself to illustrate three troublesome cart drivers to watch out for.

1. The “Diva.” Miss Thing believes the grocery store and all its inhabitants were created just for her. You can identify the Diva driver by the way she leaves her cart unattended in the middle of the busiest thoroughfare, wandering off to contemplate the intricacies of fresh versus concentrate, effectively blocking both lanes of traffic until she has made up her precious, precious mind.

Strategy: The Movement. Whenever I spot an abandoned cart, no matter how many children, groceries or personal affects it has in it, I like to hunker down beside it and start singing protest songs at top volume. Usually, the Diva can’t get away fast enough.

2. The “Daredevil.” This is NASCAR style shopping. This guy carries no list, coupons, or meal plan, armed with only his wits and, unfortunately for you, a major weight advantage swinging blindly around a corner at thirty-five miles an hour.

Strategy: Reconnais-sance. Dispatch your spouse or a trustworthy child to precede you like a hurricane hunter to gather intelligence on activity in nearby produce sectors. If the Daredevil is barreling your way, remain calm. Do not try to outrun him. Get low and cover your head to protect yourself from flying canned goods. Shield yourself with a 12-pack of quilted toilet tissue if available.

3. The “Diner.” These shoppers usually mill around in foraging herds, particularly on sample day. As crafty as they are hungry, they create pockets of gridlock around any display of food that is not protected by a vacuum seal. Particularly dangerous around grapes and bulk peanuts, an unruly group of Diners can also form an arterial clog in the self-serve bakery aisle.

Strategy: Infiltration. Sneak into the throng’s outer perimeter while making chewing motions with your jaw. Turn to the person nearest you and whisper, “Say, did you have any of those lobster claw samples they’re handing out over on Aisle Six? Man, are they good or what?” Then move aside swiftly. Standing in the way of stampeding grocery-store moochers can be more dangerous than running with the bulls in Pamplona.

With this information, your next shopping expedition should go smoothly. And if somewhere in this article, you recognize yourself, so much the better. We can’t all stand in the express lane, but with a little effort, we can make it back to the safety of our cars before the ice cream melts.

After a couple of accidental clicks of the mouse the other day, I realized that I have officially seen enough naked people in my life. This does not mean that I never want to have sex again, or that I don’t want to see the person who I currently see naked all the time naked any more, it just means that I don’t want to see any additional naked people. I have too much information, and I am done.

I am as surprised as you are, because you’d think that naked bodies might be endlessly fascinating, but they are not. Kind of boring now, actually. When I walk past the magazine rack at Target and I see the latest seminude cover of Maxim featuring Tara Reid staring me down through a thick smear of eyeliner, I’m most likely to cluck and think, “Honey, wash that crapola off, you’d look so much prettier.”

I miss the sense of anticipation. Back in the day, when a person wanted to see another person naked, it involved an elaborate period of give-and-take usually referred to as “courting.” You would have to pass many different levels of social acceptance before you were able to view the object of your curiosity undressed. Or, if you were unable to maintain a working relationship with this person, but then decided that you still needed to see people unclothed, you had to get into your car and drive to the bad part of town to pay for the opportunity to see strangers naked. Both ways required a certain amount of risk and effort. This might be the St. Paul side of me talking, but doesn’t everything of value entail an expenditure of effort?
I don’t understand the idea of nudity on credit. Or even the “buy a boob, get the second one free” feel of pop culture. Video scamp Pink says in an interview that she got her nickname because she blushes easily. Gosh, I’ve never noticed. In her last video, though, I think I saw a cervical polyp that she should probably have a doctor look at.

The other thing that gets to me is that I don’t recognize naked people as naked people anymore. They all look the same to me. Like Disney character versions of naked people. Smooth and bouncy, sort of wholesome even. I prefer my naked people hairy and disconcerting, like my husband. These other non-naked naked people represent a frightening hybrid species that exist only to be manipulated to serve passing desire and then tossed back into the abyss they sprang from. Sure, it sounds like fun, but hey, there’s a reason they put a three-minute limit on a Tilt-a-Whirl ride. Too much fun plus more too much fun equals trouble.

Now that nakedness holds no thrill for me, I’m afraid that I have developed perversions, cultivated strange tastes in order to compensate. I’m into a little thing I like to call Cake Porn. While I have seen all the pictures of naked people I can stand in one lifetime, I have not even begun to see enough pictures of cake. One of my big suppliers of Cake Porn is women’s magazines. Every week, there are new glossy beautiful layouts of spongy moist cakes to tempt me.

Pictures of great-looking cakes hit me on two levels. Number one, I would like to eat the cake. Number two, I would like to be the kind of a person who could make that kind of magazine-perfect cake, with five or six hours of spare time to pipe the perfect crotchless, buttercream teddy onto my lemon poppy-seed nine-inch round. Rather than the kind of person I am, the kind of person who remembers my kids’ birthdays at the last minute, rushing out to the 24-hour grocery at midnight to buy a plain sheet cake, gouging the name in with my house keys while waiting for stoplights on my way to the party.
Just the other night on the Food Network they featured a segment on a man’s 100th birthday gala. At the end, waiters rolled out the most magnificent five-foot high monument to Cake Porn I have ever seen in my life. Ribbons of icing, blazing with the light of a hundred candles. Before the celebrants were finished singing, I had to snap the television off for fear of a pixelated naked person jumping out and ruining my fantasy.

I adore a good horror film. I love these flicks because within 90 minutes I have the satisfaction of seeing the heroine prevail, and the delight of watching the monster meet a grisly death. Real life, sadly, is not like this. Heroes don’t win all the time, and after they are done tormenting you, monsters often go on to create more suffering—usually between book deals, awards banquets, and underwear modeling contracts.

Ironically, the other thing I love is this: reality programming. Because it looks nothing like my life, so I must be doing something right. Thank heavens I don’t have to live in a monsoon shelter with a TGIFriday’s bartender, a promiscuous childcare worker, and an estate lawyer. Oh, but what wicked fun to watch!

We’re about three years into the trend of reality shows, and they’ve started to evolve into sub-genres. We have reality/dating, where we can see lathered-up strangers scrub each other in a “hidden cam” shower stall one minute, then publicly scorn each other the next. Reality/family programs show us that even bat-chomping Satan worshippers put their spandex pants on one leg at a time. On the Discovery channel, we can see real live neighbors duking it out: Berber or shag?

So why not have reality/horror? I’m not suggesting for one minute that anybody gets hurt. We could just watch the news, or Jerry Springer if that were the point. What I am suggesting is that by giving small, everyday horrors some quality screen time, we might experience the same release as watching Mr. Hockey Mask fire up the ol’ boomstick and chainsaw.

Screen is black, ominous music reverberates as camera pans to furrowed brow. Beads of sweat spring forth at the hairline, eyes that have seen too much begin to bug out. The sound of a heart beating, layered beneath the rasp of a woman’s shallow, jagged breathing. She moves quickly down a narrow staircase. Her white knuckled hand shoots out to steady herself against the flimsy guardrail. A furry spider scurries over her wrist; she recoils, stumbling down the last two steps, landing at the base of the stairs, on her hip. The deep, resonating tones of KQRS’s Tom Barnard boom forth in voice-over.

Barnard: “This October, don’t go into the basement…”
Woman (Lifting her head to wail in panic—to hear a voice other than her own in the darkness): “Honey? Kids?!”
Barnard: “Some things are better left until morning…”
The heartbeat thunders over the sound of her breathing. In an instant sharp-focus lurch, we see a hollow-core door at the end of a short hallway. We know the door is thin because the hammering racket we hear is just on the other side of it, and it’s making the door vibrate. The sound grows louder as the woman drags herself nearer destiny. Her terror feeds on itself now, a feeble plea edges forth through her dry lips in a croaking whisper
Woman: “Anyone…please?”
As she grips the doorknob, the thumping gives way to an earsplitting screech. Too late!
Barnard: “Colleen Kruse in… Load Imbalance Signal!” On the shrill bleat of the buzzer, a quick succession of images flashes over the screen. A child’s hand sticking up from a mountain of unfolded laundry, a stack of unpaid bills, fruit flies dancing over last night’s casserole pan…
Barnard: “There’re only 24 hours in a day…”
The images click faster: a dog scratching at the door to get out, coffee spilling in slo-mo, splashing onto a freshly ironed white shirt…obligatory shot of a sexy, scantily clad teenage girl lolling on an unmade bed singing, “I’ll never te-hell!”…a cat squatting in a houseplant…the buzzer is fading into the distance, but the images keep coming…a toothbrush knocked into the toilet bowl…
Barnard: “And what’s left undone will wait for you tomorrow…”
Shot of a telephone ringing. Colleen grabs the receiver, brushing the sweaty hair out of her eyes. It is deathly quiet. A tumbleweed of dog hair puffs by.
Woman: “Hello! What do you want?! Who is this?!!”
Barnard (on the telephone): “Colleen, get out of the house! We’ve traced the call. It’s coming from TCF!”
She screams. Fade to black.

Writer, performer, and femme fatale Colleen Kruse is at mscolleenkruse@ hotmail.com.

I went out for coffee with my daughter the other day and the guy behind the counter sported a spike through the bridge of his nose. I couldn’t take my eyes off it. Get this—later, my kid said I was rude for staring. Well, isn’t that the point? Tattoos, scarification, piercing. You can’t tell me this stuff is for introverts.

I’ve seen nose rings and cartilage grommets, but the spike guy hit a new mark. This wasn’t piercing, this was a puncture wound. It seems to me that the trend in post-punk street-wear is to appear as if you have been through a horrible metal shop accident, or perhaps some kind of ritualistic torture. That’s probably the Hellraiser symbolism of all the needles and nails and chains. Young adulthood is torture. I certainly wouldn’t do it again. But if I had to, you can bet I wouldn’t drive a railroad spike through my face. The braces were bad enough.

Self-mutilation is not just for ne’er-do-wells any more. Good girls are getting into the act now. They’re into what they call “cutting.” Imagine feeling so pent-up full of rage and fear that you just had to… make a little mark. It’s still creepy, but sanitary and precise in an upper middle-class sort of way. When I was 15, you couldn’t get me near a razor. That was my counter-cultural message.

When nose rings became common, not so very long ago, people wondered what might be next. Scarring? Branding? Amputation? No one would have predicted the popularity of thorny, armadillo-scale-like subcutaneous implants. The other week in a St. Paul record store I saw a guy who has artificial devil horns implanted on his forehead. He told me he didn’t know who Joni Mitchell was. He recommended Enya, and then I knew for sure he was Satan’s helper.

How do people without health insurance manage to afford this kind of elective surgery? Can you sneak Grandpa’s tackle box over to the Piercing Pagoda and say, “Gimme the Full Metal Jacket?” I once worked with a guy who had bolts installed on either side of his neck. He said he could identify with Frankenstein’s monster. I guess the idea is that by handicapping yourself socially and physically in this way, you become somewhat like Mary Shelley’s sensitive tragic outcast, who was misunderstood and scary and able to withstand pain. Who did not have a place in this world. Except the guy I worked with did have a place. Even a title. He was my supervisor.

Then there are tongue rings, nipple rings, and rings in even more sensitive places. I’m used to seeing them now, like cell phones and hip huggers, but I still don’t understand it. Even back in my experimental days, when I took a fascinating stranger to bed, I didn’t want it to be a Jim Rose Circus matinee. (Though I might have made an exception for the cannonball guy, who probably knows a lot about thrust.) No, in my day all I needed to make a daring statement of personal rebellion was a box of hair dye and a pair of scissors. Or a baby.

I guess I know what bothers me about industrial bodywork, though I hate to admit it. I’m not supposed to get it. I’m not cool. My 14-year-old daughter tells me she can’t wait until her 18th birthday. She’ll get an eyebrow ring and a fire-breathing Chinese dragon emblazoned on her shoulder blade. At least it’s not her boyfriend’s name tattooed on her rear-end and antlers implanted on her forehead.

I’m counting on this whole craze being played out by then. My guess for what’s next on the bod-mod horizon is total body deconstruction. Flaying. Removing decorative patches of skin, possibly to give to one another as prom gifts or to be grafted onto one another, bringing pinkie-spit swears to a whole new level. Or perhaps the removal of the body altogether. If you’re just a pale gray brain floating in a jar, that way you know you’ll truly be appreciated for who you are, your soul, the sum total of your ideas and deeds rather than what you look like, or where you live and how you dress. Fashion Rule No. 1 has always been “Less is more.”

Writer, performer, and femme fatale Colleen Kruse is at mscolleenkruse@ hotmail.com.

Last year my friend Terry moved back to Nashville to take care of his ailing mother. Last month, when she passed away, I packed my kids, 11 and 14, in the car and drove an unplanned 820 miles in 15 hours to be with him. We left on a Thursday at 5 a.m. I worried about keeping two kids in the car like that, like veal, but we had to rocket if we wanted to make the memorial service. I had $100 in my pocket and no cash in my cash card until Friday. No fast food, no amusement parks.

The kids got into the spirit of the trip—after all, three days off school is three days off school. We ate PBJ’s and hard-boiled eggs out of the cooler in the back like an America’s Most Wanted family. After a period of silence, somewhere before Kentucky, I heard from the backseat. “Mom, make Isaac stop touching me.” My spine froze. I looked in my rearview mirror to find two dust-covered faces with puffy, punch-drunk eyes and dry, angry mouths.

I pulled off at the next station to fill up the tank. After paying, I had 60 bucks left. I looked at the kids, who were tussling by the diesel pump, whisper-fighting through clenched teeth. They’d hit the wall. Getting back in the car would be a big mistake. In the distance, just off the highway I saw a motel sign that read “Rooms $39.95. Cable, Indoor Pool.”

The Budget Inn was two stucco buildings, the main two stories, the other a long strip of rooms facing a swampy field, a “they’ll never find your bones” field. We parked in the deserted lot, walked to the front desk, and rang the bell. A narrow-eyed old troll wearing a Peterbilt cap sprang forth and asked me what I wanted.

“I’d like one of your $39.95 rooms, please.” I said. He sized us up. Single woman traveling with two homicidal kids. Easy pickings.

“Don’t got no rooms for $39.95. That’s last month’s special. Ain’t changed the sign yet. Room for you plus two gonna run $45.” “Fine,” I lied. “I’ll take it. I’d like a room in the main building, by the pool.” I dug in my pocket. I’ve been a woman traveling alone before. You always have to stay in the main building. It’s where people can hear you scream. It’s also where the free “coffee” is in the morning. “That costs extra,” smiled the Troll. “You want budget rate, can’t be by the pool. Gonna have to be in the strip.”

“How much for a room by the pool?”

“$75.”

I looked out the window into the empty parking lot and laid my money down.

“I only have $60. We’ve been on the road all day and we’re tired.” The troll snatched up the small pile of bills on his counter. “S’okay,” he smiled magnanimously. “We getcha by the pool. You the only folks here tonight.”

The kids swam. I took a tepid shower, and we tumbled into bed. I woke up at 3 a.m. to hear puking in the bathroom. My daughter had too many hard-boiled eggs. I stayed awake till 5 a.m., then roused the kids to get back on the road. I turned to my son, still snoring face down next to me, and nudged him.

“Honey. We have to get moving. You can sleep in the car.” In response, he lifted his sweet, sleepy head, and spray-vomited all over the bed. The kid was set on mist. He sputtered an apology, and I cleaned him up. We got our stuff together to make a hasty retreat. I glanced around the room to make sure we hadn’t left anything behind. I walked to the bed, and pulled the covers over the mess like covering a corpse at a crime scene. Our gift to Rumplestiltskin. Under normal circumstances, I’d have rinsed the sheets in the sink, but 60 bucks is 60 bucks, and you get what you pay for.

Colleen Kruse is a Twin Cities actress and comedian, mscolleenkruse@hotmail.com