Gay Narnia

First of all, in the category of “What the Hell Was That Symbolic Of”, I offer the following nomination. Today, at my one year anniversary at Circles (the company I work for), I was awarded a very nice fleece top. It has a little embroidered “Circles” logo thingy over the right breast. Very comfortable; I’ve been wearing it all day.

I came home at 2:15 am, sat down in front of my computer. My cat jumped onto my desk, walked in front of me, and bit the Circles logo. Twice. She then walked to the end of the table and jumped off.

Ok, glad that’s out of my system. Now, off to what I sat down to talk about: My Adventures in Gay Narnia (*PLEASE NOTE* No homosexuals of any gender were harmed during the creation of this post). Last year, I found myself in the improv Mecca of Chicago, as is my wont, for the yearly Chicago Improv Festival (hereafter referred to as CIF [patent pending]). I was attending said festival with Gary and Andy (2 of my partners from Slurred Vision – Gary is still with me, Andy now prefers his big city friends [oooooh, did that sound bitter?]). We are also there with Andy’s girlfriend Alison, and Gary’s big’n’beefy boyfriend, Pat (I’m kidding, Pat is great, an awesome guy. Who is like this huge dangerous wrestler dude who could eat the top of your head off, but is still super cool and nice.)

So, the five of us are together at a party. (I hear by officially apologize for abusing the parenthetical comment system). As we were in a foreign city in a strange and exotic land, we had not packed certain …. Supplies of an … aromatic nature that, while only a minor misdemeanor in our fair land, in this strange new world would for some reason land us in an icky and scary prison for like 2 years.

We had spent several days in this new world trying to locate said substance, but had been unsuccessful. Apparently, we kept getting the only cab drivers in the world who do not know where to score weed. On the particular evening in question, we had finally had some luck. Pat had managed to hook up with a crazy Hispanic lady who was willing to sell us some of that substance.

But we had no papers. Without papers, we could not roll (sorry for the parenthetical intrusion from the previous theme, but the cat is biting my Circles shirt again). If we could not roll, we could not rock. We broke up, and started mingling separately, each trying to subtly find out if anyone had any papers. Apparently, no one had any freaking papers.

We had finally decided that we were going to have to McGyver a bong when Andy came running up. “Come with me, fellows, come with me,” Andy called, jumping up and down in his excitement, “for I have found a most magical world, hidden beyond a big scary iron door.”

We followed Andy behind the iron door, and found ourselves in Gay Narnia. A magical, wondrous land which consisted of a large apartment in a converted warehouse space, at least 3,000 square feet. It was very tastefully decorated, and clean. The apartment had no fewer than six separate bedrooms, a gigantic living area, a disgustingly huge kitchen, and a second media room.

The occupants of Gay Narnia had papers, and were willing to trade those papers for a little lungful of fun themselves. We set about sharing our bounty with our new friends, much like our forefathers did with our little Native friends (before giving them blankets deliberately infected with smallpox and destroying their culture. Whoops).

As I took in my wonderful new surroundings, certain … facts came to my attention. The first was the fact that the entire apartment was filled by attractive young men, aged 19-24, who, for reasons I could not immediately understand, had chosen not to attend a wild party with drunk and easy women in attendance. This seemed a tad … odd to me. Then I noticed that not one of the guys at this apartment had paid the slightest bit of attention to Alison, the only female in the room (and Alison is an attractive girl).

However, it was the following conversation that filled me in (Please bear in mind, Andy was and is an innocent young pup, unwise in the ways of the world. During this conversation, I am seated between Andy and Paul. Paul is a denizen of Gay Narnia.):

PAUL
So, Andy, how do you like the place?

ANDY
Huh? Nice. It’s cool.

PAUL
What you drinkin’?

ANDY
A beer.

PAUL
Great. You know what’s good? When you grind up a valium into powder and add it to your beer. You want to come to my room and try some?

ANDY
Gorsh. Ok.

ASH
(Putting his hand on Andy’s shoulder, and pushing
him back into your seat.)
No, you don’t.

ANDY
But I want to go with him.

ASH
(Widening his eyes.)
No, Andy, you don’t.

Now, I’m not claiming that, had Paul taken Andy back to his room, that he would have locked the door, gave Andy ground-up valium, knocked him unconscious, and penetrated him anally. I am not saying that this is exactly what would have happened. But its probably more or less what would have happened. Face it, you do not offer someone, say, roofies, just because you think they’ll find it fun.

So, there was a moral in that story. As beautiful and magical as Gay Narnia was, even it had its hidden perils. Ok, not precisely hidden, it was pretty obvious. Andy was pretty dim-witted for having missed the signs. But that’s why God made me: to protect the dumbasses I love.