MYKEL'S APRIL 2021 BLOG or Side Effects

 You’re STILL Wrong

or
Mykel's

April 2021 Blog/Column

Side Effects

by Mykel Board

With some things we are trying to solve some of the problems that are caused by some of the things with which we are trying to solve some of the problems that are caused by some things. -- Mokokoma Mokhonoana

April is when the world slowly opens up and I have to compromise. People will only come out of their cubby holes, masked, vaxxed, and rubber gloved. Really? I find it hard to believe that image of the typical New York wimp is a “tough New Yorker.” Like other images, I guess, it’s only an image. Few people match the image. Out of a hundred, maybe one. Or fewer. Lot’s of other places have people with balls-- here, you can’t even say that word without some feminist saying Yo! I have more balls than you’ll ever have... and being right about that.

I give up. New York is one of the most diverse cities in the world… yet it’s one of the most conformist. I’ve been to every US state, and 70 other countries. The MOST conformist city in the world is San Francisco. Next may be Stockholm, but Stockholm isn’t nearly as cowardly as New York.

The only way you can actually meet people here... have non-virtual social intercourse... go out to eat… to a bar… to a hotel lobby with Dorothy Parker to talk about the state of the world… is to show your Covid test results or your vaccine certificate… otherwise ewwwww cooties!

Bullied into getting shot, I’m on my way to Duane Reade by Walgreens to get the second poke of the government Pfizer-subsidy program. The first shot was free of side effects, but there are all kinds of reports about nasty reactions to the second. 

I’m inside a little white room next to the drugstore pharmacy section. (You’re too young to remember when drugstores WERE pharmacies.) There’s a chair, a tiny table, a sink, and a garbage pail that has a hand-written sign taped to the top of it.

NO FOOD IN GARBAGE. Thanks

This is clearly to discourage patients from rummaging for lunch. A slightly chubby woman, glasses, stern, smile-less... looking more like a security guard than a nurse... asks me to roll up my sleeve. I take my shirt off.

“I need to see your vaccine card to indicate your second dose,” she tells me. I pull it out of my wallet where it lies right next to my new food stamp card. The unfriendly needle-sticker writes some stuff on it. Then...

She wipes an alcohol swab on my arm and BLAM! ...jabs my shoulder with the pre-loaded needle.

“Have a seat outside for fifteen minutes,” she tells me. “If there are no side effects you can go home.” 

“What if there are side effects AFTER fifteen minutes?” I ask her.

“Then stay, home,” she says… in a serious cop voice, “take Tylenol and drink some tea with lemon.”

“You’re shittin’ me,” I don’t say as I put my shirt back on and go outside to wait for the rest of my hair to fall out. It never occurs to me that there could be side effects other than something horrible

The outside room brightens suddenly, as if someone turned a knob that had been only halfway up.

About 10 minutes into sitting out my 15 minutes, the nurse passes me to talk to another patient. It’s then that I notice her ankles… like a dancer’s… a sheet of muscle pounding between bone and skin… and her calves… like tight black eggplants… begging to be skinned and boiled. And the way they disappear under her white lab coat… begging to be followed… explored… lifted. Those legs will be the most beautiful thing in the world. I knew then that the smile missing from her face could be found between her legs. I feel a stirring between my own legs.

The RN loudly clears her throat, and looks at her watch. “Your fifteen minutes are up,” she says. “You can leave now.”

“Did anyone every tell you,” I don’t say… but think… “that you’re the most beautiful woman in the world?”

Somehow I manage to get myself to the door. I glance back, but the goddess in white is gone. As I leave the store, I can still feel the blood pulsating between my legs.

Outside, a Mexican delivery boy dismounts his bicycle. On his back is a square backpack with the word CAVIAR in white against a red background. He wears a heavy jacket that does not conceal his Alfred Hitchcock profile. He also wears a black mask with more ridges than a Ruffles potato chip. Above his mask I can see his eyes. Deep brown… the kind that draw you in… the kind that hook your own eyes and pull you closer. The kind that you just want to look at for the rest of your life.

I stare into those wide brown eyes. The guy looks at me, clucks his tongue, then looks back at me. Then he looks skyward, heads to an old apartment building and rings the bell. I watch him move… sexy as a ballet dancer… one leg kicking out… then the next. I’ve never seen anything like it…I’m in love... more stirring between my legs.

I look at the sky. It is blue… a few wispy clouds form the ass of the Venus de Milo... callipygian… right there above my head. I imagine those cloud cheeks… settling themselves on either side of my face. A gluteal COVID mask… right overhead. I turn around to get a different perspective. I turn again… and again. Before long, I’m just spinning on the sidewalk... whirling... arms flung out… a manic ballet… a Dervish on Spring Street… images of those cheeks resting on my face.

I’m getting dizzy. I stop. The spinning doesn’t. The streets twist around me like chopsticks on a turntable. I feel something under my elbow… a hand… pressing to support me.

“Are you all right, sir?” comes a voice whose source I can’t quite locate. “Here, let me help you to someplace where you can sit down.”

We move to a stone porch. I sit on one of the lower steps. Slowly the spinning stops.

“Is that better, sir?” comes the same voice. I look up into his face… scruffy beard… impossible to tell where the nose hairs end and the mustache-beard begins. Bushy gray eyebrows… shooting off in all directions. A double… no triple,,, chin, pushed out by the downward look of the mysterious stranger. He’s one of the most beautiful people I’ve ever seen.

“You… you…” I start… “Thank you, you saved me,” I say.

“No problem sir,” says that melodious voice. “You think you can make it home by yourself? Should I call an ambulance?”

“I’m okay,” I answer. “Did anyone ever tell you how dazzling you are?”

A smile with a few missing teeth answers my question… I fear I’ve made the smiler uncomfortable.

“No problem, sir,” comes that voice. “Have a nice day.”

I watch as he walks away… what an ass on that guy!

Holy shit! You never think of side effects as anything but BAD side effects… but this must be a vaccine side affect. Shoot me again... and again. I’ve got to get home to take care of the pressure between my legs. I won’t need youngperps.com today. Just my memories and a glance out the window at a passing stranger. So much love… so much beauty!

See you in hell,

Mykel Board

ENDNOTES: [You can contact me on facebook or by email at mykelboard@gmail.com. Through the post office: send those... er... private DVDs..or music or zines... or anything else (legal only!) to: Mykel Board, POB 137, New York, NY 10012-0003. If you like my writing, you can be notified when anything new is available. Send me an email with SUBSCRIBE in the subject line. Back blogs and columns are at https://mykelsblog.blogspot.com]

--> Speaking of Cop-like dept: WDJT reports that a Wisconsin security guard wound up handcuffed and had to call the cops. Police were dispatched to a local Bath and Body Works around 2 a.m. after receiving a call from the shackled guard.

When asked what happened, the guard told them he was bored and put the handcuffs on himself to pass the time. He hadn’t realized, though, he left his keys at home. He added that it wasn’t the first time it had happened either.

One of the officers used a police handcuff key to free the victim.

Reports are that the guard has since put the cuffs where he can’t easily get to them. I wonder what he looks like.

--> A bird in the Wuhan dept: [This was taken from the CRACKED website.]
Even at-least-now-I-have-time-to-catch-up-on-Netflix thinking can become a curse as you enter the ninth day since you felt sunlight. When you're isolated you crave novelty, and over 40 million people found it in the form of Chinese construction vehicles.

Chinese state broadcasters hosted livestreams of two hospitals being built, and very bored people developed a fandom around the equipment. Cement mixers were dubbed Big White Rabbit and The Cement King. A flatbed truck was declared Brother Red Bull, and the biggest stars of the show were Folkchan, "the cutest and most hard working little forklifts." Fan art was created. Viewers could vote on their favorite vehicles, and little mythologies sprung up in live chats as the construction efforts were cheered on. So please enjoy this lighter side of the corona saga before someone inevitably makes hardcore forklift porn.

–> Howdy Partner Dept: The Washington Post tells us that more than 2,000 police and fire departments across the U.S. have “cooperative agreements” with the Amazon doorbell camera Ring system. This is up from 60 in 2018. The pace of new sign-ups is now two new “partnerships” a day.

Those partnerships allow officers to ask all camera owners within half a square mile of a crime scene to share video that could help with the case, and agencies have been seeking out video at a striking rate. Police in Milwaukee, for example, now send Ring video requests for every homicide and nonfatal shooting in the city. Last year officers there requested video more than 800 times.
Credit where it’s due though. This scary report was published in a newspaper owned by… (drumroll here) AMAZON!

–> More side-effects dept: The Week Magazine reports that there have been unintended side effect from the Zoom Culture that developed over the Covid year. Here’s what they said:

–> Something fishy Dept: CNN reports Taiwan’s government has pleaded with citizens to stop changing their names to “salmon” in order to get free sushi. Restaurant chain Sushiro launched a promotion that people whose names include the Chinese characters for salmon could get a free all-you-can-eat meal with five friends. Taiwan’s interior minister complained that the rush for official name changes created “unnecessary paperwork.” But one college student now named Explosive Good Looking Salmon said it was worth it because he’d already eaten 245 dollars worth of free sushi.

See you in hell… again,

MB

LINK TRADE DEPARTMENT:

I read that the search engines like lots of links... and it's also nice to support my friends and enemies in their blogs. So facebook me or email me if you have a blog, webpage or something else to connect to. I add you. You add me.

Here's a start:

Here’s Richard Goldberg: goldberg.wordpress.com

Poetry and humor fans will like Justin Martin in The Latency

And my friend Mike R has a nice site with recipe hits from the past! (He cooked for me once... great stuff.) Check out Yesterday's Recipes.

Rock-writer and historian extraordinaire, Jim Testa, has continued his great zine online. Jersey Beat is still going!

And here's one by a member of ANTI-SEEN... a tour diary of sorts.

Andy Shelton has an interesting blog here.

Savage Hippie is a guy who has been YouTubing for a long time. Our opinions largely overlap... but he complains that I'm a Communist. I'm not! I'm a communist.

Chris Stecher publishes a zine called PRECIS. You can see the back issue links there... and he promises a new issue soon.

George Fertakis has a very nice graphics-heavy blog... with music and books featured prominently. If there’s no link here (I can’t find it temporarily), then Google… er… Duckduckgo him for information.

And my long-term pal Sid Yiddish contributes with his Mishegas Master Blog.

And connect to TRUST Zine, a long-running German punk zine… that STILL PRINTS!!! Yeah, they have a website too… of course! It’s here.

Here are a couple video links.

This from Jon Cox https://squelchchamber1.bandcamp.com/album/down-so-low

And this one from my very long-time friend Roger Armstrong.

Jim Testa moved his long running zine, Jersey Beat, to the blogosphere awhile back. You can read it here. Jim also recommended a kind of unique album… in a style you don’t see to much of these days… or any days. Neo-Hassidic Rock Opera. You can stream the album here.

Kyle Nonneman is in prison in Portland. At least he can’t be kidnapped by the secret police… I think. I post his blog for him, he can’t do it from the klink. Lots of stuff about noise metal… and some very weird politics that will either fascinate or repulse you… or both.

Oh yeah, then there’s me. I have a blog of stuff I’ve written mostly from last century. You might enjoy it. Then again, you might not. It’s here.

I have a very occasional blog about how rich people are just like us… same needs, same desires, you know. You can read it here.

Let me know if you have a blog… or a print zine… or a YouTube and want to be added to the list. You show me yours… you’ve already seen mine. god@mykelboard.com