Shroooooms

GODALMIGHTY WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?

About a month ago I undertook to alter my perceptions of reality. A clinical trial, if you will. To discover the effects of "shrooms" (clinical name: psylocybin) on a twisted and warped mind such as my own. I endeavored to keep my observations of a strictly scientific sense, and use the Socratic method wherever possible. I even made an "experiment in progress" sign to hang on my door knob using the envelope of some communist party stuff I’d received. Those efforts did not last for long. This account is compiled from my rambling and often incomprehensible "research notes".

The first hurdle to overcome was that, though I had managed to purchase the awful wrinkled things, I had no idea how to use them. I knew they were not smoked, and eating was preferable, but how? I don’t care what kind of high it gives. Those things reminded me of my grandmother. I’m not putting that wrinkly grossness in my mouth. Shove them up the ass? Inject them? What?

Using my culinary knowledge I soon figured that I could crush them into a beef stroganoff tv dinner. I let it cool down a bit first and then in they went. I devoured the whole thing with every kind of hunger man can have. This was to be greater than sex, greater than food, greater than dope or booze. It was nirvana’s doorstep and I had the key.

Soon typing began to sound like giggling, which I later found was me laughing because my typing sounded like me laughing. Then what little common sense I had began to fade away. This was problematic. I had done absolutely nothing to prepare my room, because I was looking forward to a spiritual trip wherein the Goddess, Karl Marx, Che Guevara, or some angel would pop by and impart wisdom.

Partly due to my misconceptions and over abundance of faith in my fleeting sanity, I hadn’t secured my room. Arrows, swords, droves of knives, paint, and dangerous music were everywhere. The only thing I had done was to decide ahead of time not to listen to a lot of MCR. I did NOT need an image of my female companion turning into a zombie in my bed, especially while I was laying in said bed.

But I digress. My grip on self preservation was fading. I’ve always had self destructive tendencies. It’s a humble thing really. I know that my death makes little difference in this swirling sphere of gas and rubble. So it was no surprise that the first thing I noticed was a push pin on the floor. I wondered suddenly what "sharp" felt like. But for the moment I had the self control not to pick it up. Worse than that though was the sensation of heat everywhere. It had been fine earlier in the evening but I was certain I was hot, so off came all my clothes but my underwear, which would later be augmented by an apron and a lot of paint.

Soon I curled into a ball as if it would make the heat go away, but unknown stimuli kept shocking me and I began to spin around laying on my bed. I had my first vision which I recorded as being a jewel suspended above water with green and purple lightening.

But what did it mean? There was no time to interpret it because I soon began to unleash the gospel of the Good Lord’s Muskrat and the Red Lord’s Musket in a Kurtzian monologue.

"this is the last efighe(sigh) pf a dyiong mnind
a desperate thingy
smell i canb smell everything
thus ibe(I’ve) nonent(unintelligible) the drug has brought me to is perfect and golden there is nothing herlse(else)
yhtres unity npow to be fouy d(found)
theres unity now to be found
are they teh same
the red lord and the food lord
goooooooood lord
the red lors musket
the good lords muiskrat?
future sight now
holy hole in the foot and the shouklder
spreading the gospel of tghe good lords mujskey
i stared downj it to day"

In response to my ranting Slade was most cooperative:

"I will keep my eyes peeled for all rodents wielded as weapons by royalty, I promise."

I muttered to him about Jim Morrison and Hendrix in reference to the fact that I was struggling to turn The Doors onto repeat. But after one of their songs it went straight to "All along the watch tower" The jamming intro nearly shattered my mind just by pure stimulus. As a result I soon put on an apron.

I know this because I began to freak out about a red thing around my neck when I discovered I’d put it there. The apron became my armor in a bizarre battle against a statue I had in my room. It had been shifted around until it was infront of an old crucifix I have for no reason. The statue was gold, an unfortunate color for what I deemed to be an idol. I slung three knives into it with incredible accuracy considering my state, and beat it until it fell down along with a few other things. The arrow, I believe, was what I used to actually knock it down. At which point I distinctly remember exclaiming "Oh fucking dragon!"

Talking to Slade throughout the experiment may have saved me a lot of trouble. The next morning, for instance, I discovered that in my epic battle with the golden idol I’d crushed my lamp. I made a comment about the lamp being spidery, so Slade wisely pointed out "maybe the lamp is unsafe right now?" Regardless of my companion’s help I soon realized that "In the eye of this storm I’m alone" and that everyone was outside. I’d lapsed back in from madness to realize that this was all in my head, regrettably. None of it was a holy sign or anything… not yet.

Then it came to me. Slade had been speaking to me of how he couldn’t do shrooms, and I was speaking of how he should. When I bought them I used the euphemism "ingredients" or "dietary supplement". (always use fake names just in case when dealing with people. You never know if they’re wearing a wire man) So I began a mantra about how he should supplement his diet. Suddenly though I realized that supplementing Slade’s diet was immaterial. What was important was that I ate stars. Stars were, indeed, my diet. That became my mantra for the night since I’d destroyed my cd player in a Hendrix induced rage.

Was it all so uncommon, though? The tantrums of tornado-like destruction? The raving about things no one else can comprehend? I live very much within my own mind and only a few would know what goes on in there to varying extents. Maybe it sharpened such things, the creativity and the destruction, and the one in the other. In any event I soon took it further.

I was afraid that I might lose myself, so I renamed myself Stars Are My Diet and proceded to label myself as such. With a pair of scissors. I’m not sure if it was suicide or not. I really could care less, it didn’t scare me in any way whatever when I saw the cuts on my chest and wrist the next day. Remember in Fear and Loathing where Gonzo is all "I didn’t want to cut you, I just wanted to carve a little Z in your forehead" It’s kind of like that. Sure, death might have resulted, but I don’t know if it was my intent.

After the sharp thing were exhausted I moved on to drug no-no number 2: mess making materials. I needed to paint, needed to create the manifesto of Stars Are My Diet. Of course, I couldn’t handle a brush and soon grew frustrated, so in went my hands. By the time I was done my legs, chest, arms, and even my underwear were covered in paint and a canvas was splattered in reds and blues and toothpaste.

When I finished using the toothpaste to paint I decided I had to shape up and be responsible. I put on a bathrobe and decided I still looked too crazy in my dilated pupils, painted fruit of the loom, and bath robe. So I put on a tie. There you go, I thought. You look like a real go getter. And then responsibility continued with me getting my teeth brushed. I was mixing up directions and trying to figure out which teeth were mine and which weren’t. It’s amazing how one still feels the need to complete a routine hotwired into their subconsious even among such mad circumstances.

I crawled back to the desk foaming toothpaste and began to experiment, making fairly interesting discoveries that amazed me at the time. I discovered that I liked "soft" and that I didn’t so much like sharp. Then I felt something that I deemed to be wet. It turned out to be a battery. I had discovered a difference between cold and wet. I was stunned. Then I began to question Slade if he knew of "spinny", which is one of the four elements along with cold, soft, and wet. He did, and it comforted me to know that I was not the only researcher of "spinny"

Somewhere around five am it finally peaked. Slade had left and I was seeing things too wild to record or recall. I THINK I tried to go to sleep. I did that whole brushing my teeth thing and then I spit out the toothpaste and all that and then went back to my room... I think I went and got a camera, I was terrified by the cracks of some chip bags, believing them to be explosions. Then I took pictures of the scene for EVIDENce. And then I heard yelling.

The fear set in. Redneck yelling. The very worst kind of yelling.

I was Dr Frankenstein in the castle and these mad fools were coming with their torches

Or were they?

I peeked out my door, light streaming in from the hall.

It was just charlie and lorie yelling about money. I laughed merrily when I found that and so I went downstairs as an ambassador, and also to wash my hands of the paint. I like it on... you know, everything else... but its good to have clean hands. If I was to be the ambassador of stars are my diet, I'd need to clean up.

So they're yelling yelling yelling

and I yell something about owning all the teeth, they're talking about teeth at the time so its not too out of whack.

and then lorie wondered off into her own slot style slot car life to go get whatever she does -- drugs alcohol, idiocy, her haze is killing while mine has created!

so I talk to Charlie. Try to tell him his yelling nearly sent me on a bad trip after all the mushrooms I'd ingested,. he just laughed. He hopes to have his cast off. We actually talked and it occured to me that I wasnt the one who was weird. They'd both been yelling and disturbed me. Charlie felt this? Perhaps. I was no longer the crazy person covered in paint and with a gut full of psycotrobic mushrooms. I was simply Stars Are My Diet.

And I was conversing with these people and they couldnt tell I wasn’t ok.

I went upstairs to see if I was still tripping as soon as my food was done. I'd seen some meat thawing in the sink, or was it bad and left there to die? Hard to tell... anyhow, I decided meat was a poor idea. Stars are, after all, my diet. So I had just pasta with rose sauce. I considered throwing out all my meatatarian food. Naw, too much irony, I thought. I'd just gone shopping. That meat was still fresh, and besides, it was in the freezer and freezers were cold.

So I got back up to my room and I started in on the music. Ginsberg's Howl first. I heard the lines that aren’t in the poem most people hear... "Break through to the river", kind of like Morrison says in that other song, but in Ginsbergs sweet old man voice.

and then I decided my emo angry music was the order of the day. Somewhere into Ghost of You, which I was grooving to quite happily like it was all happy and shit, I passed out. I awoke the next day covered in paint wearing an apron and a bath robe, and with slashes on my wrists and chest that might have been attempts at words. It was a great night and I hope to do it again soon.