First, we went to Von’s for dinner before the show. I’ve been wanting to go there for a long time, mainly because I’ve been intrigued by their sign that says Martini – Manhattan Memorial. I like martinis.

So Von’s was good. Very friendly staff all around, great food, and a fun atmosphere. The walls of the dining room are entirely covered in beer tap handles, which are fun to look at. I had a yummy roast chicken, a dirty martini, a decidedly clean martini, and apple crisp. All yum.

There was a fairly long line to get into the Paramount, but it moved fast enough. While we shuffled along, we were entertained by the fruitless efforts of Jesus-sign guys. Apparently Jesus has given us over to our wrongful passion. I got a Get Out of Hell Free Card, and then I actually witnessed a Jesus-sign guy who was reasonable and logical and possibly even sane and intelligent.

Our tickets were general admission on the floor, no chairs, which basically meant you cram up as close to the stage as you can. The floor was pretty empty when we got there, so we were able to watch the opening band from about 15 feet away.

The opening band, by the way, was the most depressingly boring band ever to be granted musical instruments and electricity. I speculated for some time about what the band might be called, and I got it narrowed down to Cure for Insomnia, Lullaby, or Trank. They went on for an eternity with their dirges, and the audience grew ever more restless and unkind. They finally left the stage to much relieved applause, and we were allowed to listen to the DJ’s odd assortment of songs while we waiting at least another seven hours for Marilyn Manson to take the stage.

There was quite a bit of unsneaky smoking going on in the crowd, both of the tobacky and the wacky sort. Not good for my cough, but it became clear that everyone who worships the devil smokes so they can meet him faster.

The crowd became increasingly agitated, with people jockeying for position and shoving each other in the drawn-out fashion of high school kids who do not yet understand what is meant by appropriate touching and just want to get attention however they can.

During this limbo, we got to know some of the interesting characters who’d come to see the show.

First, there was Crazy Lady. I’m not sure what she was high on, but it made her twitchy beyond belief. She must have come alone, but she acted as if everyone was her best friend. The punk girl in front of us, wearing a concert tee-shirt and sporting tattoos, piercings, and a respectable mohawk became the unfortunate object of Crazy Lady’s glassy-eyed attention. Crazy Lady kept touching Punk Girl’s shirt, skimming her fingers across the tour dates and mumbling something, and at one point she even touched Punk Girl’s little tattoos behind her ears.

Next we have Accountant, so named because he, well, looked like an accountant. Closely cropped hair, glasses, weasel-face. He had a mishmash of tattoos all over his arms, but only from the elbows up, presumably so he can look respectable to his tax clients while wearing shirts with sleeves. Accountant was also very high on something. He kept trying to make out with a girl that was not interested in him. He also roamed through the crowd holding up a dollar bill, begging people to give him a smoke. He tried to worm his way through the crowd to the front by putting his hand up in a parting-the-sea manner, but he always got shunted back again. At one point, he spent about 10 minutes trying to arrange with a hairy man near him to follow him as he traveled up to the front, for what purpose, I have no idea. Maybe he wanted backup. He was so high, there was a minute when he stood frozen, hand held firmly straight in his mid-air parting motion, his chin resting on some guy’s shoulder, just staring at the glory of his own hand.

Then there’s Russian-Blue-Blocker-French-Maid Guy with his harem of brunettes. He was wearing a French maid costume and headware that looked like someone had put an upturned bucket on his head, draped it with black velvet, and tied it up with a gaudy gold rope. And he was wearing blue blocker sunglasses. One of his brunettes was the one Accountant tried to make out with, and a brief tussle ensued wherein Accountant was ejected unceremoniously from that section of the floor. Russian-Blue-Blocker-French-Maid Guy and his harem had been at Von’s as well.

There was a little catfight between Pushy Jackass and Evil Threads Guy. Apparently one of them bumped into the other, and much hell was to be paid. Evil Threads Guy was there with a blonde, so life went on for him and his oh-so-scary black t-shirt, but Pushy Jackass just couldn’t move on. He spent much of the limbo time roaming around, telling everyone about his fight. Pushy Jackass was about as agile as a retarded elephant, so he conked me on the head and rammed into my side a fair number of times. Should he ever wake up from his massive state of stonification, he’ll find some bruises he was too impaired to feel last night.

Oh, and the Frat Boys. Frat Boy #1 spent a large chunk of time yelling into his cell phone, telling his “homies” (his word, not mine) that he was the one holding up the cell phone, then peering into the back of the theater with that very unsober look of serious concentration. Eventually, he was joined by the other Frat Boys, and they had much fun shoving each other to disguise their latent homosexuality.

And my favorite of them all, Pillow Lady. She was very soft and plush, not too tall, and she smiled politely when I made snarky comments about the above-named characters. She was the best person to be behind when the ramming and shoving began, because it didn’t hurt. She wandered away later, much to my dismay, but it was nice to be behind Pillow Lady while it lasted.

And then Marilyn Manson took the stage.

Our location about 15 feet from the stage, became an instant mosh pit. I was picked up and twisted and shoved and torn and practically knocked to the ground. I was seriously afraid of being trampled to death, and I used every self-defense tool at my disposal to keep upright. There are concert-goers waking up today with bruises, pinch marks, and puncture wounds from my elbows, fists, and fingernails.

We struggled back about 10 feet and found that we were actually able to stand up without getting crushed. And we could still see Marilyn Manson’s face loud and clear. And what a face it was — but more on that later.

Once the concert actually began, new characters emerged.

There are the girls who get on boyfriends’ shoulders and bare their chests for all the camera phone junkies to enjoy.

There are the guys who get too warm and run around the crowd without shirts on, subjecting everyone to their nasty sweaty skin. Maybe they’re just jealous of the flasher girls.

The crowd surfers, who get someone to launch them up and then try to ride the wave of arms and heads to the front of the crowd. I guess if you like the thrill of being groped by a hundred strangers, that’s good. Until the crowd lets you fall to the floor. But it was funny to watch.

There was Members Only Jacket Guy, who was so clumsy he makes a bull-in-china-shop analogy work, even in a mosh pit. He rammed into me so forcefully, nearly crushing my hand, that he’ll wake up today with a purple nurple. Not my fault.

For a good portion of the concert, I was trapped behind a wall that I’ve named Jabba. He was a very large, very hairy, very smelly man. He blocked the whole stage. I thanked God (or Satan, or whoever would be listening at a place like that) that he didn’t feel inclined to raise his hands in the air.

And there was an assortment of camera phone devotees. Their sole purpose in attending this concert seemed to be to hold their phone in the air and snap dozens of identically lousy photos. I was able to see all of this quite well, since their glowing blue screens were hovering in the darkness at a level high enough for me to actually see past Jabba. The majority of the pictures that got taken included arms brilliantly lit by the flash, with some color and light and shadowy figures behind. Occasionally, they’d get lucky enough to take a picture without arms in the way, in which case it was merely stage lights and shadowy figures. Some of these people spent the entire concert attempting to get a decent picture and never succeeding, watching the whole concert through their LCD screen instead of actually using their own eyes and enjoying it.

I’ve been to my share of concerts (Billy Idol, Aerosmith, Kiss, etc.) where it’s customary to throw the goat. You know, make devil horns with your fingers and stab the air. Well, Marilyn Manson fans make the weirdest devil horn fingers I’ve ever seen. It’s like a lazy version, with the horn-fingers relaxed and curled up a little, not thrust out in an angry ramming motion. But the weirdest part was that the two middle fingers (those not forming the horns) weren’t just pressed down. They met the thumb in a perfect little circle. The whole thing reminded me of a shadow puppet bunny. Not impressive for people who are supposedly full of rage and satanic impulses. They could at least throw a proper goat.

So, in case you weren’t sure, Marilyn Manson is unspeakably unattractive. Even though I was trapped behind outsized hillbillies and sumo wrestlers and beanpoles with giant ears sticking out, I could see the main attraction occasionally. And we were close enough to get a good look. Red painted-on eye mask, death-white face, and a mouth that looks like he won a cherry pie-eating contest — you know, the kind where you have your arms tied behind your back. I’m not saying he’s untalented. Just hideously icky, to my taste.

I won’t comment on the music, because I wasn’t really familiar with any of it, but everyone seemed to enjoy it. I did, however, get to use some of my kickboxing and self-defense skills, which was gratifying. I spent most of the concert in the fighting stance, with at least one arm up, poised to strike. I kicked several shins and calves, punched a few kidneys, pinched some arms violently (plus the one purple nurple), and rammed my elbows into some backs to keep from getting knocked to the ground to squashed like a bug. All of this was in protecting my own space, but I did get a sick delight out of it, too. But not even a single person reacted in pain to any of the abuse I distributed. I can only hope that they’re feeling it today.

All in all, the whole mosh pit nature of the event reminded me of Day After Thanksgiving shopping, when all rules of courtesy and normalcy are suspended for a while. It’s survival, baby. In fact, I was really freaking out about the crushing and shoving until that analogy clicked, and then I got into the spirit.

So the concert ended, leaving me with sore feet, tense muscles, temporary deafness, raging thirst, and blog fodder. All in all, a good time was had by all.

1. He has a very loud ringtone on his personal cell phone, and it is some country song.
2. When I snark about exhibitors after they’ve left the desk, he tells me I’m very negative rather than joining in.
3. The book he’s reading is some Christian non-fiction thing that he could not explain to my satisfaction.
4. He left me alone on the busiest day of the show to tend to his sick kid. Apparently his wife couldn’t leave her highly pressing job in data entry.
5. He habitually falls out of chairs, knocks phones off desks, and trips over cords with much flamboyance and little finesse.
6. He takes personal calls on his cell phone while helping exhibitors, who he then must pass off to me.
7. He gets to show site late every day and jets out at the first possible moment, because he claims it takes him at least 15 minutes to walk the 1/4 mile to the train stop.
8. He lives with his parents and his wife lives in an apartment. I’m not sure where the kids live. But the dogs live with his parents.
9. He has a tattoo of a cross with an American flag.
10. He has a tattoo of a local punk band. Local in this case means Bremerton. Their ‘hit’ song was called “Move to Bremerton.” He’s not a member of the band. Just a very very big fan.
11. He is attending a Christian music concert tonight. His wife spent three hours on various buses trying to get there early to get good them seats. She took a bus from Auburn to SeaTac, then transferred to a bus to downtown Seattle, then transferred to a bus to Redmond, where the concert is.
12. When I mentioned I’m attending a Marilyn Manson concert on Monday, he looked at me as if I’d just bitten the head off a newborn puppy.
13. When I asked him what he was doing for Valentine’s Day, he said they didn’t have plans. After all, his wife’s birthday was just a week ago, and he gave her flowers then. How many flowers do you need? Plus, she doesn’t like chocolate or jewelry, so there’s nothing really to do for Valentine’s Day.
14. In the two hours I wasn’t supervising him, he took two checks from customers, handled them completely wrong, and jacked up my whole receipt book in the process.
15. He didn’t pay his mortgage for about six months while trying to sell the house. Now he’s confused about why his credit score is low and he can’t buy another house.
16. He has 3 sons between the ages of one and four.
17. He (absentmindedly, I hope) rests his feet on the foot rest of my stool, tapping and swinging me back and forth in an unnerving way.
18. I bought him lunch a few days ago because he didn’t have cash and said he’d buy next time. So today, when he was going to buy, he couldn’t because “the money was not in his account.”
19. He was married 3 months after meeting his wife because she got pregnant.
20. He was out on the floor for an hour to pass out invoices to booths. In that time, he passed out only five because he couldn’t find the booths. Despite the fact that they are numbered, there are aisle and floor signs, and he had a map.
21. After his failed invoicing expedition, he sat at the desk for half an hour peering dubiously at the map. Then he spent another half-hour painstakingly highlighting on the map each booth he needed to drop an invoice at. With two hours left, he set off again, with highlighted map in hand. FYI, there are about 400 invoices to pass out.
22. About 45 minutes later, he returned, having passed out about 5 or 10 more. He had given up because he came to an exhibitor who yelled about the invoice. Wimp. He’s going to come in at 7am tomorrow to pass them out when nobody’s in their booths.

3:15 pm – There is a guy working here who looks exactly like Slugworth. From the original Willy Wonka movie. His face, hair, ears, everything. But the oddity doesn’t end there. He’s wearing jeans and a sweatshirt. He’s also wearing dangling silver earrings that must hang about an inch and a half down from his Slugworthy ears. His watch is silver, wide, and oh-so-flashy. And the best part is his necklace. I’m pretty sure it’s made of the inner rings of 2″ binders.

4:20 pm – A guy with three teeth and a mouth full of marbles just asked me what I do. I mentioned the pipe and drape, carpet, and tables and chairs.  He grinned toothlessly and and said in a long drawl, “Ohhhh, you’re an interior decorator!”

First, we have the women with a grudge against how men pee. According to Mothers Against Peeing Standing Up (www.mapsu.org), it’s unclean and rude for guys to pee standing up. Tiny pee particles get everywhere, and then their mommies have to clean it up, which destroys families and causes nations to go to war.

Seriously, you can buy t-shirts and stickers and mugs from these people to support their cause and remind you to change your evil peeing ways. The delusional people here say that their goal is “to transform the way the world goes to the bathroom by year 2010.” They even go so far as to have a Yellow Ribbon Campaign, in case you want to equate their lofty mission with the plight of soldiers overseas.  In a similar camp, but with a tenuous link to backwater science, is Nature’s Platform (www.naturesplatform.com). (I wonder if these two groups have heard of each other. If locked in a cage together, would they get along or fight to the death? But I digress.) Nature’s Platform is basically a frame made of plywood and PVC pipe that you put around your toilet so you can poop in the squatting position. According to their website, people will be miraculously cured of appendicitis, diverticulosis, hemorrhoids, colitis, prostate disorders, and colon cancer if only they pretend they’re pooping in the woods. Imagine bringing the joys of camping into your own home! They have an impressive array of endorsements, including a Knight of Malta, a man with a PhD in yoga, and a naturopathic doctor who looks like a back-up dancer for Rick James. One woman proudly proclaims that “Nature’s Platform has taught me to listen to my muscles which announce the action of elimination.”  I understand that 2/3 of the world’s population uses the squatting position for all their elimination needs. And maybe it helps them avoid hemorrhoids and colon cancer. But it seems to me that those same people have much bigger problems, like AIDS and famine and swatting flies off their babies, so maybe we shouldn’t so readily compare our situations to theirs. Maybe it’s something else besides how we poop that predisposes us for these diseases. Maybe something like eating crap food and living a sedentary lifestyle.  And true, our ancestors pooped on the ground. They also died by age thirty and used teeth for currency. And it’s not like they had the choice to sit on a toilet. Even if they’d had porcelain and indoor plumbing, I doubt they’d take the time for a leisurely sit when lions and bears were trying to eat them. And if we’re so keen on the pooping habits of cavemen, where are the leaves? I don’t think Neanderthal Man had access to toilet paper. Apparently, one of the drawbacks of the platform system is mess when using it for urination. I guess the squatting puts your bum into a bit of a hover over the toilet, so the makers of Pooping’s Best Friend recommend use of a funnel or some other kind of spray shield. I wonder what the MAPSU nutcases would have to say about this. Certainly seems unclean, but maybe it evens the playing field, gender-wise. With Nature’s Platform, now women can make a big tinkle mess too!

First off, you must know that Company X has a thoroughly entertaining website. Every time you click on an internal link or load a new page, you get this awesome bit of music that I swear came from a scene transition on Miami Vice. A smattering of cool drums and laser noises, followed by a near-silent reverb. Classy.

And the web writing is among the finest I’ve seen. Hyphens have been outlawed at Company X, but it’s okay because they have many resources at their disposable. Oh, and they aren’t eliminating potential employees merely for lack of wok experience. That’s good to know.

So, admittedly, I wasn’t expecting much when I showed up at 10:20 for my 10:30 interview. (I mention the time because I got in to the actual interview at 11:10.) But my low expectations were dashed down a few pegs when I saw that every window of the place was plasted with a Vote for Dino Rossi sign. I did not vote for him, nor would I ever.

Once inside, I was met with dingy white walls, filthy industrial grey carpet, and a cardboard sign bearing the Company X logo leaning on the floor against the wall just past the receptionist’s desk. Oh, and the radio was blaring KEXP radio, which apparently specializes in taking easy listening songs and adding a rockin’ backbeat. And I do mean blaring. The receptionist, when she finally arrived at almost 11, had to yell to be heard over it.

As I sat in the dirty gray-and-chrome chair, filling out paperwork, I sized up my competition. The woman who arrived moments before me was a grandma with helmet hair, a frumpy skirt-suit with a breast cancer awareness lapel pin, and spikey black leather boots. She recently moved here from Atlanta to be near her son and 4-year-old granddaughter, because he was relocated by Boeing. She hates the weather here (more to the point, she hates my weather), and her age has been a big problem in finding work.

And yes, it is weird that I know so much about this woman.

A while after I arrived, another woman showed up. She had a shaky grasp on the English language, and she was very chatty and chummy. She was wearing the very same black/grey/hot pink stripey pants that I own and sometimes wear to interviews. She too was wearing spikey black leather boots, and she had her resume tucked into a magazine that she’d brought along, and when she turned it in, she had to pencil in some information on the top.

A while later, another woman joined our little party. Her spikey black leather boots made me wonder if I’d missed a memo somewhere. She was wearing a black pinstripe suit, and she tried very hard to be hip and hide the fact that she was well past middle age by chatting with the receptionist about Britney Spears.

Ah, the receptionist. You would’ve thought she hadn’t had human contact in years. She went on and on, in an inanely loud voice to carry over the music, about how she just moved here from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where she was forced to become a huge football fan. Apparently there’s a game on Saturday. Oh, and an interesting fact about southern Florida is that nobody who lives there is actually from there.

And the last contestant, who appeared just a few minutes before I was finally summoned to the interview, was a gangly young guy in an oversized and ill-fitting suit. I don’t think he realized the back of his jacket collar was sticking up like he had come straight from a Corey Haim photo shoot. Or maybe he did. I’m not sure which is worse. He had oddly shaped facial features, like a Ken doll that gets pinched in at the ears, and he had one of those wrap-around-your-ear hearing aids. He made a very concerted effort to not make eye contact with the receptionist.

Oh, and then I got to meet Mr. Personality. He made a point of telling me that this was the kind of fun office where the music is blaring, and where there aren’t any “suits.”

The interview went by at a kind of hyperspeed blur. I vaguely remember disturbing phrases about “very small events at QFC” and “the event coordinator position has absolutely no growth potential,” but I was swept up in the surreality of it all.

In my bewilderment, I agreed to a second interview tomorrow at 10am. As I was being shunted out the door, he mentioned that it would be an all-day interview, and that I shouldn’t wear tennis shoes, jeans, or t-shirts, and that I should “check the weather and dress accordingly.” Um…what? Either he thinks I’m too mentally deficient to know how to dress myself, or he’s implying that we’ll be trekking around in the out-of-doors.

So I won’t be going back for the interview. Instead, I’ll sit around wondering why the only people who want to hire me are the ones that I wouldn’t want to work for. It’s like junior high all over again. I was, and ever will be, a geek magnet.

2. I went on a lively rant today over a pleasant meal and a friendly game of sudoku. Not a rant at the person I was dining and puzzling with, but one that kind of came out of the blue. I’ll write about that apparently fascinating (to me) topic tomorrow, when I will hopefully not have a headache brought on by the job application process.

3. I have cramps, and I think they’re somehow related to the ridiculously annoying groin muscle pain. I don’t know how I made it my whole life without ever actually feeling pain in those particular muscles–it took me quite a while to realize that was actually what those muscles were–but it was a nice 32 years and I’d rather not again, thank you.

4. I actually had to look up bow tie to see if it had a space in it or not before I could hit the submit button. Turns out, it can be spelled bow tie or bowtie. I like the space. Otherwise, I want to pronounce it differently.

5. Seven weeks until I leave for the cruise. Zipline tour of the jungle! Cave tubing! Clear kayaking! Unlimited eating! Christmas in a tropical location! WHEEEEEEE!