Covariate Analysis in the Early Works of Hemingway

I wondered, briefly, Friday evening whether I might be in a horror movie. I had spent an ungodly amount of time in one of the local supermarkets in an unsuccessful search for fresh apple cider, and then I appeared to be trapped in the express lane line, which did not move at all for quite some time. The man in front of me was wearing dirty green work pants and a dull orange knit shirt which perfectly matched the color of his skin. My first thought was that he didn't look well. Then I thought, "Interesting costume, dude," but I returned to the notion that he was unwell when he attempted to cough up a lung. There was a definite moment of surreality, which felt exactly like the moment in a horror movie just before everyone turns into zombies and begins wanting to eat your brain. But that didn't happen, and I managed to escape the Safeway with my life and my brain more or less intact, though I did have to settle for clear cider with an unnaturally long shelf life.


I had left the office early, so I did manage to make it home and light the candles in the jack-o-lanterns before the fall of darkness and the arrival of costumed children. One of the first groups to arrive at my doorstep and demand candy as a form of protection money was comprised largely of under-fives and their parents. I was passing out the candy when one child, who cannot have been more than two, apparently saw something in the house that he liked and walked right in. This disturbed his mother, but when one of the other mothers said, "You better go after him," she replied that she didn't want "to just walk into his house" and proceeded to stand in my doorway and shake a bag of candy at her son, who soon decided that there was nothing in the house as interesting as the combination of his candy and his mother. He was wearing a giraffe costume and was cuter than one would have thought it possible for even a two-year-old to be, so when his mother apologized for his having walked into the house, there was nothing to be done but shrug and give him an extra piece of candy. I'm pretty sure that if one of my children had wandered into someone else's house back when she was two, I'd have excused myself and gone in after her, but the occasion never arose, so I can't say for certain.


The trick-or-treaters were mostly finished by 8, though at 8:30, when the candles in the jack-o-lanterns had burned themselves out, a group of teenagers came by. I had not turned out the front porch light because I was expecting Logan. I took a quick but nervous shower in the downstairs bathroom, wondering all the time how speedily I could get dress if someone showed up at the door, but fortunately, the next time the doorbell rang, it was after 9:30, and it was Logan. He'd emailed me earlier in the day, and he'd implied that it would be nice to sit and chat for a while before I took him upstairs and pounded him, so we did that, and it was very nice, and then I took him upstairs, and we watched some gay short films while we got started, and then we took things very slowly, so that we were maybe ninety minutes in before I started to penetrate him. And that was probably just as well because I bent him into the angle where I could most effectively hit his prostate, and he began to cum fairly quickly. But he's the sort of bottom who continues to enjoy being hammered even after he's lost a load, so I power fucked him for the next hour (with some short breaks, of course: I'm not twenty-five, after all), and then I came. And then we spent the rest of the night alternating between cuddling, making out, sleeping, and fucking. He left around 11 the next morning, after which I ate leftover Halloween candy until I was thoroughly sick. It's only once a year, right?


B&c was due back from Managua in the evening, so even though it was the nicest early November day in memory, I mostly stayed in and cleaned the house some. I heard from my down-the-street buddy Christopher in the middle of the afternoon. He wanted to catch a movie last night, and his suggestion was that we either travel into DC to catch Another Gay Sequel: Gays Gone Wild or go to one of the local theaters and see W. I was going to beg off, but then I realized that b&c would likely be exhausted from his flight back and would just come home and go to sleep. I further realized that even though we'd be out pretty late, I'd have an extra hour, so after verifying with b&c that he had, in fact, been up since 3 am, I told Christopher that I was game. I simply could not stomach seeing W so close to the election. I didn't know anything at all about AGS:GGW, but Christopher said there'd be lots of flesh, and I sometimes enjoy trashy movies with lots of flesh, so I thought, "Well, how bad can it be?" I figured for once I could abandon my policy of seeing a movie without reading at least one review or checking the tomatometer.

Oh, readers: do not. I can't bring myself to say any more about it. Do. Not.


Having set the clocks back at 2 am, I got up at 8 this morning to go to church and sing with the choir. It was the pre-election day sermon, wherein the minister makes it clear, without mentioning any of the candidates by name and without giving anything that could be construed as an endorsement, that we're all voting for the Democrat. In some years, that probably isn't universally true, but the church has 365 members, and if you figure that's one for each day of the year, I would be shocked if Senator McCain got beyond January 2. The sermon was very rousing, and we were singing "Freedom Come" and a very interesting and stirring arrangement of the national anthem, and it was very, very difficult not to feel hopeful about Tuesday. I did my very best to beat it down, though. If I get all hopeful, and the election goes the wrong way, then I might have to become a secessionist, and that might be difficult. If you promise not to tell anyone, though, I'll admit that I'm optimistic about the election.


After church, I met up with b&c and my friend George in Rockville for brunch. The place we'd originally chosen wasn't open yet, so we went to Gordon Biersch, where b&c and I each had one of their beer samplers. You get four ounces each of the six beers that they make on the premises, all for less than $6. I also had a burger. Five of the six beers were very good. The Czech Lager was the exception, but I tried to view it as an educational experience. One sip of that beer, and you can taste exactly how it feels to have your hopes for democracy crushed by a Soviet occupation. I made it through about half of my four ounces before I felt entirely overcome by the weight of history, and then I gave the remainder to b&c, who is better able to take the long view.