Second Clementine

We spend a lot of time in our lives trying to tame paper tigers, fighting windmills and chasing dragons.

We're pretty stupid that way, I guess.

They say that part of the biggest clusterfuck about drugs is that, the first time you try a lot of the hard shit, the high is so unfuckingbelievable that the track-marked motherdrugger spends the remainder of his or her natural life using to try to replicate the intensity of that first line, or that first hit. And that's the problem: it's never going to be that good again.

Ever have a car that was as awesomsauce as your first car? No. Neither have I. And, for two years, I drove around in Herbie, the Love Bug.


Um, yeah. Seriously, that's a picture of my car. And even that wasn't as cool (at least, in my head) as my first car. Which is just another example of there being serious issues with my brain.

Anyway, we're dreamers. We're thrill-seekers, and we're obsessed with replicating those first thrills of our lives. Remember your first kiss? Um, I do. Frequently. Sometimes my trousers are around my ankles when I'm remembering it. Sometimes not. You know-- depends.

Though I never really thought of myself as someone who chased dragons-- because I've never done drugs or consumed alcohol other than Shabbat wine or a sip of champagne-- I've recently realized that I do chase my own particular dragons, in my own particular way. Maybe this is why I've owned 10 cars in the space of approximately sixteen years. Here we go, in chronological order:

1966 Volkswagen Beetle
1990 Ford Crown Victoria, late of the Delaware State Police
1988 Volvo 240-DL
1994 Ford Taurus
1997 Ford Crown Victoria
2001 Chevrolet Impala
2001 Volkswagen New Beetle Turbo (Herbie replica pictured above)
2005 Ford Focus
2001 Chrysler PT Cruiser
2002 Volvo S-40 Turbo

Yeah, I'm a little embarrassed by that, but I also think it's fucking awesome. And, I can promise you that there will be a lot, lot more, and some of them will be pretty fucking crazy.

Trust me.

Fortunately, I'm not this way with women. My wife has often opined how lucky she is, and how lucky I am, that I am not as fickle.

But I don't think it's about being fickle, automotively speaking. I think it's about thrill-seeking. About dragon chasing. I'm always trying to replicate the excitement of getting into a "new" car for the first time. Because, really, there is no feeling in the world like it. And it doesn't have anything to do with "New Car Smell," because I've only owned a "brand new car" two times out of the ten.

I also chase the clementine dragon. If you eat clementines, you know what I'm talking about. You can't eat just one of those pert little orange bastards. They're just so fucking good. You eat one and you go, "Oh! Oh, that was so sweet and succulent and wet and refreshing, and..... small. How the hell can I not have another one?" And you have a second one.

And the second one tastes like shit.

This happened to me on Sunday. And, because I learn from my mistakes like a lobotomized housecat, it happened to me again last night. I brought a second clementine upstairs as I was thinking about a blog topic. I bit into it lustily, my oral cavity wet with the sensory memory of the first, glorious clementine I consumed about three minutes prior.

"Auuughghh!" I whined. "Fucking dis-gus-ting! Why is it that every time I go to have a second clementine, it inevitably tastes like a monkey's dick?" I asked, rhetorically and hypothetically, of course. I was about to put another piece of it in my mouth when Mrs. Apron, at her sewing machine, exclaimed,

"Don't eat more of it! Throw it in the disposal."

"But that's all the way downstairs!" I bitched.

"Then throw it in the trashcan here."

"But it'll rot in here!" I moaned. Jesus, can you imagine being married to me for even ten minutes?

I ended up going (all the way) downstairs and throwing it angrily into the disposal. The aftertaste is still befouling my mouth, even as I type. What I need, of course, are cookies.

The question is: how can I eat just seven?