My friends and I were here on Halloween for a show by the Legendary Pink Dots–they’re like a gothic Grateful Dead. The place was packed. I’d say half in costume and half out. I met some interesting people, including a mysterious gothic young lady who had the widest, most frightened eyes I’ve ever seen. I realized later that it was because her boyfriend thought I was trying to pick her up as he was standing beside her. After the show the lead singer happened to be walking around in a feather boa and sunglasses, and I bummed a cigarette from him. I wanted to talk about his music and his influences. He was very gracious and a non-Axl-Rose-type performer, the opposite of what you’d expect. Then, just before I left, one of the friends of a friend that I had met earlier in the evening stole a kiss on my cheek. I was rather perplexed by this, but I figured he kissed me because I had on a sailor boy costume. I went home to my girlfriend to try to explain the weird night and realized that the evening was kind of my own Fellini movie–my own La dolce vita with a bit of Satyricon thrown in.
–Michael John, anesthetist