Midnite Till Death No. 25 was a scary fuckin’ time and I thought I was going to die. What made it so terrorizing was that the Mishka Monster Crew showed up and ruined everything. Mike Jones showed up early, effed up on muscle relaxers, his head rolling around on his shoulders and drooling on himself. His shit was falling out of his pockets and he just let it stay there. Dumb twelth grade fools who follow him around like Manson girls kept trying to shove his shit back into his pocket but he kept swatting at them like they were bad dreams. That guy is a hundred percent scum. When he dies I’m throwing a party.

Ease DaMan showed up around the time that the Men started doing their high energy, technical brain buggery razzle dazzle. “What is thizzzzzz fuckin’ shittttt?”, he loudly asked, to no one and everyone. His dick was hanging out of his pants and there was a GI Joe tied to it by a length of shoelace. I think the GI Joe was Shipwreck for those of you who are stupid enough to care. It was hard to understand him but he was high or dying or something and he kept trying to pull the sneakers off of everyone there and screaming,”These mine! I know they mine! You bitch! You fucking bitch! You fucking shoe stealing bitch!” Eventually he tired himself out and just took a nap in a corner with his butt in the air.

Things quieted down after that debacle with Ease blowing his shit but around the second song of DJ Guitar Trips set of guitar shreddery and tape loopery I heard someone shriek”Nice fucking sandals, you girl!”

“Oh shit”, I thought. “Oh shit, not that monster.” I turned around and was face to face with Michael “Sharklestein” Cohn. His pupils were so giant that I could hardly see the whites of his eyes. He looked like what’s-his-face from Limp Bizkit but musically talentless and violent. He was breathing hard and standing way too close to me. I looked down and saw his hands were balled into fists and he was shaking. What made this different from normal was that he was smiling. He looked like a real live shark with blood was in the water. “Oh god, oh god, please Michael don’t hurt anyone, especially me.”, I pleaded in my bleating monotone. Michael could sense my fear. It gave him energy. He stood behind me for the remainder of the show and did a key-bump at a rate of one a minute. I can still feel his breath on the back of my neck. I did not like it.

So far, three Mishka monsters had been vanquished and thankfully Greg was off acting like a bearded nine year old at San Diego Comic Con but the worst was still yet to come. Wellington Ladies Welfare League showed up and ripped it up like you know. Brian, Mikhail, Gill, Ron and Reed clambered down the stairs with the goth one that works at the store and they were all sorts of gross. Ron wasn’t wearing a shirt and he had a macho stride to his walk and ended all of his sentences with “Hah?!” Reed put his whole fist in his mouth and it got stuck there. Brian had brought a Crave Case with him and kept stuffing White Castle sliders down his food tube. I tried to talk but he shoved one down mine. “I like it better when you shut up.” I actually liked that.

Mikhail was wearing a jaw dropping ensemble comprised of denim shorts that came down past the knee, a top hat, ski goggles, a dookie chain, Bad Brains sneakers, an OBP shirt from two years ago and he had a big smirk on his face. “How you like my new threads, Gazin?” he defiantly asked me as he slapped me on the belly with the back of his hand. “You look…you look good, Mikhail.” He snorted back,”Fuckin’ better! Shit cost enough but fuck! I gotta look the part.” When he smiled you could see the toll that drugs and exercise had taken on him. At forty-five Mikhail almost looked like an animated corpse that was dressed as Poochie for Halloween. I didn’t know how to verbally respond to Mikhail but it didn’t seem like Mikhail cared if I had anything to say. “Look I got big plans for this brand and I got big problems with you. You don’t blog enough. You gotta blog more. You signed a contract and if you want those checks and fruit baskets to keep coming you gotta keep writing. Write about your “People to kill” list. Write about those strange images you see in your excrement. I don’t care.” And with that he put his Newport out on my forehead.

While trying to figure out the least bothersome way to end my dull and shitty life in an attempt to break free of Mishka and the binding agreements I have made with them and their parent corporation (Old Navy), the next band went on. It was my friends, Fostercare. I like these guys. It was the guitarist’s birthday and we all wished him a happy birthday. Then Gill came up to me in tears and collapsed into my arms. After a few moments of staggered sobs she told me that she was pregnant and she was pretty sure it was Mike Jones’s and that she didn’t know what to do because she hates that asshole and his weird complex system of penis piercings/armor but she can’t get away because she’s afraid that he’d kill her family. There was some other stuff. Gill is a notorious pathological liar and one time I heard that she intentionally drove a couple of girls in her high school to suicide but no woman deserves to have to be Mike Jones’ sexual victim. I told her I would take care of it. She looked up at me, tears streaming down her sad face and thanked me and said something about how I was such a nice guy and some other shit. Later I strangled Mike Jones to death with Ease DaMan’s penis shoelace.

As I announced the death of Mike Jones everybody in the place toasted to the end of our suffering through his company. Some people were crying tears of joy.

Finally All Nines went on. Sometimes they smell their band name “99999999.” The guitarist used to be in Tunnel of Love and the drummer used to be in and is still in Antimagic. I like them a lot. There’s really nothing left to say.

- Toilet Cobra