Official Slacker Handbook Read online

  5. Layering is everything.

  Less important in the summer months, layering is an extremely cost-efficient way of cold-weather dressing. Tights and thermals can make even the lightest cotton skirt suddenly a year-round staple and a T-shirt, long underwear top, and two flannels equal one outrageously expensive J. Crew wool sweater.

  WHY WE’VE STOPPED WEARING UNDERPANTS

  -Takes less time to got dressed.

  -Takes toss time to get undressed.

  -No unsightly panty lines to mar our fashion silhouettes.

  -Makes us feel like rock stars.

  -From of quiet rebellion against intolerable bourgeois mores.

  -The thought of buying used underwear from a thrift store grosses even us out.

  1879-1940 Life of Leon Trotsky. Another important communist who sported a goatee, Attacked by Stalin after Lenin’s death in 1924, Trotsky was exiled in 1927 and eventually was killed with an ice-pick through the skull, Stalin (1879-1953) took over from Lenin as ruler of the Soviet Union in 1927. Loved, hated, and feared, he was responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of his own people; however, he wore a big, fat, stupid mustache.

  1956 Alien Ginsberg published Howl.

  1948 Jack Kerouac began writing On the Road. The Beat Movement in America had begun.

  1957 In a burst of Benzedrine-induced frenzy, Kerouac finally finished his masterpiece, nine years after he started it. Get a job, man!

  Mid-1950s-1960s American Beatnik Coffeehouse Movement. A lot of educated boys moved to New York and San Francisco, wore black, smoked cigarettes, drank coffee, composed poetry of questionable value, had their friends accompany the readings of it with bongos while their girlfriends did interpretive dances, and, oh yes, worked on their goatees. Bob Dylan had one, and so should you.

  THE GAP OUT OF YOUR PRICE RANGE

  EVEN IF THE SLACK FASHION DIRECTIVE SEEMS TO MAKE ROOM FOR WIDE VARIATIONS IN TASTE AND PERSONAL STYLE, FIGURING OUT WHERE TO BUY YOUR CLOTHES IS NOT AS EASY AS IT MIGHT SEEM.

  A GOOD RULE OF THUMB IS THAT IF YOU DON’T FEEL COMPELLED TO LAUNDER A NEW ACQUISTION BEFORE OUT OF YOUR PRICE RANGE.

  THE MORE SUSPECT, PAWED-OVER, THIRDHAND, AND POTENTIALLY SOCIAL-DISEASE-RIDDEN A GIVEN ARTICLE OF CLOTHING IS, THE BETTER.

  A DISTINCTION MUST BE MADE BETWEEN THE STORES YOU BROWSE THROUGH AND THE PLACES WHERE YOU ACTUALLY BUY THINGS. YOU MIGHT LOOK LOVINGLY AT THAT NEW SCOOP-NECKED, CRUMPLED POLYESTER, CALF-LENGTH FLOWERY DRESS HANGING IN THE WINDOW OF URBAN OUTFITTERS, BUT WHERE ARE YOU GOING TO GET YOUR HANDS ON NINETY BUCKS? THE GAP, OF COURSE, EXISTS AS AN OBJECT OF MOCKERY AND NOTHING ELSE, AND THE FACT THAT THEY PUT JACK KEROUAC IN THEIR ADS ONLY FUELS THE FIRE OF SLACKER CONTEMPT.

  THRIFT STORES.

  Thrift stores come in two varieties: urban and suburban. You will unfortunately have to make do with urban most of the time, unless you have a friend with a car, in which case make it your business to drive into the land of the manicured lawns and get some dry-clean-only secondhand clothes with that timeless designer label appeal.

  K-MART.

  Shopping at K-Mart—not simply hightailing it to the shampoo section to buy a gallon of Suave for ninety-nine cents, but marching into the dressing room carrying an arm full of clothes dangling Jaclyn Smith I tags—signifies a significant coming of age for the novice slacker, in which that upper-middle-class suburban high school mentality is skewered and (momentarily) left for dead.

  MILITARY SURPLUS STORES.

  The surplus store doesn’t just mean snow fatigues and mosquito netting anymore, and if you happen upon a cheap mock-military surplus store (all the ambiance of the original, but with racks of flannel shirts and piles of outdated Swedish Navy regalia), you’re in for a day of one-stop slack shopping.

  STOLEN/FOUND CLOTHES.

  The best kind of cheap clothing is free clothing. By far. From the T-shirts you steal from your boyfriend to the bowling shoes you find in the garbage can, the rule is that if you can steal it or find it, don’t buy it.

  CHURCH RUMMAGE SALES.

  Basically, if a guy has died and he’s your size, you’re in clover.

  YARD SALES.

  Depending on where you live, yard sales run the gamut from white trash setting out broken knickknacks on card tables to white trash dangling faded clothes on wire hangers from laundry lines. But since everything is priced at fifty cents, and even that’s negotiable, the yard sale remains a key slack shopping opportunity.

  Garage Sales.

  Like a yard sale, but one that takes place in a garage.

  Carport Sales.

  Another name for a garage sale.

  Porch Sales.

  A yard sale that takes place below the Mason-Dixon line.

  Sidewalk Sales.

  The urban apartment dweller’s answer to sales of the Yard, Garage, Carport, and Porch variety. Throwing one is a traditional slack rite of passage, marking your earliest attempts to liquidate your possessions to raise funds for that hoped-for trip to Belize. Brace yourself, though: Random passersby will act as if your cherished belongings were radioactive and will look upon you with undisguised disgust.

  1959-1963 The goatee made its debut in mass popular culture in the form of Maynard G. Krebs, the bongo-beating, job-fearing, sort of dirty beatnik who was Dobie’s best friend on the very popular television show The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis. Maynard was played by Gilligan’s Island Bob Denver. Basically, for four years Maynard and Dobie attempted to decide something about their futures. (The original Beavis I and Butthead, Wayne and Garth, Bill and Ted, ad infinitum.)

  October 21, 1969 Black Date in Goatee History: A bloated, as always clean-shaven Kerouac died in I an alcoholic stupor, having lived the past three years of his life in his mom’s house.

  1970s Black Decade in Goatee History. Everyone got really hairy.

  1971 Bob Denver arrested for possession of narcotics paraphernalia.

  1985 Black Date in Goatee History. In an ill-fated attempt to hide from the world the fact that he wore peach shirts with white suits, Don Johnson-star of popular TV preen/Phil Collins fest Miami Vice—grew a strange stubble and left it there. Pop sensation and WHAM!-escapee George Michael followed suit. The age of sculpted scruff had begun.

  TRANSCENDING HYGIENE: GRUNGE WAS A TREND GREASE IS A LIFE STYLE

  Level Occasion Action

  1 The Lost Weekend ↓→-Pick crusty scum out of corner of eyes

  2 Not going home for the holidays ↓→-Wipe dried saliva off of cheek

  3 Contemplating suicide ↓→-Singe off unwanted body hair with stray menthol cigarette butt

  4 Starting the bender ↓→-Don pair of “air-cleaned” underwear hanging from doorknob

  5 Joni Loves Chachi marathon on cable ↓→-Don pair of “air-cleaned” underwear hanging from doorknob, but turn them inside out

  6 Visiting the unemployment office ↓→-Scrape teeth with uncut fingernails while

  7 In the middle of a powerful new short story ↓→-Elect to cultivate facial hair in order to camouflage embarrassing adult-onset acne

  8 Heading to work ↓→-Undergo cursory “trust, but verify” underarm inspection

  9 Sliding-scale therapy appointment ↓→-Brush teeth (without toothpaste)

  10 Crashing a bar mitzvah for free alcohol ↓→-Brush teeth (with stolen toothpaste)

  11 Important job interview ↓→-Run fingers through hair

  12 Coffee with old girlfriend ↓→-Fumigate private parts with pine-based air freshener

  13 Reading poems at an open mike night ↓→-Steal roommate’s fresh socks

  14 Hot date ↓→-Inspect self-inflicted nose piercing for signs of infection

  15 Stint as a nude model for housemate’s art class ↓→-Manually de-lint belly button

  16 Stepsister’s wedding ↓→-Shower

  17 Posing for band photo ↓→-Trim goatee

  18 Dinner with generous visiting grandparents ↓→-Launder jeans

  Summer 1989 Richard Linklater be
gan shooting the seminal film Slacker in Austin, Texas. A total of ten—over 20 percent—of the men in the film sported goatees.

  1992 Nirvana’s Nevermind album released. The single “Smells Like Teen Spirit” went to number one on the Billboard chart. Grunge descended upon America. “Alternative” became not so much so. Every hip young rocker or Hollywood star sported a goatee. Kurt Cobain did, as did that silly guy from Stone Temple Pilots; however, that other grunge-maestro, Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam, remained, for a while at least, clean-shaven (presumably because he was the best-looking of the lot and had nothing to hide). Matt Dillon’s character in the movie Singles (a character based on Pearl Jam’s guitarist Jeff Ament) sported a goatee. Members of Pearl Jam played his bandmates in the movie.

  25 October 1993 People Weekly released its annual “Best and Worst Dressed” issue, with a special report entitled “Follicles of 93: The Goatee is Back,” So, who had one? Try Brad Pitt, Christian Slater, Lenny Kravitz, Rod Stewart, Julian Lennon, The Edge, John F. Kennedy, Jr., Ashley Hamilton (that’s Mr. Shannen Doherty to you), and Bruce Willis.

  1992-1994 Evan Dando of The Lemonheads appeared on some twenty magazine covers, was widely heralded as the Fabio of College Rock, and yet REMAINED CLEAN SHAVEN!

  February 1994 Ethan Hawk’s character in the Über-twenty something movie Reality Bites is accused by Winona Ryder’s character of turning her living room “into a den of stack.” His character sports a goatee, reads Being and Time in luncheonettes, sings in a band, and won’t get a real job.

  Home Sweet Hovel

  INTERIOR DESGIN, THE SLACKER WAY

  CODE VIOLATIONS

  1. Exposed swing that maimed the cat

  2. Broken support beam

  3. Asbestos snow scene blanketing Elvis piggy bank

  FIRST-TIME VISITORS TO YOUR HOME SHOULD RESPOND TO IT THE WAY URBAN SOPHISTICATES DID WHEN CONFRONTED WITH THE TRANSGRESSIVE PERFORMANCE ART OF THE EARLY SEVENTIES: THOUGH INWARDLY SHOCKED AND DISGUSTED, THEY MUST ALWAYS ACT UNFAZED AND POLITE.

  EVOKING SUCH A VISCERAL RESPONSE WITHOUT THE HELP OF A HIGHLY PAID DOMESTIC DESIGN PROFESSIONAL IS NOT EASY. IT TAKES A KEEN EYE TO PULL TOGETHER WILDLY DISPARATE DESIGN ELEMENTS—PARTICULARLY THOSE DESIGN ELEMENTS SHOPLIFTED WITHOUT SO MUCH AS A FLEETING THOUGHT GIVEN TO THE ROOM’S DOMINANT COLOR SCHEME—AND CREATE AN INSPIRED “WHOLE.”

  YOU’LL KNOW YOU’VE ACHIEVED THE DESIRED EFFECT WHEN YOU ARE STRUCK BY AN INEXPLICABLE FRISSON EACH TIME YOU OPEN THE FRONT DOOR. (UNFORTUNATELY, SOME PEOPLE HAVE BEEN KNOWN TO CONFUSE THIS WITH THE WALL OF SCENT EMANATING FROM THE CAT BOX. YOU DO SO AT YOUR OWN PERIL.)

  1. Dead creeping charlie

  2. Joe Cool shower curtain bought with Camel Cash

  3. Threatening, abusive letters from bill collectors

  4. Collection of violently defaced Barbie dolls

  5. Cans of tuna stolen from friends’ houses

  6. African fertility figurine

  7. Cat, tragically maimed in freak electrical accident

  8. Hole in floor

  9. Stuffed armadillo

  10. Dirty socks

  11. Remote control

  12. Batik bed sheet covering mysterious brown stain on wall

  13. Important scraps of paper

  14. Shop-Rite shopping cart filled with materials scavenged from nearby construction site for newest art project

  15. Overflowing ashtray

  16. Heap of smokable butts

  17. Stack of unpaid phone bills

  18. Sink filled with Class 6 hazardous materials (HazMat suit required for anyone approaching within a five-foot radius)

  19. Dead Wandering Jew

  20. Deck of nudie girl cards

  21. Twinkly Christmas lights

  22. Space heater

  23. Mural commemorating the 1984 McDonald’s massacre in San Ysidro, California, done in the style of Picasso’s Guernica (gift from ex-girlfriend)

  24. Pile of unread newspapers

  25. Mandolin

  26. Crab colony living on sofa cushions (Legacy of likable drifter who squatted your living room for two months)

  27. Head-butt hole in wall (Legacy of likable drifter who squatted your living room for two months)

  28. Futon

  29. Bed sheets sporting Shroud of Turin-like imprint of sleeping body

  30. “Penises of the Animal Kingdom” poster

  31. Overflowing cat box

  32. Marijuana seeds

  33. Dying ficus

  34. Stash of pornographic magazines

  INSIDE THE BOTTOM DRESSER DRAWER

  1. Dusty condom

  2. Embarrassing high school picture

  3. Baseball card collection currently on the block

  4. Emergency provisions hidden from housemates

  5. Frank Frazzetta book

  6. Mothballs hidden by mother

  Laundry: Mirror of the Self

  LAUNDRY SITUATION PSYCHIC STATE

  Heaped in four-foot mound on closet floor TORMENTED BY PANGS OF MORTALITY

  Strewn artfully about the room ALIENATED FROM THE SELF

  Mildewing within stolen plastic clothes basket GRIPPED BY UNEXPRESSED RAGE

  Scrunched in bottom of oblong duffel bag CAUGHT IN THE THROES OF MORTAL DESPAIR

  Dangling from hooks/draped over chairs/hanging from doorknob HAUNTED BY JUNGIAN SHADOW SELF

  Jammed under the bed AFFLICTED WITH APOCALYPTIC VISIONS

  Resting inside dormant clothes dryer PRACTICING AVOIDANCE

  Stolen from laundromat by mysterious roaming sociopath OVERCOME BY MANIC PARANOIA

  Folded neatly in dresser drawers TRAGICALLY, IRREVERSIBLY MENTALLY ILL

  HOW to Forestall the Inevitable: UTILITY TERMINATION AND YOU

  The phone bill has arrived in the yellow envelope. Again.

  THE ELECTRIC BILL IS IN THE DREADED PINK ENVELOPE. DITTO, THE GAS BILL.

  Come to think of it, every time you open your mailbox a new utility bill has materialized, sheathed in an attention-grabbing pastel envelope.

  There’s not a whole lot you can do about those pesky credit card people who leave messages on your answering machine and insist on bugging you while you’re at work (“Could you please call Tom Gardener at 1-800-555-3746, extension 211 at your earliest convenience.” Sure you’ll call. Right away.) They’re going to cut off your credit card capabilities pretty much no matter what you tell them.

  But while having a credit card turned off is a minor inconvenience, having your telephone, electricity, or gas turned off can be an unmitigated bummer. Before you resign yourself to taking cold showers and running to the U-Totem for phone calls, be proactive—get out of bed and give them a call.

  PLAN A: Sick Baby

  Claim that you have a SICK BABY in the house and therefore you need EMERGENCY UTILITY SERVICE for at least the next THREE WEEKS.

  PLAN B: DEAD HOUSEMATE

  Claim that you have a DEAD HOUSEMATE who unfortunately recently suffered a DEATH that was both TRAGIC and UNTIMELY. Admit to being OVERWROUGHT WITH GRIEF and respectfully request EMERGENCY UTILITY SERVICE for A FEW WEEKS until his finances can be put into order.

  PLAN C: Crime Scene

  Claim that your DEAD HOUSEMATE met his VIOLENT DEMISE in THIS VERY HOUSE! It is thus a bona fide CRIME SCENE and you would most respectfully request EMERGENCY UTILITY SERVICE for the next SEVERAL WEEKS so the POLICE can proceed with their investigation.

  PLAN D: ASTHMA SUFFERER

  Claim that you are an ASTHMA SUFFERER and that the TELEPHONE is your LIFELINE, and if they turn it off you might not be able to get EMERGENCY MEDICAL HELP when you need it. If the ELECTRICITY goes you might not be able to locate your INHALER in a moment of PANIC. If they decide to turn off the HEAT, well, they might as well just pour MAPLE SYRUP down your WINDPIPE. Do they really want to KILL YOU for a lousy sixty bucks?

  PLAN E: Quarantine

  Claim that your house has been QUARANTINED by the regional head of HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES due to an unfortunat
e outbreak of CHOLERA which had been FESTERING IN THE BOWELS of your buddy Darin who is just back from his WHIRLWIND TOUR OF SOUTH AMERICA. You most respectfully request EMERGENCY UTILITY SERVICE for the next MONTH OR SO, or until the quarantine is lifted, whichever comes first.

  ODE TO THE FUTON

  I met a girl, she had clean sheets;

  I lived with her for several weeks.

  She kicked me out, heels over head;

  A carpet scrap was then my bed.

  I did my time on floor, on couch,

  I sofa surfed, arose a grouch.

  And then one day I came upon that curbside coup, a used futon!

  Serta Perfect Sleeper,

  Sealy Posturepedic,

  Sterns and Foster, Springmade—

  Hell I just don’t need it.

  Brownish with age, wine-stained, and smelly

  (I hope that that weird blot was jelly).

  I dueled to the death with an odd creeping mildew.