The Lady Wanted a Transfer

I wrote this story around 2000, after my car was totalled and I began taking the bus again.


Julia didn't realize the woman in front of the bus was a man until he started arguing with the driver. When she took a closer look, it became obvious. The dark, muscular calves were revealed under the below the knee-lenght red paisley dress, and patches of hair from a too-quick shave could be seen. The counterfeit Hermes scarf fell on his wide shoulders, prominently displaying his adam's apple.

"Listen, you - " the bus driver hesitated, debating on how to address his rider. "The fare is a dollar and thirty five cents. You put four quarters.

"No I didn't." His falsetto voice could have cracked the windows. "I put five quarters and ten pennies. You're ripping me off a transfer."

The bus continued its smooth journey onto Colorado Boulevard, but inside, it was a tense or indifferent ride for the passengers.

After five minutes of arguments, cold silence, then arguing, it was apparent the cross-dresser wasn't backing down. Julia reasoned the driver wasn't an L.A. native, because he would have known better than to mess with a black transvestite.

"OK, fine!" the bus lurched as the driver hit the brakes. He grabbed several transfers and threw it at the man. "Take another bus. I'm not moving!"

A silence filled the bus, and everyone looked towards the front.

The she/man hesitated for a moment, the thin strips of bus transfer paper falling slowly on the ground. Julia wondered when this would end. The bus had stopped for only half a minute, yet it felt like an hour. Nobody moved, and the potential passengers waiting outside had looks of confusion and concern.

The cross-dresser finally reacted, letting out a huge "hmph!" and grabbing all the transfers from the floor. The driver pressed a button and the door opened. He stumbled out with his 4 inch high heels, and stomped on the concrete away from the bus. Julia sighed, relieved this little eruption passed. She knew there would be more to come, as long as she took this bus route.

The Broccoli Made Me Do It (Circa 1997)

i wrote this all in one sentence because i had a running bet that i couldn't write so many words without stopping


you know how it is sometimes, when you want to say something, but it doesn't come out right, and when you've finally had the guts to go to a party of a guy that you like, and you spent a ton on a new outfit and hairstyle, and your face looks perfect, and after an hour, that guy who's talking to some girl finally sees you and looks at you like you're the only one in the room, but just as you begin walking towards each other, some old guy who probably crashed the party steps in front of you and starts a conversation about how smashing you look in your too tight of a white dress, because the broccoli and bean dip that you devoured an hour ago is now paying you back by bloating your stomach, and his yellowed teeth have bits of carrots and spinach, and sometimes as he speaks a bit of food spits out, and you politely smile and duck from his spittle, as he talks about how lucky he felt finding a discarded bus transfer to get to this party, and it's getting to hot in the room, and the music blaring, and just as he describes his Star Trek collection, you discover too late Montezuma's Revenge is upon you, so that your pristine white cotton dress has a huge brown explosion from the undercooked dip you ate, and suddenly the music stops, the spotlight's on you, and the old fart didn't have the common decency to say goodbye!

A Love Letter to Elvis on His Deathday

August 16, 2002

Dear Elvis:

I am watching your 1971 movie, "Elvis: That's the Way It Is" in my living room. Snapshots of women swooning and screaming fill the T.V. screen, and there you are, wonderful, flamboyant, yet straight-looking in your white one piece sequined jumper. For the second time in my life, I am getting the chills watching you gyrate to the music with that wicked smile of yours.

Out of all the white men to exist, no one can shake their thing as well as you did. And even if someone claimed to have done a better job, can 50 million screaming fans be wrong?
I grew up with the fat Elvis, raised with National Enquirer headlines of dead Elvis sightings, sometimes in escapades with Marilyn Monroe, Bigfoot, JFK, and anyone else popular and/or dead in the late 70's.

My aunt saw you in Vegas in 1971. She said it was the best performace she'd ever seen. My mom saw the Beatles at Dodger Stadium in 1966, but I bet Paul and John's head shaking were no match for your karate moves on the stage.

The Elvis that I've just begun to appreciate is the one my mom and her sisters dreamt about, those sleepy eyes, those soft lips, and that unreal dark skin for a Southern white boy. How they imagined to be Ann-Margaret, wearing those controversial black tights for pants, swinging and sashaying next to Elvis.

The first time I felt tingly over you was a few years back during a trip to Vegas. My friend found a picture postcard of you in a military uniform. We both ooohed at the same time, as if this were the first time you caught our eyes.

I was seven when you died. I don't remember what I did the day you died, but I do remember the next day. Sitting inside a laundromat, a National Enquirer placed on my lap, there was a grainy photo of you, bloated and dead in a casket. My mom was very quiet that day, and I remember she wasn't her normal chipper self for a while.

I want to believe you're still alive, cracking jokes and blending in with all the other impersonators of himself in Vegas. But I wished you died sooner, before that 32-inch waist gave way to 42. My theory is that just as you reached the crest of the second wave of your entertainment career, about 1971 or so, you either had a massive breakdown or died in some horrific accident. So the Hollywood powers-that-be brought in an Elvis double.

However, this new Elvis went overboard, drank too much, took drugs, slept around voraciously, forgot his lines, met Nixon, etc., and got so fat he couldn't fit onto your blue suede toilet. That's why Elvis' middle name is wrong on his tombstone; the faker was drunk the time he changed his name.

Elvis, you were hot, literally and figuratively, in your movie. I never thought you could fit into those jumpsuits so well.

Love,

Yolie Guacamole

Why I No Longer Eat Pork: A Love Letter about “The Other White Meat”

July 17, 1997

Dear Pork Eaters:

Experience the same things I have to deal with at least 4 days a week, and you will longer eat pork.

Every weeknight, usually after 9pm, I have to pick up my boyfriend at the UPS hub in Vernon, California. If you are not familiar with Vernon, it is an industrial city in East Los Angeles, about the size of a large town, but with only 85 residents. It is listed by the Environmental Protection Agency as the most heavily polluted city in the nation. I can agree with this because I am forced to roll up my car windows and turn the air conditioner full blast as I drive through this place. The neighboring community, Boyle Heights, which uses Soto Avenue as the connection between itself and Vernon, almost always has traffic during the day. But at night, once you hit the Vernon city line, it is a ghost town, trucks barreling over the potholes.

You would think that the wonderful smells emanating from the Hoffy and Farmer John’s plants, which are just a few blocks away from each other, would cause me to stop eating pork. Those are reasons, but not the major ones. On Mondays, Tuesdays, and occasionally Wednesdays, both plants eek out the combination of blood and pig excrement. However, you forget the horrid aftertaste in your mouth after smelling this once Thursdays and Fridays come around. The air fills with bacon and smoked sausage.

Here is why I no longer eat pork. As I mentioned before, Vernon at night is usually deserted except for the occasional truck. What kind of trucks pass through here? Mostly UPS trucks. However, I have passed by huge trucks that have a special trailer attached to it, with symmetrically placed holes, about 5 inches in diameter, 6 inches to the right, left, top and bottom. Whenever I drive past these trucks, they are empty. One night, I saw why there were holes in the bed.

I was at a stoplight at Soto Avenue and Washington Blvd., about 5 blocks away from UPS, where I was picking up Dave. It was almost 10 pm. A truck with the holes stopped right by my car, and it was filled with live pigs. The entire two-level truck bed was packed. I understood now why the holes were about 5 inches in diameter – their snouts poked through, trying to breathe in the industrial air. Some had their pigtails sticking out.

My windows were rolled up, and my air conditioner turned on, but I decided to turn off the air and roll down my window. Just as I thought, the pigs were squealing loudly, but not the cute type of squeal you hear in the movies or on T.V. It was a desperate plea, as if they knew where they were going to end up. The sounds reminded me of the time I had ingrown viruses on the soles of my feet. I was ten, but I could not help but scream at the top of my lungs as they burned those out with a two-inch syringe.

I could only hear a few seconds of the squealing, because the stench was overwhelming. Once the light turned green, I burnt rubber all the way to UPS.

If this does not convince you to stop eating pork, please give me a call. I’m conducting tours of Vernon at night. Your first ride through the town is free. Pig squealing may or may not occur during the tour.

Love,

Yoli Guacamole

Hello Everyone!

Welcome to my new blog page. This will contain writings I have done over the past dozen years or so. Please feel free to email me at hipowerbooks@yahoo.com ! thanks!