I am back in the Bay Area after six --yeah, six-- days in Boulder City, Nevada. My IQ is slowly returning to normal, which isn’t saying a helluva lot. I seem to have come back with a case of Crotchity Nevada Mouth, otherwise known as uncontollable excessive swearing. I did not say, “sweating.” Sometimes, when I’m in Southern Nevada, I come down with a dual case of excessive s-WEAR-ing and excessive s-WEAT-ing, but it was cold and rainy this time, so it’s just the uncontrollable swearing.</p>
<p>Btw, I missed my chance to get a free drink at the local saloon which is called, The Back Door, or something ambiguously suggestive like that. They serve free drinks on any day that the sun doesn’t shine (another ass reference, right?).</p>
<p>When I was a teenager in Boulder City, the saloon was called, The Saloon. Business names aren’t real inventive in my home town. It’s a tradition to name your business something completely unimaginative and practical. This relieves passersby…uh, passerbyers (f***!)…people walking by on their way to buy a carton of cigarettes of the brainpower required to translate the meanings of these things. Next to The Saloon was a place that sold clothes only to men, and it was called, The Men’s Store. No, really. They sold 501 jeans, belts, and long-sleeved plaid shirts.</p>
<p>The two coolest girls in my high school decided to go in there one day and buy some jeans, because in 1973, genuinely cool girls wanted the ERA to pass, so they decided to invade the inner sanctum of The Men’s Store and go buy some jeans. This, of course, got them instantly labeled as lesbians, which was kind of like being labeled as an outlaw --a really cool outlaw who was way ahead of the rest of the town in terms of self-identity --but an outlaw, nevertheless. They entered The Men’s Store as girls who were light years ahead of the fashion curve by wearing men’s jockey shorts sticking out of the top of their jeans, and they came out, as rumor had it, as “lezzies.” The thing is, they weren’t actually lesbians, but everybody said they were because they bought two pairs of 501s at The Men’s Store. I got tagged as a lesbian, too, after my best friend and I accidentally wore the same dress to school one day. Then, I solidified that impression when I turned down an invitation to attend Homecoming with a ginormous jackass who drove an orange Pacer.</p>
<p>Technically, I was in Teen Hell because my parents moved us back to Southern Nevada from Omaha where I had just finished my sophomore year at a highly-regarded college prep high school. After a summer of mowing lawns and clinical depression, I resigned myself to start my junior year at a high school that was physically connected to the junior high and the elementary school. They were all connected, and I guess, this was so that the elementary kids could walk home for lunch with the rest of the town and start learning how to smoke during their breaks.</p>
<p>Faced with the prospect of going to Homecoming with Rick the jackass Pacer guy, I jumped at the chance to babysit for my neighbor and his wife. He was a teacher, and they were chaperoning the dance, and for some reason, they were under the mistaken impression that I knew how to change a newborn’s diaper. I mowed lawns and hung out with lesbians, apparently. But, being a girl, they figured I automatically knew how to take care of a newborn. This is the level of childcare one can expect in Boulder City. Even now, you don’t have to know how to take care of kids in order to babysit. Preventing them from running into traffic is more than adequate. Besides, my mom was right next door, and she could come over if I needed help, which she did.</p>
<p>Okay, I’m not sure what my point was. Anyway, I missed my chance to get a free drink at The Back Door. I noticed that the place doesn’t have any windows, and I wondered about that when I walked by with my egg plate from The Antique Store 'cause I wanted to see who among my graduating class had turned into the town drunkards. Missed my chance. 
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