Casa Del Pecadillo

In about a month, my two best friends and I will be moving in together. Our "house" still needs a little work, but it's coming along. I say "house" because it's really more of a shanty. It's the kind of place that only single guys, fresh out of college would live in, and even we're having second thoughts. My future roommates, C-Train (a very odd and disturbed individual) and "Muffin" (who has yet to enter the blogosphere), are also my two best friends. We've already purchased our first, and most essential piece of furniture; an air-hockey table.

She's a beaut'.



The house, however, is not.




The property is owned by Muffin's parents, and in a year or so, they're going to tear the house down and build their dream home. Until then, they're being awesome enough to let us live there for next to nothing. I keep saying "the house" but in actuality, it's two. There is a small, two-room main house, and a two-room guest house that is almost just as big. The backyard is huge. It's easily big enough for a good game of football or even baseball, something you don't see a lot of in California. C-Train and I will take the guest house because we are, without a doubt, the only people on the face of the earth who could tolerate living with each other. Plus, that's where the air-hockey table is. The pair of us share the same off-beat plans for interior design. Crawford will be contributing a painting he made in elementary school that features a sword-wielding rat, while I will be displaying a portrait of the one and only Sean Connery. Not young, good looking, James Bond era Sean Connery mind you, this picture is of the old, bald, depends wearing Sean Connery. We also have the same Blues Brothers movie poster that we have been talking about hanging next to each other ever since we got them in junior high. Living together is going to be very interesting.



Muffin will be our front man in the main house. His job is simple, he must keep up the appearance of normalcy so that neither C-Train's, nor my own LAPD background investigator will know what we're really like. This will work out nicely as Muffin can best be described as a 75 year-old-man trapped in the body of a 20 year-old. Let me explain; he is the only guy (my age) that I know of that listens to Dean Martin, refers to everyone as Sir or Ma'am, and always speaks with flawless grammar. Sometimes, his unwavering politeness can be a little hard to fathom.

Warning: Muffin is a nickname that only a select group of people are permitted to use, very few have earned the right. It's a lot like how a guy can say the most insulting things to his brother and it's all good, but if anyone else does, they're dead. Muffin's real name is the same as mine, and when we started to become good friends in high school, that caused a lot of confusion. Clearly one of us needed a nickname, so I dubbed him Muffin. It is my opinion that a good nickname must be either random or insulting, Muffin is both. Perhaps that is why it has stuck so well. Take my advice, if you ever encounter him, do not attempt to call him Muffin unless you have earned the right.

While we are on the subject, it should be noted that I am the undisputed king of nicknames. I have dubbed more alternative titles than I can remember. In high school, there was a kid that always tried to hang out with us. He was a nice enough guy, although I have the sneaking suspicion that he managed to make it all four years without taking a single shower. WOOF! Everyday it was worse. This rising crescendo of stink that never subsided. So of course, I dubbed him "the onion", as he smelled much like you'd expect a burning onion patch would. Just awfull. Another friend, named Rey, has become "little Rey of sunshine". That name is particularly enjoyable to shout in public.

Anyhoo, Muffin is a scholar and a gentlemen, and I have yet to persuade him to start his own blog. He will, no doubt, have a very respectable looking home that Crawford and I will endlessly enjoy messing up. Muffin is definitely the Felix to mine and Crawford's Oscar. It's amazing to me that he continues to put up with us.