The New Noise

The Noise seems to have morphed. Lately, Gllen has been hissing at me. Like a cat. He'll be looking at me, being somewhat normal, and suddenly he'll open his mouth, bare his teeth and hiss.

1st Guest Blogger: Mike Ricketts

I'm pleased to introduce my very first guest blogger, Mike Ricketts. Mike is one of the few people that can hold an online conversation with Gllen for more than three lines. Even I have a hard time with that. Mike has an interesting perspective on who/what Gllen is, especially since he is one of the only people that has befriended Gllen outside of his childhood circle of friends. Quite an accomplishment. A lot of it is due to their unique communication style... And without further ado, I give you Mike Rickett's Living with Gllen guest blog:

The Noise

For as long as I have known Gllen, our methods of communication have been constantly evolving. The first time I met Gllen was St. Patrick’s Day 2001. He came from Wausau to a party in Minneapolis and said maybe four things. Our communication at this point relied on brief awkward stares. The case was the same when I visited Wausau that summer and was a guest at Gllen’s house for part of an evening. I observed aloud, “Gllen, there is not one thing on any wall in your house except for that tiny picture of Eminem over there in the back room.” He looked at me and shrugged his shoulders. Later I noticed a pile of about 200 Mountain Dew cans in the kitchen sink and asked him if he liked Mountain Dew at all. He gave a sheepish grin and nodded very slowly. Even though he said less to me during this visit, he communicated more.

Later, Gllen moved to the Twin Cities and our communication blossomed into daily conversation, both in person and over instant messenger. For a brief while I lived with Gllen and that stretch represented the climax of our verbal interaction. Still, even amidst that flourish of banter, if you were to do a word count on one of our conversations in the garage, Mike would be responsible for over 2,000 words and Gllen would have about 23.

A few months after I moved out, Gllen got a phone. This was the first phone I’d ever known Gllen to have. It was a remarkable thing to be able to call Gllen, however we all soon realized that the phone would remain shut off 99% of the time. To this day, I think I have received less than 10 calls from Gllen. In rare cases I am out with someone who receives a call from Gllen, their reaction is ALWAYS, “What the fuck!? Gllen is calling me?” In recent years he has been more active in making and receiving calls, and text messages, however it doesn’t matter anymore because we have honed the most reliable and dynamic method of communication mankind will ever need: The Noise.

It started out as a sarcastic jeer of dismissal, a condescending reflex.

“Gllen, do you have any mustard?”
“Pssssht.”

“Mike, where is the DVD player remote?”
“Chaaa.”

“Gllen, did you have a jack that last hand?”
“Pffffft.”

This went on for many months. The Noise began to evolve, taking on new organic directions on a daily basis. The challenge became to create sounds that were as ridiculous as they were dismissive and unhelpful. Our instant message dialogues often involved no actual words, but I like to think something still got done.

“Mike, what time is grilling?”
“Ptshhhaka.”

“Gllen, can I get a ride?”
“Bzzzztrikaa.”

“Mike, did you win last night?”
“SssssssffffffppppTK.”

Presently, we’ve reached the asymptote line of absurdity. We’ve been traversing it for over a year or so now. Basically any time Gllen or I see each other, we emit The Noise. How do I describe The Noise in plain text? This is such a tall order. Hopefully Janelle can coerce Gllen into letting her record a good sample to embed here, but I’d say The Noise is like a bus with 50 ducks on it crashing headlong into a tanker full of alphabets.

It also possible to make The Noise quietly—just imagine the bus and tanker are peanut-sized.

The Noise is always in full force during poker nights. As more and more alcohol becomes involved, The Noise presses and mutates the boundaries of its relevance (please see figure 1). It gets laughs from some people, but it should be noted that Janelle absolutely hates The Noise. She hates on it real bad. On the surface, she harbors ill will toward me for being a co-conspirator on behalf of The Noise, but deep down I think Janelle knows that it is not my fault, and that it is here to stay regardless of what any of us do about it. Like the Seinfeld episode where he mocks his date’s growling stomach with a fun and jovial voice. Janelle can hate on The Noise, but that will only make it stronger, exactly like the evil goo that blankets New York in Ghostbusters 2.

Figure 1

Today, it remains my most effective channel of communication with Gllen—a product of years of linguistic evoIution.

I really am sorry, Janelle, but this is bigger than all of us.

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Janelle's Response

I have real compassion for Mike's getting to know you story. I met Gllen at least 30 times, and had several stilted conversations with him, before he even noticed me. I met Gllen 6 years ago. If you ask Gllen, we met 3 years ago. He just isn't one to who worries about social pleasantries.

Now, about that Noise. I really do hate it. It is the most annoying thing to hear come out of anyone's mouth. It could never be done in a cute way. And despite what Mike says, it is not here to stay as far as I am concerned. When Gllen and I are alone together, he does NOT make The Noise. Partly because of the Angry-Girlfriend-Death-Glare I give him when he makes it, partly because he refrains from upsetting me, but also another reason... Its not fun for him. He likes making The Noise and having someone react to it. Sort of like a call and response kind of thing. I don't respond. So, Mike, if you wonder why I'm giving you the evil eye and radiating ill-will, it is because I'm pissed that you are encouraging him.

Under Attack

I have a habit of leaving my socks laying around on the bedroom floor after I take them off. Gllen particularly hates the nylon knee-highs I have been wearing all winter. He calls them "land mines" because he will step on them and they will stick to his bare feet (he really should exfoliate more). So this morning, as Gllen was shuffling out of bed, I noticed that he unknowingly stepped on one of these socks and it was attached to his heel.

Trying to get his attention as he meandered off, I called out "Bomb! Bomb!" because I couldn't remember the term "land mine". This message took a while to get to him and he was already down the hall entering the kitchen before it caught up to his sleep-clogged ears. I couldn't see him anymore, but I could hear him freaking out: "Aaah! What the...Aaah!" (scuffle, scuffle, scuffle)

I followed the commotion and found the sock lying in a wilted heap on the floor and Gllen standing a few feet away staring at it in shock. He glanced up at me and accused "I thought you were shouting 'BUG!' and I thought some giant bug was attacking me!"

I looked at the murdered sock and said, "No, I was telling you that you stepped on a bomb."

"It's called a land mine." He growled. He sidestepped the sock and went to his office. I picked up the sock and brought it back to the bedroom, absentmindedly dropping it back on the floor.

Chomp, Chomp!

Last night, Gllen and I were watching a show on the food network and he started having a fit. The scene on the tv was a kid eating a giant meatball off of a fork. This kid was going to town on the meatball, eating it from every possible angle. Gllen starts twitching, and I think I hear him say, "Chomp, chomp!" I look over at him, about to snidely ask if he's jealous, but the look on his face is not envy. He was pulling his legs up, flailing his arms and throwing his head back and making incoherent noises of objection. Pretty much "Arrlllggghhh" until the meatball scene was over. I asked what was wrong and Gllen says, "He was going to bite down on the fork! Arrllllgghh!" So of course, I have to rewind and see the scene again, which sets Gllen off. By this time I'm laughing so hard at both the overzealous kid and Gllen's reaction that I can barely talk. Meanwhile, Gllen is freaking out because he still thinks it looks like the kid is going to bite the fork. I finally ask why that bothers him so much. He incredulously asks "Haven't you ever bitten down on a fork? It's the worse thing in the world. I've probably done it three times in my life and it sucks so bad!"

The meatball/fork scene came up in conversation this morning, and Gllen still got the jim-jams.

Beast or Boy?

This little audio snippet comes after one of Gllen's nights out at poker. I think the imbibement got a little out of hand, and he ended up making some interesting sounds as he slept. It was so bizarre that I had to record it, to prove to Gllen, that he does in fact snore (an open-ended argument that we had been having anyway). It is interesting to note that Gllen is a somewhat orchestral snorer. Notice the pitch of each note ascends up with each meter, and the sound crescendos into an amazing and sonorous note at the end.

The experience will only be enhanced by plugging into some surround sound speakers or headphones.