On Friday night, Igby threw a ‘hooray, I’m single’ party, complete with a penis cake and assorted shenanigans. When you arrive and see a car like this parked outside, you know you’ve arrived at a vortex of awesome:

Igby herself started the party in high spirits; meaning, of course, that she was consuming a LOT of spirits. Everyone was, actually–it was one of those parties where games like shots and ladders are not only welcome, they’re EAGERLY welcomed, which means that A)I was one of the oldest people there and B)not a single person would go unscathed by Lady Liquor’s horrible wrath.

I’m pretty sure that drinking wine out of the bottle is equivalent to being a college-age hobo. The next step is to jab a bubble-tea straw into a box of Franzia–the adult juice box.

It’s also a party where homemade penis-shaped cakes are eaten with gusto.

See the girl in the Horrorpops shirt? I’d never met her before, I don’t remember her name, but halfway through the evening, we ended up drinking in the street, walking to meet a friend of hers, and immediately afterwards, she was making me drinks like I was one of her best friends. Drunken stupidity is a powerful friendship adhesive. Also, it turns out she is the owner of the Vehicle of Awesome pictured above.

Then things started going wrong; Igby’s ex showed up and ruined her night. She ended up crying, getting very, very sick, and a sort of gloom was cast over the festivities. People started brainstorming ideas to try and cheer Igby up–one of her roommates (I think?)announced he knew what to do, and that he needed someone short and pliably drunk, glanced over at me, and said that I would do just fine, and that I should follow him into the basement.

That’s when things went HORRIBLY wrong.

Yeah. That’s me. Me in a motherfucking tiger costume. That’s Ryan behind me, while I try to throw up the horns. Even though most everyone saw me go into the basement with the stranger, and the stranger leading a tiger back up the stairs, Ryan was the only person who figured out it was me inside.

So since I was a costumed non-entity, they had their way with me.

After people finished having their fun, I made my way to the bathroom where Igby was camping out. I got in behind her and started rubbing her back, trying to say soothing things even though my mouth was disgustingly full of costume fur. I don’t know if she thought someone with English Mushmouth had sneaked into her party or what, but she looked up to see who was making sympathetic noises and screamed when she realized it was a tiger. Screamed.

Somehow I don’t think it made her feel much better. Just saying.

I managed to shout out ‘AMBER, I’M SWEATING BECAUSE I LOVE YOU!’ and somehow it became the new catchphrase of the drunk and stoned.

But seriously. Sweating. It was hot and gross inside the costume, I couldn’t see, it was constrictive and difficult to breathe, and when I finally managed to remove the head, boob-grabber up there screamed as well because apparently she thought she was molesting a GUY.

Soooo…let us never speak of this again.

And just like that, one of my few remaining dreams has died. I loved the Weekly World News more than it’s probably healthy for any one person to love outlandish news.

Once upon a time, many years ago, my family was on a road trip going to visit my great aunt in Colby, WI. No one really liked this aunt, even my parents, so why exactly we were visiting remains a mystery to this day; HOWEVER, given that my dad knew exactly how awful, boring, and summer-wasting this trip was for the kids, he was feeling particularly indulgent when my brother and I raided the gas station for small entertainments. It was then that I picked up my first-ever copy of the Weekly World News. The issue focused on alien abductions, and the small, sadistic tortures they would inflict on abductees. I was simultaneously enthralled and terrified; so much so, that the mere thought of having the PICTURE in the room with me when the lights went out at the motel was unbearable. What if it was looking at me in my sleep? What if the newsprint was a beacon to aliens, who only search out those who know the truth? I locked it in the bathroom all night and prayed that they would take my brother instead.

My mother was rather unhappy with this development.

Still, once I had the bug, there was very little she could do to stop it. I put the ‘good luck’ dot in my shoe before the spelling bee (in case you were wondering, I still lost). I bought the Ed Anger column compilation book, ‘Let’s pave the stupid rainforests and give school teachers stun guns: and other ways to save America’, and dutifully memorized each one of its pages. I reveled in Dear Dottie’s venomous wit.

As I grew older, I came to understand that the whole thing was filled with entertaining lies, and, this revelation, instead of ending our love, only served to increase it. I appreciated the effort it took to print news of this variety week after week, and when I learned Photoshop, I swore that one day I would work in those hallowed, Bigfoot-adorned walls. They needed me. I knew this, because I caught them recycling articles time and time again. I could take them to the next level, one day, I was sure of it.

The years went by, and still the Weekly World News persisted. I can’t say I was happy about the way it had changed. No more Ed Anger, no more Dear Dottie, and in their places, a fiercely pro-american, anti-‘towelhead’ vibe that felt reactionary, out-of-place, and a little sad. It felt like they were desperately trying to get a foothold in the market, any market, to survive. I had no interest in anything with Osama or Saddam on the cover, so I stopped buying. I missed the old days, with dinosaurs being found in a remote part of Brazil, sharks with razor sharp teeth sticking out of every available surface, and Elvis riding off into the sunset on a Chupacabra’s back.

So the Weekly World News is now dead. Even though, much like Elvis, they took some missteps towards the end, they will still be sorely missed. Whenever I buy groceries, I expect to feel a black-and-white weekly-sized hole in my heart.