Whenever I watch Night Court, I feel demonic.

I don’t know if it’s Judge Stone’s obsession with Harry Houdini or Dan Fielding’s oversexed antics, but I feel satanic during the whole viewing process. It’s as if I’m going to burst full blast into a black mass during the first commercial break. I might just desecrate a bible and sacrifice a virgin while someone tries to sell me a new deodorant or soft drink.

But I always resist the urges.

I was 26 when it started or maybe it started earlier and I never realized it. Who knows, right? Despite having a college education, I was living hand to mouth as a gas station attendant, barely scrapping by. It wasn’t the life I imagined myself having.

My days were spent inhaling the sweet aroma of gasoline while trying to catch glimpses of the high heels of women who stopped to fill their cars. I longed to see their shoes on the pedal. At times I believed I could smell their feet through the gasoline smell. Many days I had to stop my mouth from confessing my desire:

I imagined myself saying, “Can I help you?”

The woman would say, “Fill it, regular.”

I’d reply, “Sure. Can I smell your shoes?”

She’d say, “Fucking pervert.”

Oh, but I resisted the urges. I needed my job and didn’t have the slightest interest in going to jail. I wouldn’t last there as I’m too delicate and bladder shy.

So I spent my days at the station and my nights in my one room apartment, surrounded by paperback books and old magazines. It was cramped, but comfortable. I always liked wrapping myself in blankets and lounging on pillows while I watched television. In the winter it was a necessity because I had no heat. I ate soup out of the can and watched rerun after rerun of classic television. That’s where Night Court came in.

Some people my age would have found my life depressing. It was quite the contrary. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed every second of warmth in my comfortable chair (the only one I had in my apartment). I occasionally went to the bar down the street to have a few drinks and sometimes brought home a bottle or two. Then I’d get drunk and reread issues of True Detective. I’d end up watching an episode of Perfect Strangers. Larry pisses me off. Like when he took a sledgehammer to the wall, ruining the mural Balki had painted. I ended up throwing a bottle at the television but luckily I missed.

So okay, back to Night Court.

As I sat and watched Dan Fielding again try to get Christine into bed, I kept tracing pentagrams on my blanket. What now?

Ants crawled onto my chair, getting comfortable in the pentagram I was tracing. They worshipped Baphomet of Thee Unholy Church Ov Thee Old Blanket. Stupid little insects. They don’t know it’s all made up. They don’t realize it’s all because of that stupid, fucking Dan Fielding and the judge’s Houdini obsession.