With this issue of Exotic, we bid a somber farewell to Butch and Petey, the sexually confused pair of "Trucker Fags in Denial" who've wormed their way into the hearts, minds, and water-cooler discussions of greater Portland area sex workers--and their esteemed clients--for nearly two-and-a-half years. We take a moment to reflect on their trials and triumphs, their rough 'n' tender lovemaking ... and the sense of poignance and dignified rage they brought to every waking action, whether it was changing each other's tire rims or giving each other rim jobs. Butch and Petey are gone, true, but their muddled ethics, their misguided aggression, and, most importantly, their searing hypocrisy and need to point fingers will continue burning in our hearts like a bad case of acid-reflux disease,

But fret not, ye tiny female reindeer and leaping buck jackalopes who smudge their fingers with each monthly issue of Exotic--a full-length Trucker Fags in Denial comic book is coming in June, to be released by Fantagraphics Books in Seattle. Through a sweeping act of graciousness in keeping with his patrician bearing, Jim Goad will be offering signed copies of this alterna-comic opus on his website, www.jimgoad.com, for a very reasonable price, considering all the work that went into it. It is highly suggested that you visit that site right now and drain your coffers with lavish love offerings to Jim in appreciation for all he means (and continues to mean) to you.

There is no more appropriate place than this, the third paragraph of this article, to reveal for the first time anywhere that Butch and Petey are fictional characters, While the 28 monthly installments of the Trucker Fags saga have involved us so intimately with Butch and Petey that we could feel their hemorrhoid lumps and smell their ball sweat, the sinister truth is that they only exist in the fevered, megalomaniacal mind of Jim Goad, who only dates Jewish gals and therefore can't really be a Nazi and who stopped beating women when he realized it gave them too much attention. The sad, telling truth is that Mr. Goad channeled these characters from a walnut-sized tumor in the back of his brain, relating his troubled visions to artist Jim Blanchard, who rendered the queasily vivid etchings in what is rapidly becoming the most beloved illustrated narrative series since Peanuts.

To reiterate: Butch and Petey are not real. This isn't to say there aren't real characters like them--desperate, self-loathing creatures who need to lash out at others in the same way that sharks need to keep moving lest they die. Guilt-projection is such a universal facet of the human experience that it often escapes notice. So in the sense that Butch and Petey are able to function and prosper by blaming and punishing others for acts which they commit themselves, Butch and Petey are all too real. It might tighten your sphincter to hear this, but there's a little Butch and Petey in all of us.

And yet, despite the author's better wishes, there exist humans who aren't as twisted and damaged and petty as the "homophobic homosexual" truck drivers who've whisked against the collective consciousness of we, the Exotic readers, like one of those Swiffer wet mops on a dirty, dirty floor. Hard as it might be to believe...and even harder as it might be to admit in a steamy locker room filled with naked middle-aged dudes...there are real men who drive trucks, suck cock, and who yet don't feel compelled to engage in homophobic killing sprees.

Many trucker fags...most, perhaps...aren't in denial at all. Many of them are so proud of their lifestyle that they exhibitionistically produce books and films about it. They host websites and discussion boards devoted to unabashed trucker-faggin'. In one extreme case--the Gay Truckers Association (www.gaytruckerassn.com)--they've even founded a fancy legal organization which lobbies on behalf of the Trucker Fag Nation.

The Trucker has been a perennial gay archetype along with Village People-style macho icons such as The Cop and The Construction Worker. Gay literature abounds with titles such as Raunchy Truckers, White Trash Truckers, Hard Dirty Truckers, Truck Me Harder, Truckstop Trash, Truckers and Suckers, and Truckin', Suckin', Fuckin'. An online fiction story called "Trucker Jack Meets Jeremiah" contains this tender line:

Jack had many men fuck him, but never one at seventy years of age with a cock that was the sausage of life.

Gay porn videos bear titles such as The Truck Stop Toilet Tramp and Trucker Daddies ("No rest in the rest areas either!" screams the promo material. "Big Daddy Truckers--hard