Bullshitting Meets Plagiarism

I'm Out Of Wit; How 'Bout Some Dense Observations?

2009-09-25T07:13:00.000-07:00

This blog's days are numbered.

It will be gone, but not forgotten. I know entries have been dragging ass lately. Super sorry. All I can say is that there be a methodde to thyne own madness, and writting about myself in 3rd person old English is easy.

In the mean time, I've noticed some things. Some famous people look like other famous people. No one's ever pointed that out! Don't worry. To make up for this shitty post I'll give you some stupid pet tricks next time. K?

Virgin Billionare Richard Branson...

...and a bloated/scarred Mickey Rourke

Thomas Haden Church (3/3/2009, 7:56 PM, charged with Mopery; later acquitted)..

...and Libyan singing sensation Moammar al-Gaddafi

3. (this one's sad)

Drew Carey 2009...

...and Michael Moore

Movin’ Pictures: District 9

2009-08-27T08:10:00.000-07:00

I hate to break the news to all the Sara Suburbs or little Johnny Culdesacs out there, but poor people are as ubiquitous in the world as the Miley Cyrus posters are in your bedroom. I think every continent has some sort of good movie that represents the hardships of its ghetto dwellers; you have your City of God's, your Slumdog Millionaire’s, your Kangaroo Jack’s, etc. The only continent left just happens to be the most colossally fucked one ever (including Pangaea).

Making a slum movie about Africa should not be hard since, oh, I don’t know…it’s AFRICA. It had that whole “colonialism” thing. Also that little apartheid thing, whatever the heck-a-roonie that was. There’s also the abject poverty, the AIDS, the Super AIDS, ebola, gun-touting militias, military dictatorships, and just the overall haze of suck that kind of hangs over the land. Africa has a billion people living in what is essentially the world’s largest ghetto. Film that.

Man, the only thing that place is missing are aliens. If only Africa had some aliens, then and only then could we make a kick-ass ghetto film.

District 9, like this review of it, leaves the audience asking, “what the fuck are they trying to say?”

Check this out, I’m not making this up. Here are two quick reviews I read on RottenTomatoes. Both are positive.

“A brilliant social commentary.” – Victoria Alexander, FilmsInReview.com
“[District 9] signifies nothing.” – Tim Brayton, Antagony & Ecstacy

I have no fucking clue what I just watched. So, there are hyper-intelligent aliens with advanced technology, and for some unexplained reason they turn dim and chill out over South Africa. The government collects them all, puts them in a slum, and then normal slum-like problems occur (gangs, black market). It’s like a fucking, normal slum movie except all the poor, stupid people are really poor, really stupid and they look like Shrimp Men.

I know this was supposed to be a sci-fi horror comedy satire. I don’t care that some professional movie critics are comparing it to Planet of the Apes. District 9 was objectively retarded. It was a bore that didn’t have to be so goddamn boring.

Without giving too much plot away, I’m just going to say I hated the protagonist. Wikus van de Merwe (Copley) is almost as unintelligible as the fucking non-English-speaking aliens. He has some sort of jumbled South African dialect that makes him sound Welsh. I did like watching him argue with the alien protagonist, Christopher Johnson (hahaha). Hearing those two go back and forth reminded me of the cantina scene in Star Wars.

Movies need to stop being shot with the shaky cam. It was fine for the first 20 minutes where it was supposed to feel like a documentary. That actually makes sense when the plot involves a whole film crew tagging along with military operations. But when you’re watching something that only the audience is supposed to know about and the footage is still at home movie quality, you’re left feeling confused and motion sick.

I’m not going to lie. There were some pretty funny parts, like the human-alien bareback humping or when a Gundam mech suit hits a pig into a soldier and they all die. So, yeah. The film is not a complete loss. Mindless fun, I guess.

If you want to see a deep movie about life in a ghetto, rent Fiddler on the Roof. If you want a deep, sci-fi flick, rent Planet of the Apes. If you want to watch campy aliens tear ass on humans or vice versa, rent Starship Troopers. Don’t combine them into one, big, mediocre fart.

I give District 9 5/10 corgis. Meh.

Movin’ Pictures: Inglourious Basterds

2009-08-26T10:39:00.000-07:00

(I really hate the title’s incorrect spelling, which is weird because if it weren’t for spell check, this whole blog would make me look like a stroke victim)

I’m going to sound like a dick. Sorry. As I sit here trying to think of things to say, going over a few points over and over in my mind, it all starts to make me sound, to myself at least, like a huge, effin’ dick. But honestly, I like the movie. A lot.

It’s just that I thought the movie would fucking blow my mind. Instead, it was merely awesome. Tarantino shot for a Pulp Fiction but wound up with a Kill Bill vol. 1.

By now you’ve probably heard about how this was supposed to be his glorious Cowboy Western epic, that it took 10 years to write, and that he left on the editing room floor enough of his WWII fairy tale to make a fucking WWI prequel. Not bad for a 2 and a half hour long slog fest.

The film has two main story lines that culminate together at the end. One follows the events of Shosanna (Laurent), a French Jew who loses her family in a raid and winds up as the manager of a little cinema theater. You better like this chick because this is basically her film and her story. I was a little disappointed because I thought the second story line, the one following Lieutenant Aldo “The Apache” Raine (Pitt), would be focused on more. This is the shit that was really cut out. All the back story with The Basterds, shots of them tearing ass through Nazi occupied France, the pithy dialogue, almost all cut out. You can tell you’re watching a watered down version; an incredible revelation because god damn those guys are funny and brutal.

You’ll like every single character. I was surprised that I liked Eli Roth’s character, Sgt. Donny “The Bear Jew” Donowitz, because I personally don’t really like Eli Roth and his stupid snuff movie porn shit. I guess it makes sense that an annoying, sadistic Jewish American would be cherry picked to play one. Good job, Eli.

The movie is extremely dialogue heavy, which is a good thing if you find agonizing tension just as enjoyable as agonizing slaughter. You can thank “The Jew Hunter” Hans Landa (Waltz) for that. Tarantino and Waltz created the perfect movie villain; a romantic, and sinister genius who serves as the only real bridge between the two protagonists. It feels really weird liking a Nazi this much.

Tarantino does a great job with the directing, using all the artsy fartsy camera/lighting/setting techniques I’ve completely forgotten from the cinematography course I barely passed. The film definitely deserves to be watched more than once; keeping track of all this stuff AND the plot AND the great acting AND the constant sensation of being gob smacked, you also have to keep track of all the moderately obscure movie tributes Tarantino makes because Tarantino is a huge fucking movie dork (not necessarily a bad thing)

Inglourious Basterds gets 9/10 corgis. It should be seen.

ABC ‘s Fall Lineup

2009-08-24T10:39:00.000-07:00

All shows premier September, 4 2009

Hugo and Me

[Background Music – Wooly Bully, Sam the Sham and the Pharos]

Johnny Wright was the best and brightest student in his little Kansas high school. But when this All-American Rhode Scholar decided to travel abroad, he didn’t realize that his host daddy…was the daddy of Venezuela!

“Sorry I’m late, Pop. I’m not used to nation-wide mandatory curfews.”

“Aaaaammeeeeerrrrriiiiiicaaaaaaaaannnnooo!”

[Background Music – What if God Was One of Us, Joan Osborne]

Can love and understanding bridge the divides of nationalism?

“You’re not my real daddy!”

And can we find the answers…in our hearts?

“[I’m proud of you, Johnny. I’ve (sob) always...been so proud…]”

This fall, control YOUR media, and watch the state of….Hugo and Me. Staring Shia LaBeouf and Hugo Chavez, as himself

Cougar Hunter

[Background Music – Wooly Bully, Sam the Sham and the Pharos]

The pest control game wasn’t really cutting it for high school drop out Ed Fisher. At 22, his life was going nowhere…until he started hunting bigger game amongst New York City’s richest divorcés!

“Rrrrrrrrrrow…”

“Uh…meow?”

[Background Music – What if God Was One of Us, Joan Osborne]

Can this amateur jiggalo make the hearts of older women purr?

“I love you, Ed…”

Or will the whole experience leave him scratched?

“We found ‘em like this this mornin’ ‘round 8. Two bodies, both shot in the head, ‘cept this one definitely did it to himself Cobain style.”

“That’s a lot of blood. Christ, this perp reeks.”

This fall, the best time to hunt cougars is when they are in heat. Cougar Hunter, staring Courtney Cox and Hugo Chavez as Ed

Stuck in the Middle

[Background Music – Wooly Bully, Sam the Sham and the Pharos]

Bridgette Hallmark always had trouble balancing her home life with her high paying CEO job. But when the entire global economy is sent into a tailspin, she goes from power player to home maker over night. Now she’s middle class in the middle of the country and is rapidly approaching middle age!

“Which one of you incompetent fuck heads ate all the goddamn potato salad!? That was for the stupid fucking PTA meeting tonight that your goddamn low-balling public school is making me attend.”

[Background Music – What if God Was One of Us, Joan Osborne]

Can she learn to cope with her slower, more down-to-Earth life?

“Sometimes I just get the urge to drive off a bridge and take my whole family with me.”

Or will she be forever lost in the past?

“Sometimes I just get the urge to drive off a bridge and take my whole family with me.”

This fall, Hugo Chavez is…Stuck in the Middle.

August Rush

2009-08-06T12:43:00.001-07:00

August is a weird month. For some strange reason, it is both the most important and the most useless month of the year. Don’t believe me? Check your calendar, right now. I bet it’s filled up with birthdays and vacation plans and sex parties, all while the worst calendar picture of the year is proudly being displayed (Playboy’s Ms. August 2009 has scoliosis and razor burn on her chest).

Now, on average, you share your birthday with about 18,000,000 people. But that number is slightly larger in August. Why? ‘Cause bitches be fuckin’ at Thanksgiving. That’s right, August has the most birthdays out of any month for reasons I can only assume are related to family, alcohol and tryptophan. If that’s not the case then you tell me why so many people like to have a sloppy, unprotected fuck in November. Ew. What if it had to do with Veterans Day? Or Election Day?

Being the sweaty taint of Summer, August is too much of a hazy inferno to accomplish anything. It’s really more of a time to enjoy southern delights like impromptu BBQ’s, swimming holes, and lounging around complaining about how lazy other people are as they lounge around and complain about the heat because they’re so fucking lazy. I know last part sounds retarded and grammatically convoluted, but it’s August and hot and I just don’t…fucking…care…anym

November might be prime deer hunting season, but August is by far the best season to hunt human. It is by far the bloodiest month. Some blame the heat, while others blame the “evil-amulet” properties of August’s birthstone, the peridot. On top of being the month where numerous wars started and ended, when we bombed Japan back into a Flintstones episode, and when God sent Hurricane Katrina to punish New Orleans and by accident every person in a 250 mile radius, we just had the physical manifestation of rape do that voodoo that he do soooo well. Always with the suicide at the end. The mentally disturbed need to take it back to the outlaw glory days where actual bank robbing criminals had the decency to go out in a hail of gunfire.

As for me, my birthday is right smack in the middle of August. I’d throw a murder-theme party for all my friends if I wasn’t so goddamn hot and I wasn’t…so…goddamn…tired.

Stick Me in the Ground

2009-08-03T10:57:00.000-07:00

Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave

Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;

Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.I know.

But I do not approve. ‘Cause only fags do that shit, son.

Houston, represent!

-Edna St. Vincent Millay

I think what this Pulitzer Prize winning dame was trying to say was, “Let’s prevent some more zombie attacks here. M’kay, people?” This collectivist approach towards body disposal has issued in a golden age, no, a dynasty of zombie-free living; it’s been almost 4 years since the last recorded attack.

In lieu of traditional burials, people are opting for more alternative methods: funeral pyres, body harvesting, living longer. Gross. Oh sure, this all sounds great. No more zombies? Hell yeah sign me up. But what the American people have forgotten in the time since 9/11 is that by eliminating the Life-Death-Reanimation-More Death-Apocalypse-Genesis cycle, you’re making the quality of life worse and extending it at the same time.

Let’s get the obvious downfall out of the way first: too many old people. They want to die just as much as we wish they would. Seriously, who wants to be 105? God has a specific plan once you turn 70 and it involves dying and walking the earth as an abomination. Zombies may have destroyed the very fabric of civilization in some parts of the world, but never has a zombie dinged my car, or told me a really boring story about the 30’s, or smelled like medicine, or complained to my manager.

Without dead bodies, several key industries will go under at a time when our economy is teetering on the brink of collapse as it is. Sam Bowman of Patterson, Illinois is the North American Casketeers Union leader of Local 34.

“How many people are here on Earth? Ten billion? Twenty? A casket’s got about…I’d say on average 40 dollars worth of lumber, bolts, screws, linen, whatever, and we charge ‘em at about the same price as a used car. If the casket making industry were to suddenly pucker up like my wife’s asshole…we’d be better off if Ford went under. Shit comes and goes, but people will always be dyin’.”

If there are no dead bodies, then there would be no caskets. And without caskets, there’d be no cemeteries to bury them in. And without cemeteries, where would fat, goth girls go to smoke marijuana?

Look, I know that when it comes to this subject, people’s emotions get pretty raw. It’s a debate that’s been going on for thousands of years, and we still can’t figure it out. Aristotle couldn’t come up with an answer, and he was taught by Plato. Plato couldn’t either, and he was taught by Socrates. And even Socrates couldn’t because he’s full of shit.

The point is that, zombies are like this big cleansing fire. They sweep through this forest, aka, human civilization, and clean up the thorns and dead animals and used condoms that clutter our lives. It isn’t until we’ve seen our own loved ones devoured by a decomposing army of the damned that we can pause, reflect, and come to meaningful conclusions. “I shouldn’t have lost my shit at that Starbucks employee. That poor girl. She probably never even knew two-dollar bills existed. Not her fault.”

So I say put dead bodies in the ground where they belong. It’s not like we won’t be seeing them soon enough.

Title: [Untitled]

2009-07-31T12:03:00.000-07:00

Title: [Untitled]

Characters:
Greg – A nerdy, mid-20’s accountant. Very lame and mild mannered personality. Uses office jargon a lot.
Alter Boy – A latently gay and polite, religious zealot who is clueless
Captain Yo-Yo – If a Skip It commercial came to life and was a wigger. Actually terrible at the yo-yo.
Dungeon Master – Your typical heavy set, snarky, and irreverent nerd

Setting: A library conference room. There is a large table with a macbook resting on it, a few chairs, and a white board with a few scribbles on it. Three men are sitting at the table while one stands. There are some wayward pieces of paper on the table.

[open]

GREG
Alright, this is good. This is great. Look’s like everyone is here so…I guess I’ll begin. [Ahem]. My name is Greg Higgins. I’m a former accounting underling of Black Mantis, who, as you all know, was arrested along with Beaver Man, The Prankster, Dr. Velocity, uh…Hot Cop; basically, the entire League of Bay Area Super Villains. That day was a real barn-burner. They were arrested…for forever…by that insufferable, Dewlapped Destroyer, Moose Man. [chuckling] I uh…don’t think I need to tell you guys, our feelings, about uh…that guy [smiling].

OTHER THREE MEN
[silence]

GREG
So, that is why I, the last part of LOBASV, combed all the Bay Area high schools and assembled you guys…the best, up-and-coming super villains, this town has to offer! The young blood! Seriously, give yourselves a round of applause!

Greg applauds enthusiastically alone.

GREG
‘Cause seriously, it’s all about you guys. We are going to recontextualize the villainy in this town and together, get that dirty so-n-so Moose Man. So, what I would like to do right now is continue onto our next action item which is part 2 of the itinerary-

CPT. YO-YO
Yo, I didn’t get no eye-tinrary.

GREG
…well, why don’t you share with him and… it’ll work out. It's fine. You don’t really need an itinerary for this part right now ‘cause what we’re gonna do is introduce ourselves, sorta, familiarize ourselves with each other, become real homies, right bro-hams? [awkward pause] And then we’ll come up with a plan for killing Moose Man. So, why don’t we start with…you, in the blouse. Stand up, tell us your name aaaaand what you’re about! Go.

Alter Boy stands.

ALTER BOY
Well first off, this is not a blouse; it’s a surplice-

CPT. YO-YO
[to Dungeon Master] It’s a very pretty blouse…

ALTER BOY
Hey, shut up. It’s not a blouse! It’s a surplice and, the ladies, love it. They just…swarm all over me all the time-

CPT. YO-YO
They flock to your smock.

ALTER BOY
They flock to my smock. But I would never fornicate with harlots because-

DUNGEON MASTER
You’re gay.

Dungeon Master and Cpt. Yo-Yo chuckle.

ALTER BOY
No. Because it’s villainous to leave girls in wanting.

Dungeon Master and Cpt. Yo-Yo make faces at the weird phrasing.

GREG
Listen, Alter Boy. I know, we’re all amped. Everyone here wants to kill Moose Man really really bad, but plans for villainy aren’t until item 6; check your itinerary. So why don’t you take a few power breaths, collect your thoughts, and continue.

ALTER BOY
[annoyed] Fine. I am Alter Boy; the Catholic Shape Shifter-

Dungeon Master and Cpt. Yo-Yo burst out laughing.

ALTER BOY
-THE CATHOLIC SHAPE SHIFTER, AND THROUGH MENTAL PRAYER, LORD, MAKE ME AN INSTURMENT OF THY PEACE, IN JESUS NAME KILL MOOSE MAN AMEN.

Alter Boy sits down quickly.

GREG
Thank you, Alter Boy. That had a lot of goodness. Let’s see. Captain Yo-Yo! You’ve been hot-desking with Dungeon Master a lot today. Why don’t you stand up and tell us about yourself?

CPT. YO-YO
Hey, Greg. Why don't you fuck off?

GREG
‘Scuse me?

CPT. YO-YO
My name ain’t Captain Yo-Yo. It’s Captain Yo-Yo, the Jr. Spin Champion of Oklahoma City. You gotta say the whole thing, otherwise you sound as gay as Mr. down-on-your-knees over here.

DUNGEON MASTER
Hey-O.

ALTER BOY
I’m not going to sit here and pretend to understand what that’s supposed to mean, Mr., Mr., whoever-that-long-named-singer-man-lady-person-from-the-90’s-was. Mr. Long Name. Uh…purple rain!

DUNGEON MASTER
What?

CPT. YO-YO
Prince? Are you trying to talk about Prince?

DUNGEON MASTER
Jesus Christ you suck.

ALTER BOY
Hey, hold thy tongue, Dungeon Master! Why don’t you go back to your mom’s basement which is where your dungeon lair is. Probably.

DUNGEON MASTER
Yeah, that’s right. My mom’s basement is my dungeon. And her bedroom is my sex dungeon; where I butt-fucked Jesus.

CPT. YO-YO
OH SNAP! That’s what up!

ALTER BOY
Wh-wh-…

DUNGEON MASTER
Pwned.

CPT. YO-YO
Villainous!

ALTER BOY
Greg!

GREG
I’m sorry, Alter Boy, but I’m going to have to go ahead and agree with Cpt. Yo-Yo that what Dungeon Master said was quite villainous.

CPT. YO-YO
Mmhmm, yeah. That’s what he said! How's my dick taste, son?!

ALTER BOY
Hey, Why are they even here?! I can shape shift, for gosh’s sake! They don’t even have any powers!

CPT. YO-YO
Hey hey hey hey woah woah…wait a sec. Don’t you go comparing Captain Yo-Yo, Jr. Spin Champion of Oklahoma City with dime store Kevin Smith over there. I got powers. Check it!

Cpt. Yo-Yo starts to stand up, first by taking his feet off the table

DUNGEON MASTER
[to Alter Boy] Where do you get off saying I don’t have any powers, you little butt nut?

CPT. YO-YO
Boom!

Cpt. Yo-Yo spreads his arms, brandishes his bandolier of yo-yos, and opens his hands. Several yo-yos (4) unfurl and land on the table.

CPT. YO-YO
Yo, what’s good now, son?! Ever been smacked upside the dome with one of these?! I don’t think so! This shit hurt more than suckin' on Johnny Law's night stick, feel me ya pussay ass bi-otch?

DUNGEON MASTER
Why the fuck are you even here? Why would some newb like you ever try to be a super villain?

CPT. YO-YO
Yo I got yo-yo weapons, yo-yo traps…

ALTER BOY
They say we alter boys live dangerous lives…

Dungeon Master and Cpt. Yo-Yo speak at the same time

CPT. YO-YO
Whaaaaaaaa….

DUNGEON MASTER
Man, that is such total bullshit. I bet my BangBus subscription that you've never even seen that movie.

GREG
This is good, people. This is a really good robust dialogue going on. I can feel the synergy. I’m gonna give this part just a few more minutes but then we are really gonna wanna move on to item 3 in our itinerary -which I believe is…Our Scarred, Emotional Pasts- if we want to make it out of the library before it closes.

CPT. YO-YO
Yo, fuck the eye-tinrary! Let’s just jump that motherfucking moose and ice his ass. I. Don’t. Give. A. FUCK! I’ve kilt bikers, I’ve kilt jump ropers, I totally fuckin’ dropped this one bitch on a Skip-It…

DUNGEON MASTER
I’ve got my stepdad’s car outside. I guess we could run him over or something. I don’t care if that car gets dented; I hate Steve.

ALTER BOY
I could shape shift into a baby lamb as a distraction. That could work!

OTHER THREE MEN
[silence]

GREG
Jeeze, this is like herding cats. OK, guys. I'm gonna be above-board for a sec. I think our main problem here is agreeance. We need to be proactive. Let's start a dialogue and air it out. No more of this imagineering on how to kill Moose Man when I’ve got a 57-point slide show on exactly how to do it. The first step: understanding ourselves. And each other.

CPT. YO-YO
[disillusioned] Yo, alright, that’s it. Captain Yo-Yo, Jr. Spin Champion of Oklahoma City ‘bout to peace the fuck on out of here. So, so long, douche, Mr. Kevin Smith, Pride Parade over here; I’m ‘bout to ride out on my yo-yo-nicycle. Maybe rob a bank, pick up some bomb-ass hoola hoop pussy, you know, whatevers down by the boardwalk. So uh…don’t none of you hacks follow me, or try to evil around with me ever again. Aiight. Peace!

Cpt. Yo-Yo flips a hardcore peace sign and swaggers out of the room.

DUNGEON MASTER
Yo-yo-nicycle?

GREG
I’m not quite sure what that is either.

DUNGEON MASTER
A yo-yo unicycle?

GREG
[chuckles] What a spark plug.

DUNGEON MASTER
How would he even sit? How is that physically possible?

ALTER BOY
I bet it’s like this loooong [demonstrating with arms] piece of string that sticks straight up in the air that you sit on and it hurts. Ew. That would be awful.

DUNGEON MASTER
Oh, who are you fooling? We know you think that sounds delicious.

ALTER BOY
[praying] Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccáta mundi, dona nobis tyrannosaurus rex.

DUNGEON MASTER
What are you doing?

ALTER BOY
[still praying] Shape shifting into a dinosaur so I can bite your face off.

DUNGEON MASTER
Now, are you shape shifting into a pre- or post- great flood T-rex? Because Noah totally had them on his boat, and, I just want to know-

ALTER BOY
Shut up.

DUNGEON MASTER
-if I should be worried or not. ‘Cause, pre-great flood T-rex had no immunities to human diseases-

ALTER BOY
Shut up!

DUNGEON MASTER
-so I could just kill them with a sneeze or something like that.

ALTER BOY
Fuck you!

GREG
Yeah…and I think on that note, at least for right now, we’re done. Good meeting, gang. Seriously. Very proactive.

Pointless Update

2009-07-29T06:33:00.000-07:00

Apology in advance. This blog update is pointless.

I’m writing something big and new and complex and unfamiliar and hopefully funny.

Catch my untitled script about awful super villains this Friday. It should be done by then.

BFFs Forever

2009-07-24T10:09:00.000-07:00

(Note: the second F stands for Fucking)

Although we are genetically superior to every one of God’s creatures, they never cease to amaze us with their human mimickry. These soulless automatons run the gamut of apparent intelligence from “none” all the way up to “retarded human child”. Of course, it isn’t real intelligence; you need to accept Jesus Christ into your heart before your mind can open up and receive the divine light of knowledge radiating from God’s throne in Heaven. And that is a physical impossibility for anyone but humans.

Clyde the Orangutan is so apparently smart he resembles a gangly, pot-bellied hillbilly child from Georgia. Look at him; put him in a pair of overalls and a straw hat, maybe a little chew in his lip and boom – he’d look ready to rape some city boys a-la Deliverance extra bonus footage. But unlike most unwashed poor people, Clyde “knows” sign language. To be fair, I would have been condescending and put “knows” in quotation marks if I were talking about hillbillies “knowing” sign language. Some creatures that walk this earth are just too dumb to know anything.

Clyde’s life partner is Ruby, a Blue Tick Hound. He’s good for rooting around, chasing rabbits down hollers and stirring up small game for Clyde to pick off with some buckshot. Sike. That’s a lie. But the two are inseparable and they do kill animals together.

I visited Clyde on his salt-of-the-earth hunk of land that the government was nice enough to donate to the National Wildlife Federation, of which Clyde is not a member of due to his communication skills. He’s basically squatting in a dirt pile owned by the federal government which is so In Your Face it’s almost punk. But that’s cool with Clyde. He and Ruby spend most of their days just kicking it and occasionally raiding the weekly flea market, heavy on some Mongol Viking Raider Bezerker type shit. That part’s not true either but I just like the visual since Clyde does look like Attila the Hun (not racist). For some reason their presence has been missed for the past 3 weekends. That’s why I came down for a visit.

I failed sign language in middle and high school but we seemed to vibe each other out well enough to quell the murderous desires fuming inside us both.

Me [signing]: Hello, Clyde
(Clyde remained aloof as he fondled his penis)

Whatcha doin’, Clyde?
[Signing] Chase tickle.

Where is Ruby?
Kill dog. Dead good bye.

Ruby is dead? Who killed Ruby?
Hard killing. Bad dog.

Clyde. Who killed Ruby, Clyde.
(Clyde stuck his toes in his mouth and rolled onto his back)

Did you kill Ruby, Clyde?
You bird

[Out loud] You little shit.
He is breakable. Me know from study.

Where is Ruby? Where is Ruby’s body?
Me am not having picture of me in article.

Where is his body, Clyde?
Rotten. Stink.

Clyde. Where is his body?
Shame.

Clyde!
In dirty toilet.

I found Ruby’s decomposing body in Clyde’s outhouse.

Why, Clyde?
No want jealous attention. Sorry.

Why were you jealous of Ruby?
He can lick privates.

That still doesn’t explain-
He can lick privates.

Clyde…
Good.

Animals are dumb.

History’s Mysteries: Walt Disney’s Head, Part 2

2009-07-21T11:47:00.000-07:00

How did 1 misplaced frozen head launch the end of the world? Why did Walt Disney freeze his head to begin with? And where is it now?

The real catalyst happened earlier than you think. It was during the so called “Golden Age” of cartoons, from 1937-1941. Some might look at that date and think the parallels between an anti-Semitic cartoon mogul and Adolph Hitler’s growing war machine are “a stretch”, and “specious at best”. Well let me tell you something, Buster Brown; fuck you.

See, this was after Walt spent over a decade fellating the egos and dicks of rich Hollywood Jew executives. Breaking into a new town isn’t easy, especially if your weapon of choice is a drawing of a teenage mutant ninja mouse on a steamboat.

Walt’s growing empire and paranoia are what led him to make his first major decision related to the apocalypse. He decided to surround himself with a team of cartoon animators who shared his controversial beliefs about Jews, genetic superiority, and the coming race war. They were going to make the best family-friendly cartoons ever! This is what led him to travel to Nazi Germany and personally ask Hitler to take back to America the Third Reich’s greatest cartoonist.

Baron Von Strauss. A disciplined man. A man of no nonsense. A bed-wetter and pyromaniac. A reclusive, hate-filled man who secretly killed cats for fun. And, a life long friend to Walt. He didn’t mind Von Strauss’ eye patch or gimp. He thought the facial scars added panache. When they weren’t animating, the two would sit around for hours, reading exerts of Mein Kampf by the fire, sipping fine chardonney and quietly giggling in a silent understanding.

The years passed in unparalleled bliss. But there was trouble in paradise. Unbeknownst to Von Strauss, Hollywood and himself, Walt Disney had a malignant brain tumor (in addition to a myriad of other congenital conditions, including Peyronie’s Disease and The Evil Gene). Just as their media empire finished the first of their giant induction compounds located in California, it appeared as if Walt was not destined to see his labors come to fruition. After a chemotherapy session, Walt told Von Strauss that he would have to carry on his legacy of hate mongering and propaganda as he resigned himself to death.

What would you do?

What would any battle tested Nazi foot soldier who may or may not had sex with his commanding officer do? Spit in the face of God, that’s what.

Pulled straight from Hitler’s playbook, Baron Von Strauss initiated Operation: Long Winter. It was originally a contingency plan to prevent sterilization in case radioactive fallout levels were too high for human testicular survival. What it required was for Disney (the Fuhrer) to be flash frozen with cryogenics, have his head removed and placed in a jar. Then Von Strauss collected some of Walt’s sperm by jacking off his dead body. When the sperm was collected, it was placed in a vial, then that vial was put in the jar with his head, then that jar would be placed as the head of an indestructible robot body powered by burning coal .

(Note, this was almost impossible for Von Strauss to pull off since he embezzled the money for this project from The Disney Company’s new idea of computer animated 3-D cartoons, setting back the development of that project over 30 years. It was either Immortal Giant Frozen Head of Walt Disney or Toy Story and he made an executive decision.)

…

And then that’s it. No one knows exactly what happened next. But some people think it looked a little like this…

WHERE DID HIS HEAD/SPERM GO?!

Tune in tomorrow for the thrilling conclusion. “History’s Mysteries: Walt Disney’s Head, Part 3”

We haven’t even gotten to the clone wars and the fall of civilization yet.

History’s Mysteries: Walt Disney’s Head, Part 1

2009-07-20T10:28:00.000-07:00

Walt Disney lived the American Dream.

Born into the squalor of middle class life, he faced many hardships; hardships that no baby should burden alone. But those first, lonely, hard years of his life did not build character so much as reveal it.

The Chicago, Illinois of 1901 was much different than the Chicago of 2009. Or even 2001. Or hell, 1975. I think that’s the year it finally changed but don’t quote me on that. Point is, 1901 Chi-town was more of a fetid, Dickensian nightmare than a habitable metropolis. It was here among the abject poverty and boxcars on top of boxcars crammed with rotting cow flesh, that a spunky little rat-faced baby named Walter Elias Disney “fell out” and began his life journey.

Back in those days the only people who called themselves artists were renowned homosexuals or unabashedly French. Men like Felix Copperfield or Jacques Marcel Gazelle Lafayette de Calonne, who could mince into any city and start their own gallery, men of the era of whom Disney first dreamed of. Baby Walt had always admired the do-all-and-everything bravado of such gallant men, and wished to be with them, but his father would not have a gay French dandy as offspring.

He wished his son to grow up like the men he admired, the men who worked a factory job with him. Tired, salt of the earth men, who slaved away their lives for the company’s sake, under incredibly unsafe machinery, crooked bosses, and a ton of fart jokes. He wished for his son to one day be a hardened, wizen old man, amongst the ranks of legends of the conveyor belt; men like 8-Finger Fitzpatrick, Black Steve, and “The Man They Just Call Swifty”.

If Baby Walt showed any artistic talent, his proclivity would be gently curbed by his well-meaning father. For minor things like wall scribbles or cooed lullabies, Baby Walt was subjected to beatings by his father. Day after day, every day, when he came home from work at the Meat Cannery, did his father whip the shit out of with an old hickory stick until Walt turned 5.

Walt’s only outlet for his rage was his drawings. In 1906, he created the first Mickey Mouse drawing; a proto-Mickey grabbing his dick and sneering. It was an attempted caricature of his father, his demon tormentor, drawn as a hideous, clawed rat. Lacking proper artistic supplies, he drew it on a piece of old garbage with rat feces, both of which were more than abundant around his little 2-room shack next to the county dump.

How could he realize at that moment that his literal and metaphorical shit drawing would launch a media empire and billion dollar international corporation that would change the face of western civilization forever?

The all powerful, soulless, consuming beast that is the Walt Disney Company descended upon man like a plague, raping the Good Earth of its resources and corrupting the hearts of all.

And lo, did Gaia, the spirit of the Earth, no longer stood the terrible destruction of our planet. She sent 5 special rings to 5 special young people: Kwame, from Africa, with the power of Earth; from North America, Wheeler, with the power of fire; from the Soviet Union, Linka, with the power of wind; from Asia, Gi, with the power of water, and from South America, Mahttee, with the power of heart. When the 5 powers combined, the summon Earth’s greatest champion – Captain Planet!

And yay, did Captain Planet fall too in the face of opposition, from the Disney Company’s army of robotic pirates wielding the spines of 3rd world sweat shop slaves like mace.

This was all activated by Baron Von Strauss after the Operation: Long Winter mishap, right before the second Clone War, but I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s start at the real beginning.

Comming soon: "History's Mysteries: Walt Disney's Head, Part 2"

Dustin Diamond Dead, 32

2009-07-09T07:40:00.000-07:00

(Santa Barbara, CA) At 7:17 eastern standard time, Dustin Diamond was declared dead at St. Francis Medical Center .

Diamond, the 32 year old stand-up "comedian", former costar of Saved By the Bell, and all around terrible human being, allegedly died in a skirmish involving a transsexual prostitute.

“At this point, we are not revealing any details regarding an on-going investigation, but based on immediate findings of the body, we can deduce that Screech may have been with a tranny-hooker,” says Police Chief John Fitzsimmons.

Universally hated former TV nerd Screech was found in a dumpster behind a Quiznos sandwich shop. “The alley is locally known for being a gathering spot for very mannish black men in drag,” added Fitzsimmons. “I’m like 99% sure he said something to piss one off, probably the fact he played Screech.”

When asked whether Diamond used his credentials as Screech to secure free or discounted sex, Fitzsimmons said the idea was “probable.”

This morning, Quiznos issued a press release.

“Since our inception in 1981, Quiznos has always been a vocal opponent of transsexual prostitutes, murder, and shitty actors. We feel that the circumstances around this event are very unfortunate but are no way related to our commitment to providing you delicious, toasted sandwiches at affordable prices.”

Already the celebrity world is reeling from the joy Screech’s death brings.

Saved By the Bell co-star Tiffani Thiessen responded with the news by saying, “I’m surprised the little turd didn’t die sooner.

“He was always such a colossal fuck-up. See, when we were on the set, everyone else, me, Mark, Dennis, Lark…we were all acting. Dustin doesn’t know how to act. He thought he was in a real high school. We had to ad-lib lines and plot devices to compensate but it made for a very watchable show.” She added, “Fuck him. He's got 'bergers, or is like autistic or someting.”

Mario Lopez and Mark-Paul Gosselaar also spoke candidly about Diamond’s death.

“Summer is the season of death for celebrities. I don’t know what it is but the heat just kills the most random ones,” said Lopez.

“Yeah, but there’s no way you can say Dustin was a celebrity,” corrected Gosselaar.

“That’s true. Yes, that’s very true. He was no Billy Mays.”

“God said he needed a salesman, so he took Billy. God said he needed a singer, so he took Michael Jackson. And then the devil said he needed an asshole, so he took Screech.”

“That’s the perfect name for a demon who tortures the souls of the damned by telling awful Saved By the Bell jokes and then wiping off the shit on his dick on their face.”

“Yeah…”

“Yeah I’m gonna go pray and I suggest you come with me.”

Lopez was referring to the Dustin Diamond self-made sex-tape Screeched aka, Saved By the Smell leaked on the internet in 2006 where Diamond portrays himself giving his fiancé and her best friend a Dirty Sanchez. Whether or not the two women were willing participants remains an item of controversy.

Services for the 32 year old “comedian” have not been planned. (The editor in chief of MarkReissBlog believes it is wise to put the word comedian in quotation marks because nothing of Dustin Diamond’s standup career can be considered funny; nor does it adhere to the legal definition of entertainment.)

Update: Sources indicate that the immediate family of Dustin Diamond has already released ideas for his tombstone. The working model will be a giant 6-foot tall bust of Diamond's head with the epitaph etched into the forehead: "Ask not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee; and ye shall be saved by it."

I'm an Idiot

2009-07-08T07:07:00.000-07:00

Who is dumber?

1) The daughter of my coworker who ran over her cell phone with a lawn mower or

2)Me who deleted 2 full pages of an uncomplete blog update?

Either way you're waiting until tomorrow to read anything substantial. I've got some work to ignore.

Everyone is at Least a Little Bit Gay

2009-07-02T10:11:00.000-07:00

We live in a world populated by 6,706,993,152 people, and every single one of them is at least a little bit gay.

Ignoring those who are actual gays, lesbians, and dudes in Indonesia who were born male but raised female, everyone has some sort of affectation that makes them lighter in the shoes. I’d include a link here but I don’t need a search of “Indonesian Transsexuals” showing up at my work’s IT department.

All women, half the Earth’s population, are done. Boom. Simply by virtue of the fact they are women, they are slightly gay. Not like, “they act like gay men” (or vice versa) gay. I mean that it is permissible for two women folk to get all close and shit. Rubbin’ on each other. Smellin’ they hair ‘n’ shit. Two quick anecdotes:

One time in college, (I should end my story right there), two female friends came up to me drunk and asked if I would pay them 20 dollars to make out with each other. Please. It’s not like they were strapped for cash; they were strapped for reasons to make out and not look gay. I say go for it. Revel in it. In front of their boyfriends no less. The second anecdote is like the first except they didn’t try to extort money out of me or even tell me they were going to do it. They just did. And it was cool. I guess.

Now for the guys. Europe is also done. I could go on and on about the culture, prep school for boys, the French, etc. But the fact of the matter is that everyone from the fey-est queef waif of a slave in a Parisian S&M club to the roughest rough-neck ex-Soviet meat head homophobe, everyone in the motherland listens to the faggiest, faggy techno music ever. And they dance to it. Willingly, like, with each other.

(I’d like to pause for a moment and state that I’m not writing this because the Bruno movie is coming out in a week. That is purely coincidental).

The Middle East is surprisingly gay. Arab culture stresses that women dress like little non-sexual sand ninjas while the men greet each other with cheek kisses. Hand holding is encouraged. So is plucking your eyebrows. And although I’ve never actually been there, I hear billboards advertise with these big muscled, speedo-clad oily Europeans selling shit like baby oil or something. That whole region of the world looks as if those Queer Eye guys, if that fucking show is even still around, took a NYC taxi fleet garage and made it look like west Hollywood.

The North American male is a little bit harder to discern, but the results are always the same. If you were ever in a frat, you’re a bit gay. All that brotherhood, professional drinking “bro love” hugging stuff just breeds homosexual undertones. Even the most male bonding experience, eg.; gang-banging some passed out freshmen chick, is pretty gay. I mean, it’s a bunch of naked dudes in a room. The male to female ratio is way out of line. Plus, they’re all able to keep it up after looking at Fat Chad’s micro-penis.

If you own a gun you don’t necessarily have a small penis. Yes, a gun is a cock-substitute, but not necessarily for your own. Ever get the urge to just hold one?

Here’s how I’m gay: I actively visit the site Cute Overload. Every day, I gotsta get my cute animal fix. Common. Who cannot honestly like this:

That is a kitten with balloons tied to it and I think it’s adorable and if you have a problem with that I will chop your fucking head off you fucking shit fuck ass.

The only thing I can think of that’s not gay is when you fill out income tax/finance forms alone in a room with no windows because that is the most asexual, libido destroying activity in the world.

Dead Month

2009-06-30T06:29:00.000-07:00

Wow, yeah. June. I don't know what happened there. The creative side of my brain decided to completely peace out the month I had jack shit to do at work.

I'll make it up to you's folks.

We've got dead celebrities, movies I haven't seen but probably will, commentary on my own personal shortcomings, and I think an ABC guide to something coming down the pike, so get ready to read stuff that may or may not be based in some form of humor.

Bored broed bored bored bored broed bored bored uninspired do-nothing fuck my head is empty

2009-06-16T11:23:00.001-07:00

I will narrate my thoughts.

I don’t know how to spell “narrate” without spellcheck.

There’s this really awful band called “Gatsby’s American Dream”. Pandora does not have a shit filter (diaper?) for their music. F. Scott Fitzgerald would probably love this band’s shout-out. “Hey! Mr. Fitzgerald! Can you hear us down there in Hell? We love your book so much we’re going to destroy it so no one else could ever possibly love it as much as we do!”

Hank Azaria should do more movies where he plays zany, physical characters. Comparing his role in Birdcage to Run, Fatboy, Run is like comparing a flamboyant, Puerto Rican homosexual to a bland, rich stock broker. OHHHHH SHIIIIIIIIIIT

Crocodiles.

I think if I had to, I could do well in a fight. I’ve been working out once a week for about a week now, and I feel ripped. I used to have the arms of a 12 year old Japanese girl. Now it’s a boy. All I’d need is a rubber band to keep my glasses on and I’m good to go. I’ve always been kind of wimpy. I’ve never even been in a fight. I mean, it’s called “fight or flight”; I have options. But thanks to Animal Planet I’ve discovered a 3rd option: bluffing. For one thing, it might actually work, but if it doesn’t, at least you’re getting your ass kicked for a reason.

Foooooooooood

“Mommy, What’s a Jewish?”

2009-06-11T08:31:00.001-07:00

Kids ask where Jews come from, and their parents answer.

“They are the shadows of midnight. They are unspeakable dark specters that haunt our dreams and spark our imagination. They are romantic yet emotionless. They are powerful and still they are vulnerable. They can be dreadfully scary and viscous, or gentle and kind. They have passionate feelings without emotion. They are ageless, although they each have an age. Jews. Throughout history, these beings have resided alongside man. Myths and folktales from all points of the globe speak of beings that feed on the living. From the Japanese Kasha to the Irish Dearg-Du and the Tlaciques of the Mexican Nahautl Indians and the Arabic Algul they exist. Germany alone has a minimum of three distinct types of Jews. These sinister creatures have permeated virtually every culture and time period, dating as far back as the Ekimmu of ancient Babylon and Assyria.” – Dr. Peter Witherspoon

“Well, a long time ago, an inventor lived in a mansion. He made many things, I suppose. He also created the first Jew. He gave him inside, a heart, a brain, everything. Well, almost everything. You see, the inventor was very old. He died before he got to finish the Jew he invented. So the Jew was left by himself, incomplete and all alone. Of course, he had a name. His name was Edward.” – Kim

“Jews are made when very large stars die. When the star runs out of fuel for nuclear burning in the core it is no longer able to support itself from collapsing under its own weight. The star first collapses and then the outer layers rebound to form a supernovae explosion. What's left at the core is an Neutron Star or a Jew depending on the initial mass of the star. To form a Jew the mass left at the core after the explosion must be more than about 3 times the mass of the Sun. The star for most of its life probably needs to be between 50 to 100 times the mass of the Sun to eventually form a Jew.” – Robert “Bubba” Byerley.

“Since the 1970's, Colombia has been home to some of the most violent and sophisticated human trafficking organizations in the world. What started as a small Jew smuggling business has, in the last thirty years, blossomed into an enormous multi-national Jewish empire. Traffickers today have enough capital under their control to build sophisticated smuggling equipment, such as a high tech submarine that was recently discovered by the Colombian National Police. Colombian Jew traffickers had hired engineering experts from Russia and the United States to help with the design of the submarine, which apparently would have been used to secretly ship large quantities of Jewishness to the United States.” – Carlos Lehder

“During the experimental detonation of a gamma bomb, scientist Bruce Banner rushes to save a teenager who has driven onto the testing field. Pushing the teen, Rick Jones, into a trench, Banner himself is caught in the blast, absorbing massive amounts of radiation. He awakens later in an infirmary, seeming relatively unscathed, but that night transforms into a lumbering green form that breaks through the wall and escapes. A soldier in the ensuing search party dubs the otherwise unidentified creature a “Jew”.” – Stan Lee

“My name is Bill. Yes, My name is Bill. And I'm sitting here on Capitol Hill. Well, it's a long, long journey to the capital city. It's a long, long wait while I'm sitting in committee. But I know I'll be a Jew some day. At least I hope and pray that I will but today I am still just old Bill.” – Bill

Laura Bush is Scary Looking

2009-06-09T07:19:00.001-07:00

Talking about Bush and the straight-out-of-Hell past 8 years is soooooo 2008, but Michelle Obama makes a good point: the first lady is supposed to actually do shit. I don’t care what; just something.

I’m not trying to make this political. This is not a “Republican women are pug-fugly” rant ‘cause Nancy Pelosi looks like she died 2 years ago. This is intended to be a critical evaluation on the role of women in high society and the burden of expectations they bare. And to gawk at Laura Bush’s face.

Before we talk about ol’ LB, I want to postulate that being the Queen of England is the worst fucking job. And before I elaborate on that, I want to state that Michael Jackson is the most miserable person on the planet (fact). A lonely, isolated life is what is thrust upon beautiful, regal women like the Queen and Michael Jackson; a price they must pay for being so goddamn famous. They are not so much people as they are delicate, faberge eggs that must be simultaneously adorned by and sheltered from the filthy, unwashed masses. They are basically objects.

(I say being the Queen is the worst job because even though she isn’t sucking dicks for drug money a-la Pretty Woman, she lives her entire life from birth ‘till death in an insulated bubble, 24 hours a day. At least crack whores take breaks and their life of whoring didn’t start until [child molestation joke])

So is the story of Laura Bush. Primped and premed, betrothed to the Bush political dynasty, her job was to 1) stand there, 2) look pretty (emulate her mother-in-law and Nancy Reagan), and 3) churn out a slew of kids. She had 8 years to do shit being married to the most powerful man on the planet and all she did was start a book festival and wear red dresses (symbolizing menstruation or women’s health or something like that). That’s it.

What the fuck else was she to do? Stand around and look spooky. I have nothing left to say about her so I’ll let the photos of her plastic-like face speak for themselves. If I had access to photo editing software, and let’s be honest, the skills to use it, I would create a .gif of several photos of Laura Bush morphing into each other and leave you people shocked at how similar all the pictures are.

My Personal Youtube Stash

2009-06-05T07:15:00.000-07:00

Up until the 1950’s, kids would get up, go out and actually do stuff with their lives. I know. Fucking cave men, am I right? Thank god the 60’s rolled around, where they would do drugs all day instead. Then in the 70’s they would do drugs all day AND listen to music. The 80’s maxim was “get high and watch music videos!” (and the DOC shifted from weed to coke). And the 90’s were pretty much the same as the 80’s except it was heroin and the music videos were waaaaaaay shittier. Oh the times, they are a changin’.

Everyone these days knows of some quirky little video and just loves to share it with their unknowing friends. Being the one who pops a friend’s eye cherry is almost as good as being the person who actually made the video. I’m going to share with you some of my favorite youtube videos, so sit back, finish swallowing that handful of shrooms, and enjoy.

What do you get when you cross Alice in Wonderland with the Three Six Mafia? A movie the way God intended it to be. The best part is when the Cheshire Cat says “Get to fuckin’…”

This is so old. Everyone and their landlord have seen this video. I don’t care. It’s fantastic.

I joked that you should get high before watching these videos. Yeah, well, for this video that is a serious recommendation. Don’t go crazy. Just write “watch this video” on your hand, go pack a bowl, smoke the bowl, look at your hand and then come back. I’ll be waiting for you.

This video was not meant to be funny. They were aiming for “heartwarming” but somehow smacked the bulls eye on “mildly horrifying”. It’s in Spanish but don’t worry; stupidity transcends language barriers.

Half Life is a pretty popular video game. Alright, cool, I’ve never played it, but tons of people like it just fine. The story behind this video goes like this: a mentally retarded individual loves Half Life. He decides to write is own fan-fic. On top of reading like a 2nd grader wrote it, the script is filled with so many continuity, grammar and spelling errors it was deemed “impossible” to animate. Then along came a guy who had access to open-source animation skills and a whole lot of time on his hands…

I’d buy his artwork.

And finally we have the gayest thing on earth. No lie. Please watch it.

“Let’s do the fork in the garbage disposal.” Jesus Christ.

Movin’ Pictures: Up

2009-06-03T07:51:00.000-07:00

Here’s my beef with Disney, and by extension Pixar.

They are both very, very, very good…at creating ambiance. That is the secret to their brilliance and success. They can create entire worlds that are nothing more than pallets of mood and memory designed to invoke deep seeded emotions within you. If you want to know what I mean, go to Disney Land. Every ride is designed with that in mind. On the Pirates of the Caribbean, you really are on a pirate ship circa 1790 and with it comes all the adventure. On the Briar Rabbit Splash Mountain ride, you step into the antebellum south and the beauty of nature. Their movies reflect broader tones, such as love, adventure, bravery and innocence.

On the other hand, Disney and Pixar can kiss my ass because they are a multi-billion, multi-national conglomerate rivaling oil companies who really couldn’t give a flying fuck if one of the fat, mouth-breathing troglodytes they deviously pander to gets run over by a bus in the parking lot of a theatre or Disney theme park. But what really gets me is after I see one of their movies (Up is good, by the way), after they spend an hour and a half pumping me full of thoughts of beauty and awe directed towards the world we live in, I have to go outside and face the fucking reality that I’m a bitter, mean spirited asshole living in a world where at least 4 billion people live below Mexico’s poverty line.

The more I like the movie, the more I look in the mirror and think “…shit..….”

Well, I’m feeling like quite the dickhead right about now.

Up has been garnering rave reviews, and I suppose that’s justified. It’s quirky and terribly sweet, with some humorous bits thrown in there. You can tell Pixar doesn't even have to try anymore. They’ve hit their stride. They know just the right mixtures, the right combinations of voice talent, story telling and visuals (it’d be retarded for me to even try to describe how, *sigh* again, Pixar made a visually terrific film) and can just crank this shit out.

The best part of the movie for me is the first 5 minutes. That’s the flashback to when the old man protagonist Mr. Fredricksen was a kid he met his polar opposite wife over their love of adventure. Then it shows them getting married, having a life, growing old together up until his wife dies. It’s a very classic and heart warming relationship that’s strange to watch in cartoon 3-D form. The only way I can cope with not having something that beautiful and pure in my life is to remind myself that the divorce rate in this country is 51% and that no one has had something like that. Ever. Relationships like that were cooked up in the ‘50’s as propaganda to fight against communists.

There were some problems, and maybe they are related. The first was that it was too short at just 1:36:00. Uh…yeah. [Joke]. The second is that the whole movie, especially the villain, seemed really tacked on. It went “plot, plot, plot, plot, pl-WOAH, crazy blast-from-the-past villain startin’ shit for no real rhyme or reason! Is he crazy? I don’t know! Let’s see where this takes us!” The only reason Charles Muntz (the villain) existed was to show how your heroes can be dicks, then, well, that’s pretty fucking confusing. Then the ending made no sense with Mr. Fredricksen acting as a surrogate father to that fat little Asian Boy Scout kid Russell.

Also, you know the story about the founding Pixar gurus sitting together at a lunch and they busted out the ideas for stuff that became Toy Story, Bugs Life, Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo and Wall-E, right? Those were all premeditated and fit some sort of idea they were aiming for. Up just seems like it was made because they had deadlines on their mortgages (note: all these guys are richer than God so they don’t actually have mortgages).

I give Up 7/10 corgis. Meh, I liked it.

Twiright

2009-06-02T10:12:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I challenged myself to write a fan-fic based on the dubiously popular vampire series Twilight. I didn’t know what I was getting myself into. Seriously; all I knew was that it was a romance story for tween girls who want to be Disney princesses but still have their bad boys too. It’s the same lazy logic that gave the world The Jonas Brothers and X-Treme Churches.

The story is as follows: a mediocre looking girl ironically named Bella moves to a new town and inadvertently uses her bland personality to woo a vampire named Edward, who looks like some blowjob out of an American Eagle catalogue. Edward is a pansy because A) he only drinks animal blood and B) is a super powered entity that’s attracted to girls with zero redeeming qualities. Bad (real) vampires decide to hunt Bella, Edward stops them, and the movie ends with some PG-13 canoodling at the high school prom or some other stupid bullshit cliché. I mean, who cares right? This movie is nothing but recycled bits from 90210 and Are You Afraid of the Dark, so fuck it, throw one more cliché onto the pile. Go hog wild.

I was about to link a youtube clip but then I actually watched some and slipped into a coma. It was a defense mechanism. The screen will bombard your eyes with idiot-waves and your ears with the sounds of cats dying. This will trigger a parasympathetic reaction in your frontal cortex where it will undergo paralysis and eventually atrophy. You will retard yourself.

The fan-fic you are about to read stars the Japanese counterpoints to Bella and Edward: Sakura and Toyota. It is a typical day in biology class, as Sakura and Toyota are lab partners. Their teacher, Sensei Hiroshima, is comically annoyed at their awkward, baby-lamb-on-wobbly-legs romance. They are doing dissections today.

“Students!” shouted Sensei Hiroshima. “Lift surgery knife and slice frog.”

“Yes, sensei!” the class shouted back in perfect unison. They all attacked their specimens except for Sakura and Toyota. They were coyly flirting with each other.

“You cut frog, Toyota. I’m not so good biology student,” said Sakura sheepishly. She longingly stared into Toyota’s creepy albino-like eyes and turned away, covering her burning face with her hands. “Biology class is opportunity for great difficulties in life…” she muttered.

“My hearing dog powerful, Sakura. I’ll exchange mutilation with friendship of beautiful light hearted girl” Toyota said coolly, as he picked up the scalpel and drove it into the frog’s chest.

“Oh Toyota! You are real John Wayne superstar! If-“

“What is this shame?” shouted Sensei Hiroshima. “Sakura! Toyota! Have you finished honor killing of Sgt. Frog? You come to school for studying frog, not for dishonoring me and the friend of a near creature of the age.”

They replied back. “Yes, sensei!” Immediately their work finally began. They worked quietly until it was time to remove the heart. Toyota was about to sever the atria artery when Sakura grabbed his hand.

“Toyota, is this happening? You can’t remove heart of the tiny friend! How can love happen with no hearts?”

“Sakura, frog is dead.”

“But…” Sakura started. “So is Toyota. Toyota is dead! You are dead vampire guy!”

“Sakura! 1000 years of shame on your family! ” shouted Sensei Hiroshima.

They were in real trouble now. As with so many bulimics, Toyota eats when he gets nervous. He licked the blood off the scalpel unconsciously and grimaced at the formaldehyde taste. Hiroshima saw.

“It is you Toyota! You are influencing impetuousness and disgrace. I surely banish you. Leave!”

“The person who makes enemies with me also recruits it. Moreover, do not molest me on the person who knows my character! ”

“Your character is demons…” Hiroshima said through gritted teeth.

“He know!” squeaked Sakura.

“That’s finished! I will kill you good!” Toyota lunged into the air and flew head first towards Sensei Hiroshima, but Hiroshima was quick to respond. He clicked a button on his watch. Immediately a trap door opened beneath him and he slid down a long pipe into the cockpit of his F-16 Gundam fighter Sparkle Death.

“The youth of today are evil and have foolishness. Time…for…KIILLLLLLLLL!!!” And with that Sensei Hiroshima blasted out of his subterranean hanger, taking out half of the school, and engaged Toyota in a free-flying fist fight. It was total vampire vs. robot-plane thing; real heavy on some Matrix Revolutions type shit.

Sakura raced to the edge of what was left of her classroom, clutched her chest and stared up at the duel.

“Toyota! Stop! Being vampire, sun causes you great discomfort! Come back to me forever! I desire your romance!” But it was too late. Toyota flew directly into a sun beam. His skin burst into flames and he fell to earth limp. The fire eventually burnt itself out. With his body fully turned into black ash, he landed on the ground with a powdery thump, ashes scattering to the wind. The only things left of him were his Reeboks.

“Supersized homo jackass,” Sensei Hiroshima’s voice echoed out of Sparkle Death’s outboard speakers.

Sakura was beside herself. She buried her face in her hands and sobbed. A piece of Toyota’s ash was picked up by a current and delivered right next to her ear.

“Sakura,” the ash whispered. “Do not burden yourself with grief. Pieces of me are inside you through contact love bite. I live inside your blood as happy vampire friend.” The ash blew away.

Sakura fell silent. On her surprisingly cold neck she felt the puncture wounds of two fang marks running red with blood. The blossoming of her heightened senses felt like dropping acid; she could see the most insignificant minutia and could smell the blood of everyone around her. She hungered for Hiroshima’s.

“Sensei…the revenge shall be of Toyota!”

Ready to destroy him, Sakura boldly stepped forward!

…into a sunbeam.

She immediately burst into flames and died on the spot as a pile of smoldering ash.

One of Toyota’s ashes whispered to one of Sakura’s. "Stupid retard baby,"

Send me an idea for a blog entry and I’ll make it happen. Forrealz.

June Blog Challenge

2009-06-01T11:15:00.000-07:00

Alright, ya mooks.

I’ll be straight with you guys. Writing this blog is getting tougher and tougher. I’m running out of ideas. There are two, sure-fire ways to jumpstart the rusted-out 1954 Apache truck of a creative center in my brain: drugs and open challenges. I can’t do drugs at work, but I sure as shit can e-harass you. Hell, that’s practically what I get paid to do.

Some challenges are self-imposed Iron Man contests like Jared Stern's “Blog-o-Day in May” thing. F that S. My challenge will go like this:

HIT ME WITH YOUR BEST SHOT

Throw at me whatever random two word idea you have floating around in your cartoon-and-breakfast-cereal-addled mind and I will write a blog article about it that may or may not be based in humor. I’ve written everything from songs, to guides, to movie reviews, to short stories, to a series of name generators.

See this little comment part (down) here? Submit your terrible idea, like a Twilight fan-fic but all the characters are Japanese, down there at the bottom and by tomorrow you’ll be able to read it up on the big screen.

Actually, that’s not a terrible idea at all.

OK. Tomorrow I’m writing that Twilight fan-fic. I’m calling it Twiright.

My Science Fair Project

2009-05-28T10:34:00.000-07:00

Title: Deviancy in Craigslist as Determined by Intelligence

Abstract: It comes as no surprise to anyone that the internet is an open sewer, a chunky blend of sex and horror like a bad Rob Zombie movie but real. It’s hard to just fabricate something so mind-blowingly grotesque as that .gif of that guy who split his penis 4 ways or that one of the guy cutting off a live pig’s head with a chainsaw. No. That shit really happened. The internet is not an art but it certainly mirrors the worst of humanity. Craigslist is the Joe Every-Man’s face of internet depravity. It is the Robin Williams to www.northeastbearticklesexpartymeetngreet.org’s Lenny Bruce (I don’t give a damn if you get that analogy or not). Anyway, Craigslist serves its purpose as being horrible but not so horrible that I need to clear my browse history and shower after surfing its pages. There you can find real people looking for sex among joke posts, bots, and men pretending to be women. And boy are they not afraid of showing you some home-grown porn! There is definitely a geographic component as to what they are willing to show you.

Hypothesis: The less educated a metropolitan area is, the more naked pictures you’ll find on craigslist

Elaboration: People with a higher intelligence have either developed a more acute sense of shame or a credible job where naked pictures floating around on the internet are a liability.

Experimentation: According to a bizjournals.com article that I’m not going to cite, the two smartest cities in America are Seattle and Washington D.C. based on percentages of people who hold advanced degrees and those who passed the “Hey you, eat this thing!” test. The two dumbest are Miami and Santa Ana. This will make for an easy comparison of blah blah blah blah blah….

I’ll do a quick scour through each city’s Casual Encounters page on Craigslist; the first 100 ads with photos. Gays and lesbians have no shame, so trying to quantify their naked pictures is like counting sand one grain at a time. I’m not a fucking super computer, here. And fuck looking at “Men seeking Women”. Besides, it’s way harder to get a straight woman to post her naughty bits online. It’s a challenge. She has to be a huge dullard to not see the inherent creepiness of that.

There are a lot of fake ads on Craigslist. The way you can tell is if the person in question is ugly. Are they ugly? Yes? Then it’s real. I will only count the real photos. I’m sorry, but the naked photo of Tiffany Sparxxx does not count because A) she didn’t post that herself and B) she doesn’t live in Seattle.

Data Collection:

Seattle – 3 homegrown pics per 100
D.C. – 5 homegrown pics per 100
Santa Ana – 15 homegrown pics per 100
Miami – 77 homegrown pics per 100

Data Analysis: Damn there are a lot of naked Cuban moms in Miami. It’s like Castro was having a total liquidation sale down there at the Desperate Mom Store. Jesus. Speaking of which, every single one of them had Mr. Jesus around their neck. AND ONLY DUMB PEOPLE BELIVE IN JESUS AMIRITE?! YEAH!!!! *high fives room*

Conclusion: Looks like I was right. In your faces, you crybaby sociologists! I am the best! I am the greatest social commentator since Limbaugh! The gays want to convert your children to work as slaves in their sex dungeons! Feminists were created by the liberal Jew-cabals of the world to eliminate dinner time! Black people smell funny!

Feeeeeeeeeeeed……………meeeeeeeeeeeee…..

Black Presidents

2009-05-27T10:48:00.001-07:00

It MUST be the future. We have a black man running the free world. Even though I want to say “oh this is completely unexpected; I NEVER thought I’d live to see the day”, I can’t. Actually, I’ve seen it all before. Several times, in fact. It’s like in 1969 when we put a man on the moon with less technology than a calculator, people lost their shit. “Oh groovy man; the Jet-Age! How futuristic! Trippy.” Uh, sorry to harsh your buzz dude, but Jules Verne predicted nearly the exact same shit happening 100 years prior (3 men + huge explosion + Florida launch pad = moon landing).

It’s weird, but the farther back in time you look, the further into the future you see. And it seems there’s always been a depiction of a black president. So, is having one really a new concept? Is it really that revolutionary? Sorta.

Barack Hussein Obama
For those of you in-the-know, Barack Hussein Obama, the current and first black president of these United States, has been tearing ass lately. He just nominated the first Latino/third woman to SCOTUS and…some other stuff. It doesn’t matter what he’s doing as president for the sake of this article. Dude is a half white, Pakistani Muslim from Indonesia/Africa with a Chinese sister. And Rush Limbaugh says he’s the greatest living example of a reverse racist. The best part is that you know President Obama hears all this and just goes “Pfffthththth” while doing the Jacking Off gesture.

David Palmer
Democratic President David Palmer, doin’ his thang, helpin’ Jack Bower save the free world from tear-ists ‘n’ shit. I watched my first episode of 24 and, now this is probably racist on my part. I didn’t see the leader of the free world in David Palmer. I saw the guy who’s trying to get me to switch my car insurance over to All State. But I finished the episode and became a true believer. Oh, David Palmer. I know your stance. I’m always in good hands when you’re president.

Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho
Words…should have…sent…a poet…

Lindberg
The president in The 5th Element is such a minor role that the writers didn’t bother giving him a first name. Shit, they didn’t even bother giving him a last name that made sense. Lindberg? I’m pretty sure there aren’t any Space Blacks immigrating from neo-Germany to the 77 United States of America. Whatever. There are no such thing as small roles, and at least he got to see Bruce Willis and Milla Jovovich make whoopie in a tube.

101

2009-05-22T10:39:00.000-07:00

National Public Radio is really good at taking a simple concept and then dissecting, analyzing, and breaking it down to the point of oblivion. The concept then loses all meaning and you never ever want hear about it again, much less sit through another 2 hour long pain-marathon of “what is the meaning of zero?” because SOMEONE left the door to your car unlocked (CHRISTINE) and some vagrant accidently kicked the center consol as he tried to steal your super rare and valuable half-empty can of Pringles so now the radio is permanently stuck on NPR. It’s a common phenomenon. You can hit your head so hard you become retarded. Radios work the same way. For my 101st blog entry I thought I would explore the personal meanings the number 101 holds for me because, well, it’s a dumb idea and I hate all of you. In my last semester of college, I was basically done with my major. All I needed to take were some filler classes for credits, so I took two 101 classes; some sort of intro to biology and one enigmatically called “American Society”.

I got a fucking C in bio. HOW?! Well, for one, there was no science in the class. None. Ok, like, I’m a pretty liberal guy. I’m all for saving the whales, give a hoot; don’t pollute, all that jazz. My professor was such a bleeding heart, faux hippy, bearded granola-munching commie pinko leftist that he made me feel like John Wayne voting for Regan on a horse, all punching the hole in my voting card by shooting it with my .45. It was kind of hard to pay attention to all of the “Why the fishing industry has completely fucked the planet” articles which our tests were based off of.

My American Society class was pretty cool. Little work, easy tests and I took that shit pass/fail. When our final rolled around, we were given our essay questions a week ahead of time. How easy is that? So easy that I didn’t even write them. I traced an outline of my hand and turned it into a turkey. I was done in 2 minutes. Passed.

I remember watching 101 Dalmatians as a kid and thinking what a dumb movie it was. First, I was bummed that all the dogs did not come from the same litter. They were adopted. Pfffffff whatever. That one female dog gave birth to like 25 puppies as a nod to the fertility branch of the pharmaceutical industry which helps finance Disney. And then there was that bitch Cruella De Vil. Her thing was that she wanted to kill the puppies and turn them into a coat. Uh, hey slag, that shit would look horrible all Frankensteined together like that. A pelt needs congruency. It needs to be made from one giant animal. What New Jersey based fashion school did you flunk out of? Imbecile.

Obama’s first 100 days were being talked about by political sophists since day 3. After it came and went, we had to face reality and know that day 101 for Obama would be no different than day 33, 79, 666, or 1024.

You asked me once, what was in Room 101. I told you that you already knew the answer. Everyone knows it. The thing that is in Room 101 is the worst thing in the world. Under the spreading Chestnut tree I sold you and you sold me, there lie they and here lie we under the spreading Chestnut tree.

Gangbangin’ 101 is the best Snoop Dog song, ever.

The T-800 Model 101 is the end result of a bunch of confusion and fanboy bullshit born from the Terminator series. Let me explain. See, in Terminator 2 and Terminator 3, Schwartzenwhatever’s character is referred to as the Cyberdyne Systems Model 101 and T-101 respectively. BUT, in Salvation, T2 Extreme Edition DVD and the Terminator 2 video game, he’s called the 800 series. They use T-800 and T-850 to refer to the same character (what). So yadda yadda, some more detective stuff in DVD commentaries, interviews, a stork comes and visits, Santa Claus…and now the unofficially but widely recognized nomenclature is the T-800 Model 101 to describe the Governor. And that’s how bills are made in California.

To Serve and Protect While Impractical

2009-05-21T08:34:00.000-07:00

I don’t know what’s to blame these days for the slew of lazy cops the states’ been churning out. Maybe lazy is the wrong word to use. Is there a single word that encompasses the mentality of wanting to pilot recreational vehicles and have a fun-in-the-sun good ol’ time instead of your job which is to protect society against thieves, murderers and rapists so guess what you disguise as fucking police work? “Effete”?

The following are all different types of police officers, sworn to serve and protect, who have chosen a means of transportation that causes more problems than they solve. Their main problem is namely, how to do you detain a perp IF you even manage to catch him (it’s never a her). No one has even bothered to point out that hey, you’re not solving crime; you’re just being a self-indulgent jackass wasting time and energy on my dime. These are all real I swear to God.

Motorcycle Cops
To be fair, if I was a cop I would dream of being one of these until, in a ceremony held at the community center in front of the mayor, city council and the town elders, Commissioner Gordon hands me a motorcycle and says “go get ‘em, son!” But the job is limited. The only job a Hog-Pig can do is tag speeders. That’s it. But riddle me this: what happens when drivers stop being polite and start acting real? It’s not like you can pull a PIT maneuver on a Cadillac Escalade with a vehicle that weighs about as much as a really really fat person. Being a motorcycle cop would be awesome as shit if you could work like you’re life is the game Road Rash. But noooooo. This “society” we “agreed” to live in has a “social contract” and we “can’t” be “dicks” like that.

Mounted Division
Horses are cool dudes. They can give off and sense powerful vibes. Like, I used to get blitzed and wander around Colonial Williamsburg at night when I went to college. They kept the horses out in fenced-off enclosures so without the hustle and bustle of a million 9-year old tourists; it was just me and the horses. They’d be all “aw Jesus man. This guy is so high he could shit off the moon right now. Better go let him pet me. If I was his mom I’d make him a sandwich. Poor guy.” And that’s cool. I truly believe if criminals could pet a horse before their crimes, they’d never get around to committing those crimes; their hearts would be too full of warm horsey fuzzies. Unfortunately with the mounted division, you run into the same problems as the motorcycle cop except now you need to deal with your motorcycle pooping when it walks. Don’t those things need to wear diapers? And what if a perp runs into a building? It’s not like there are keys to take out of your horse when you park it. Good luck not having that shit stolen.

Bike Cops
Who among us hasn’t seen these short-shorts wearing recreationalists and thought out loud “PPPPFFFFFFFFFFFF!” Someone needs to tell them that the Jim Dangle character on Reno 911 is a character of a gay bike cop and should not be interpreted as a blueprint for effective law enforcement.

Segway Cops
And you thought bike cops were bad. These guys have to be live performance artists or Andy Kaufman whatever. They cannot be real. It’s as if someone took a bike cop, rolled it around in powdered sugar and then neutered it. Ok, see, cops are supposed to be intimidating signs of authority. It is literally impossible to look tough on an 8mph moving podium especially when Segway cops are required to wear helmets! They are police officers, not 5 year olds. Seriously, what a fucking waste. What a fucking joke.

Powered Parachute Cops

What do you get when you cross a giant fan, a go-kart, a parachute and redneck ingenuity? Why, just the best darn tool for cheap, lazy law enforcement that’s what! Cops are starting to use what is essentially a toy tourists pay $50 in Cancun after their 6th mojito, in lieu of helicopters. Yeah, it’s their job to patrol the skies and take out rogue pterodactyls or whatever, but their main job is to keep an eye on fleeing criminals, and then radio ground forces with important information. Right well, I know for a fact that I have nothing in my arsenal that can take out a helicopter, but I’m pretty sure an easily accessible hunting rifle is all I need to end Mr. I-Have-Absolutely-Zero-Protection-From-Man-Nature-Or-God-Tattle-Tale-In-The-Sky.

P.S. Don't shoot cops or commit crimes. Be good.

Jackie Chan Adventures

2009-05-19T10:40:00.001-07:00

Remember that old cartoon show? It was on the air from 2000 to 2005, mainly on Kids WB. What a golden show in a golden era. Just imagine all the historic things that went on in that period: 9/11, Operation Red Dawn, Joe Strummer dying, Subway’s 5-Dollar Foot-Longs. I never experienced any of those things. I just found out about all that stuff. I was too busy watching Jackie Chan Adventures.

In an effort to stop being bored at work, I decided to pick an old cartoon from way back in the day and overload on its respective youtube channel. After a long selection process, I narrowed my choice down to either Jackie Chan Adventures or Muppet Babies. But what to pick? I flipped a coin. It landed on tails. I realized that selection process was retarded, so I picked the cartoon that would give me the least dirty looks if someone at work caught me watching it (“Why are you watching a cartoon about monsters in diapers?”)

Jackie Chan Adventures is a cartoon where Jackie Chan is a young, not-ugly archeologist who speaks English. In ways he is actually similar to his real counterpart, they are both big on the martial arts stuff. The series revolves around Jackie Chan, his niece Jade, and his uncle Uncle as they battle ancient demons, ninja armies, international crime syndicates, magic, and latent racism. They don’t always win.

Magic plays a major role in the series (like in Jackie Chan’s real life). For the most part, the gist of the show is that the heroes scour the globe searching for things called Talismans, magical octagonal rocks each bestowed with an animal power of the Chinese Zodiac. For example, the Rooster Talisman gives you the power of flight since roosters totally fly. The Sheep Talisman gives you the power to astral project into people’s dreams since the writers are HUGE dorks and like obvious jokes. And the Pig Talisman gives you laser eyes because why the fuck not?

Epiphany:

I am sitting at my work computer. I’m supposed to be working right now. Instead I’m watching old racist cartoons meant for children and writing about it.

Is this really where my life has taken me? I am a healthy, red blooded, free 22 year old man! I should be out there, there in the real world, having my own adventures! Discovering my own magic! Taking chances, making mistakes, getting messy! What the fuck am I surrounded by? What is this gray material that comprises my cubical cell walls? Broken dreams? Behind me is a window to the glorious world outside, just waiting for me…

Man was not meant to housed, no, caged like this. We are creatures of desire, of passion, of fire. To deny our essence is to be dead inside. To wander the earth as mere ghosts of our spirited past, echoes of jubilation that ran free in glorious Eden. Here we are all slaves to the Three Masters of Money, Want, and Time.

The problems we face as a species arise from agriculture sustenance, exacerbated by the Industrial Revolution, waxing forth until the enormity of suffering and pain destroys us all! My friends, this is the source of social stratification, coercion and alienation! This is the evil which lurks in the hearts of men! We must strike now while the pistol remains cocked! Cut the head of the snake known as Civilization and watch it writhe in its blood and end-trails. I call upon you all to de-industrialize, abolish the division of labor, end specialization, and abandon large scale technologies! Take action now! Go out and throw a brick into a Starbucks! Burn your boss’ car! Destroy something beautiful…

The apocalypse is finished, today it is the precession of the neutral, of forms of the neutral and of indifference…all that remains, is the fascination for desertlike and indifferent forms, for the very operation of the system that annihilates us. Now, fascination (in contrast to seduction, which was attached to appearances, and to dialectical reason, which was attached to meaning) is a nihilistic passion par excellence, it is the passion proper to the mode of disappearance. We are fascinated by all forms of disappearance, of our disappearance. Melancholic and fascinated, such is our general situation in an era of involuntary transparency

Hitchhiker’s Guide to Central Pennsylvania

2009-05-18T11:05:00.000-07:00

Although it might not appear to be so to the untrained laymen eye, central Pennsylvania is a microcosm for heartland America. And because the heartland is the most important part of any country or person, central Pennsylvania is quite possibly the physical manifestation of America (besides the actual America). And out of all the countries God put on this planet, America is the most important and least-smelly one, so Cen-Penn is pretty much the world incarnate. And because the bible tells us so, we are the happy little nougat-y center of the universe. Indeed, central Pennsylvania is the totality of existence; the alpha and the omega.

Now the important question: how do I get the F out of here?

Super Secret Blog Spy Message!
(Here’s a little how-to on the what-to-dos-and-don’t-do should you find yourself stuck in this how-do-you-do poo-poo voodoo skip-to-my-lou skinamarinkidink-skinamarinkido human zoo)

Hitchhiker’s Guide to Central Pennsylvania
There’s a saying about Pennsylvania: They’ve got Philadelphia in the east, Pittsburgh in the west, and in the middle is Alabama. Take comfort in the fact that when hitchhiking, your chances of being picked up by either an honest-to-God redneck or an Amish buggy driver are 50-50 regardless of your proximity to Amish country. Take a chance, stick your thumb out and hop on it. You will either be treated to a lengthy story about the ’05 and ’08 Steelers or no story at all.

Etiquette is as follows. First find a deserted piece of shit of a road. You won’t have to look far. Thumb down a ride and tell them were you want to go. If you say “anywhere but here” or “just get me out of the state” the driver is then protected under Pennsylvania state laws from being accused of assault. He can legally beat your ass. Just try to be specific. Be like, “Yeah, take to that gay-bar in Scranton, you know what I’m talking about. The Man Hole. Yeah that’s right.” If you get beat up then at least it’s a no-no.

The Restaurant at the End of I-79
Interstate 79 runs the back spine of the state and then unceremoniously dies at Erie, Pennsylvania. You may have heard about it’s relevance in the news recently; it is ranked the 55th most deadly highway in the country. Some people say it’s because of all the drunks on the road. Others say it’s the Jersey Devil’s fault. I like to think it’s because of the highway herself. Once you start heading north, you’re hypnotically drawn towards oblivion. Your only options are to crash your car into one of the three great bastions of void: Lake Erie, western New York, or Ohio.

At the end of I-79 is a restaurant. It’s called Zero’s and its open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. It is inhabited by a cadre of spooky trucker patrons, wait staff, and yokels, (figurative) ghosts of their formal selves, like the whole thing is a scene from a Tennessee Williams play if it was directed by Tim Burton. They are not dead. They are survivors. They are the few who stared directly into the quantum singularity of nullity, went past the event horizon and lived to talk about it. They will tell you to order the cherry pie.

I have no fucking clue what that’s supposed to mean. I’m just saying, these guys’ brains are seriously fried or they’ve acquired some sort of super sentience through this exposure and it just seems like their brains are sizzling bacon. Either way, you don’t fuck with people like that. Just order the pie.

Life, the Road, and Um, Like Everything
So um, like, apparently? You gotta walk down some roads…before you can be called a man? And chickens cross roads? So like, um…uh….we’re all like these chickens crossing roads…? And like, the more roads you cross, um, the more you’re a man? Like it’s a man thing? Yeah, and uh, um, it’s like spiritual, man. Aaaaaaaaaand, you gotta man-up and cross the road. It’s like, everything is the road and…the road is everything. Right? Uhhh…ummmm……So uh, when you’re like walking down “that road of life,” like, don’t be a faggot.

Dust in the wind, man.

So Long, and Thanks for Nothing
A thousand thank you’s, m’Lord. How gracious of you to permit me, a humble traveler, stowage in your mechanical vessel for 10 miles. I’m so glad you didn’t over-burden your heart by driving me to my actual destination which was where you were going to fucking anyway. No, we wouldn’t want that, would we? You gotta keep that extra seat open for some skanky road-head you’ll pick up along the way to Trenton, so shit, thanks for what little you did give me. I know it was tough. If you catch a homeless person begging on the street, don’t shill out more than 35 cents for him. You’ll crush him under the weight of your enormous generosity. Hey, man. Don’t worry that you dropped me off in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night. It’s cool. Totally chill. I always wanted to know what Satan actually looked like. I’ll just crash in that coal mine tonight.

P.S. suck my ass, your ’90 Honda Civic smells like stale McDonalds.

Mostly Harmless?
A quintessential riddle for all hitchhikers: will the hitchhiker or the hitchhike-ie be murdered first? We’ve all seen The Hitcher. Some sketch guy travels the roads, get’s picked up by a car full of sexy teenagers who are really in their late 20’s, and he kills them all with an axe. And we’ve all seen the ending of House of a Thousand Corpses where after being the sole survivor of Dr. Satan’s said house of 1000 dead bodies, some half naked chick gets picked up by clown named Captain Spaulding and is promptly taken back to the house. Presumably to die. Point is all that stuff, crazy murdering hitchhikers and crazy murdering clowns who pick up hitchhikers, exists in central Pennsylvania.

But come ON. That’s 2 guys in a state of, what, like 12.5 million people? And let’s assume not everyone in the state hitchhikes or gives rides like that. Say, 1000 people in the whole state. Let’s do a really conservative estimate because it’s totally way more than that. That’s 0.2% chance of dying. That means you have a 99.8% of living (winning). Those odds are great. Shit are you kidding me, those odds are fantastic! You WISH you could have odds like that in Vegas. You probably won’t be brutally murdered so don’t be such pussies.

And Another Final Thing…
You need to walk a fine line when it comes to wardrobe. It needs to be durable, yet comfortable. Don’t come off as too hardened, or something that screams “take advantage of me.” Don’t wear any sports stuff: Pittsburgh fans hate Philly and vice versa, and you’re stuck in the middle. I suggest a Canadian tuxedo with a pair of comfortable boots lined with some of those Dr. Shoals pads. And maybe a musical instrument, even if you don’t play it (lie and say its broken when they ask).

Drink from the Septic Tank of Defeat

2009-05-14T06:30:00.000-07:00

Here’s an analogy (or metaphor or whatever):

When you imagine drinking from the chalice of victory, what does that look like? I see the happiest man on earth, drinking, no, pouring, liquid glory all over his face. It’s bright gold, almost glowing. A silky concoction that’s a cross between liquid butter and milk. It goes down smoother than water and tastes a little like a steak made from a cow that Leonardo da Vinci personally slaughtered. And brandy. All from one of those garish, diamond-encrusted pimp cups a-la Lil’ John that were popular for like 3 seconds. It’s a quick drink.

But what does losing look like?

I see a man being handed a shovel and told to dig somewhere slightly off-site from an Arkansas trailer park. He’s digging up the park’s big 2,000 gallon septic tank. Once unearthed, he is instructed to drink liquefied redneck shit until it’s empty. For the entire duration of this torture, the shit will stay at a consistent luke-warm 90 degrees Fahrenheit. It’s too heavy to lift and chug, so this man has to lay belly down on the ground and scoop raw shit directly from the tank to his mouth using his hand. It takes a long, long time to finish.

If this man lost with honor, he gets to use a dirty old Dale Earnhardt plastic cup instead of his hand.

The Washington Capitals are chowin’ down at the ol’ septic trough cup-less right now. And they've only got about 6 months to finish and put it behind them before we start this thing all over again.

Fuck did they ever lose. They lost big. On home ice. In the most important game of their lives. I’ve never seen a hockey team down 5 goals before (for my Canada-hating readers out there, most games are decided by 1, maybe 2 goals). The final score was 6-2 in favor of the smelly asshole Pittsburgh Penguins.

Being accustomed to choking is a thing every D.C. sports fan must condition themselves to, because it happens allllllllllllll the fuckinnnnnnnnnnn’ time.

Fight Night

2009-05-13T10:17:00.000-07:00

Are you ready…for some HARD HITTING, BONE CRUNCHING, FACE MELTING, (hypothetical) MATCH-UPS?! Oh YEEEEEAAAAAAH!!! That’s what I’m talking about! If your soul has a seat belt then you better buckle up, Bessie May, because I’m about to drive this car made out of nonsense into a brick wall made out of testosterone and some brick!

The rules are simple. I pair up two legendary fighters in an arena of my choosing. Each fight adheres to rules 3, 4, 5, 7, and 8 of Fight Club. I will use logic to decide who wins based on logic which I will logically ‘splain. Let’s get it on!

Fight 1: Batman vs. Spiderman
Arena: New York City
Winner: Batman
At a first glance, you’d probably think of picking Spidey for the win. He outclasses Bats in speed, strength and stamina, plus he’s got that spidey sense thing, AND he can climb walls AND he’s a smart guy. But it’s that last part that does Peter Parker in. See, he’s book smart. Batman is not only 10x as book smart, he’s got street smarts, and the street he lives on is “How to Completely Fuck Up a Meta-Human’s Shit Ave.” Dude can take out MF Superman if need be. All it takes is one well-placed, tricky batarang to the face and Spiderman’s down for the count, and Batman’s got the dexterity to pull it off.

Fight 2: Joe vs. The Volcano
Arena: The Volcano
Winner: Joe (by default)
Tom Hanks, you asshole. Why can’t you ever play a bad guy in any of your movies? *sigh/grunt*. I’ll spare you the details of this horrible 1990’s wank-fest of a movie, but all you need to know is that Tom Hanks voluntarily jumps into a volcano with Meg Ryan. The volcano erupts, blowing them into the ocean unscathed (impossible). The volcano then sinks into the ocean (more impossible). I assume that since Abe Vigoda was also on the volcano, he dies as well (super impossible: Abe Vigoda cannot be killed without the use of sorcery). Logically the Volcano should have won. No, effin’, shit. But you cannot argue with the results of the movie, written by some Hollywood suit between hours 4 and 6 of a coke bender.

Fight 3: Coke vs. Pepsi
Arena: My stomach
Winner: Pepsi
Hey, I don’t care if Coca-Cola is one of the 3 trigrams in the pillar of evil American capitalism (the other two being McDonalds and Wal-Mart). Pepsi, tastes, better. Done. Both of their advertising departments suck. Pepsi and Coke can take Justin Timberlake and Santa and shove it up their respective asses. Coke should just work on making a product that doesn’t taste like Atlanta hick spittle.

Main Event: Washington Capitals vs. Pittsburgh Penguins
Arena: Verizon Center
Winner: Stay tuned tonight because this is going to be epic. C-A-P-S CAPS CAPS CAPS! I hope Ovechkin caves Sidney Crosby’s face in.

The Scotsman, The Blue Collar Man, and Dick Cheney

2009-05-11T08:19:00.000-07:00

(To the tune of "The Times They Are A-Changin' by Bob Dylan)

Three men traveled long
From far far away
To ask a blind shaman
What creatures they display
Their spirit animals
This Indian will say
They must know
To make themselves happy
Sight beyond sight is
What they’ll see today
Because they know, their lives are crappy

The Scotsman stepped up
And said “nutin’ ta loose!”
The shaman said “great!
Your animal’s the goose!
You’re ornery, loud,
And prone to abuse
When you drink with your wife
You get slappy
Now get out of here
Before you drop a huge deuce
Because you know, your life is crappy”

The blue collar man
Was just a bit timid
And repulsed to find out
That inside he’s a squid
Spineless and gray
Screwed by takeover bids
His story is sad
And sappy
“I never wanted this
When I was a kid!”
Because now, his life is crappy

Dick was expecting
To be a lame duck
But shocked to learn
He’s bacterial muck
A parasite disease
Spreading horrible luck
A cancer on Earth
Mr. Cheney
An epiphany this grand
He let out a “FUCK!”
And now he knows, his life is crappy

And they all knooow, their lives are, craaaaaaaaaaaaa-ppy

Bitch Squad

2009-05-07T08:16:00.000-07:00

Have you seen my dog Oskar yet? He’s a 1 year old Great Dane and he’s amazing. Sure, the sight of a 140lb dog contorting himself into a sleeping position where his head rests on top of his turgid nutsack is gross as hell (albeit impressive), he’s still a sweetums.

Because of his size and cuddly disposition, my 10 year old neighbor said “He’s like a cross between a bunny and a horse! A Bun-orse. A borse!” As she tried to combine the two words I was like, “No, he’s a horny.” Smooth.

There’s this crazy lady who lives in my neighborhood. Like straight up Loony Toons, cuckoo la banza nuts. She love’s my dog. I mean, loves, my dog. I’m really hesitant to say “oh well this lonely pile of sad just needs to get laid” because seriously, I am concerned that she would try to fuck my dog. No I am not being cynical. No I am not exaggerating.

A typical “conversation” with this very, very creepy lady is full of inappropriate words and touching. I put conversation in quotation marks because in a, let’s say 5 minute, interaction with her she will say maybe 1 thing directly to me.

I’ll be walking my dog down the street, plastic bag on my hand, waiting to pick up a duce, and all of a sudden I’ll hear a loud, piercing “Hiiiiiiii boyfriend!!!” I don’t think this woman has a ring on.

It’s her, the one that constantly refers to herself as “Oskar’s girlfriend”. Iiiick. Then she’ll bend down, pucker her lips so my dog will lick them, rub all over him and I’m pretty sure I once saw her cop a feel of his junk. Dude. It’s a dog. Not even your dog. It’s my fucking dog, and I’m standing like right in front of you.

Talking to this woman is impossible. Even if you ask direct questions she’ll do that stupid baby-voiced vicarious puppet thing through the dog. I’ll be like “so nice day huh?” and she’ll be all (again, in a baby voice) “Oskar thinks is going to wain day. The clouds ahw dawk and stoh-mi. Yes dey ahw. Yes dey ahw! Who’s my boyfriend? Who’s my boyfriend?! *tries to make out with my dog in front of me*”

Ew, sick. I seriously gagged typing that up. For real.

I gotta start one of those neighborhood watch things but instead of outing pedophiles we go after nutty spinsters that would molest a dog. I’m thinking it’ll be called Bitch Squad and the tools of the trade would be stun guns, net guns, and the Holy Bible. We would travel around in a van with giant “No Means No – BITCH SQUAD” written on the side in red Veranda letters. The crew would be me, the self-righteous leader of the operation with a personal score to settle and a devil-may-care attitude. Then there’s Jones, an ex-dog catcher who’s trying to go straight in this dog-eat-dog world. And finally that Dog Whisperer guy Caesar Millan so he can consult the dogs and see if they were inappropriately touched, all Pet Psychic-ish. BITCH SQUAD will be appearing on CBS’s Fall 2009 lineup after new episodes of CSI: Milwaukee

(Note: for the sake of my dog's privacy, the dog pictured above is not Oskar)

The ABC’s of Stand Up, Part 3

2009-05-06T10:56:00.000-07:00

Road Gigs
What would you say if I told you driving half way across the country to Bum-Fuck Nowhere, Illinois to MC a sports bar comedy show for a bunch of judgmental rednecks all for $25 is what I’m shooting for? I already know what you’re going to say and you can “kiss my grits”. You might fancy yourself a worldly traveler for backpacking through Europe or Spring Breaking the hell out of Cancun but try becoming the culture of your foreign destination, just for one night. I’m just glad to get the fiz-uuuuuuuck out of the ‘burbs.

Silence
One of the best pieces of advice I’ve ever received (and continue to routinely neglect) is “enjoy the silence on stage”. The problem a lot of new comics have is that when they go up, they are so nervous that they rapid barf their rehearsed set into the mic and then immediately retreat off stage. Dude, slow down. Relax. Find some awkward pauses and sit on them. They might even turn out funny.

“Tell me a joke!”
I hate telling people, especially co-workers, that I do stand up. The first thing they want is for you to tell them a joke. “Tell me a joke!” Actually it doesn’t work like that. See, stand up is- “No common I bet you’re really funny tell me a joke!” Dude, I’m just sitting here trying to eat my breakfast burrito- “Well you told Jessica a joke!” No I didn’t. “Yes you did! You went over to her, told her a joke and then you guys laughed!” Well it wasn’t a joke from my routine. We were actually making fun of y-…Bush.

Sean Gabbert has a really funny bit about this. “Tell me a joke!” Alright. A man walks into a bar…I make $25,000 a year. Knock knock? I don’t have health insurance. Wakka Wakka (It’s better when he performs it. See? That is exactly why this shit doesn’t work)

Unintentionally Funny
Hey, there’s nothing wrong with that. Fall on the floor and find $20 why don’t you? Go with it.

Videos
Back in ancient times (re: 1989), if you wanted to get in a new room they’d ask you to make a tape and send it in. Like, tape tape. VHS. Electronic images and sounds recorded on strips of magnetic tape and housed in a cassette. Jesus, grandpa. Talk about freaking cave people. Then somewhere in the 2000’s that switched over to DVD’s for like, a month before bookers were just like “email me your best 8 minutes doood I’m streaming Heroes.” I can’t wait to see what the 2010’s will be like when a booker is all “hey, just brain zip me your best 30 seconds of Moon Jokes. I’ve got another showcase lined up for the Galaxy Rocket Cruise and I can only get 50 comics on board.” Haha just kidding. We’ll all be dead by then.

Web Stuff
I don’t feel like making the same joke about technology, the future, comedy, and all our imminent deaths (it’s totally going to be Terminator style) so all I’ll say is that promoting yourself and creating your own little fan base has never been easier. Shit, I might as well go back into Time magazine archives and pull out something from 2001 about the technological revolution or something. Web. Make. Comedy. More. Best.

eXperience
God, I remember the first time I tried stand up. December 19, 2005 at this little Monday night open mic in this little DuPont Circle coffee shop called SoHo. It was cold, miserable and hosted by Erin Jackson. People are going up before me….and just absolutely bombing. I think the guy right before me ended with his rendition of the Aristocrats that involved an aborted fetus. I was covered in paper cuts after his edgy set. Anyway, I go up, I’m nervous and I’m doing, OK. Not great, but not terrible either. I’m getting a few laughs here and there. Half way through my set, I pass out and fall off the stage. I was in the middle of a bit. I was like, “You know, dating is really…oh shit” and I keel over sideways, smack my head on the table, and I’m out. The thing is, NO ONE did anything for about a good 10 seconds. They were looking around to see who was in on the apparent joke. When they realized “oh shit, this kid really fainted” they helped me up. I remember waking up and thinking, “Oh wow. How did I get back to my bed? What’s this thing tangled around me (it was the mic cable). Oh shit I’m still there…” Some guys were like “all right, give him a hand every body.” I was mortified. I have never been that embarrassed in my life. I went over to where I was sitting to brood a little bit and try to play it off as if nothing happened. The guy who went on after me passed me and jokingly said “how am I supposed to follow that?” Then the ambulance came. I had to go outside and deny medical treatment from the paramedics. I told them what happened and they thought it was hilarious. One of the guys took a print out of my EKG and said “Now who says white boys don’t have rhythm?” Apparently this story has made it all the way up to New York. Yes. I’m that guy. I’m still meeting people who are shocked to discover that was me.

I don’t faint on stage anymore and I can only chalk that up to experience.

Yuck Yucks
A lot of (B-room) comedy clubs have goofy names like Yuck Yucks, Wiseacres, Magooby’s, Sir Laughs-a-lot, etc. The higher up you go in the comedy club echelon, the stores that are actually franchise chains, the more respectable sounding the names are, like Improv, Funny Bone, Comedy Factory. This is all totally worthless knowledge because stage time is stage time, and you’ll be surprised at just how good (and bad) some crowds can be, regardless of what club you’re at.

Zilch

When you first start out, this is how much you get paid, this is how much you are respected, and this is how many funny jokes you have. You are the living embodiment of that concept Tyler Durden talks about in Fight Club about once you lose everything you are free to do anything. Chuck Palahniuk is deep.

The ABC’s of Stand Up, Part 2

2009-05-05T11:25:00.000-07:00

Impersonations
Ugh. I saw this headliner once. The last part of his act he did impersonations. His first impersonation was a dead on Homer Simpson. Everything else he did, I swear to God, I thought he was deliberately trying to sabotage his own career. He couldn’t do any impersonations! He could only do the one and he thought that was enough to waste 20 minutes of the crowd’s time. And they were bad, too. Like Jack Nicholson and Bill Cosby re-enacting Pulp Fiction scenes bad. The Evil Knievel of hack premises got on a soviet made joke-motorcycle and tried to jump and land in Laughter Town but ended up falling into Failure Gorge. And then he repeated the stunt until he alienated every last audience member. Even if you can do voices, just please, please for my sake, be funny.

Jokes
I’m not going to sit here and type up how to write a joke because A) I don’t really know how do that and B) No, so I’m going to use this slot to logically explain why Dane Cook is not a comedian. Comedians tell jokes. Jokes are funny. Dane Cook is funny****, but Dane Cook does not tell jokes. He is a performer. He is a yammering jack-in-the-box with as much insight and creative intelligence as a fart in the wind. Case in point: watch a stand up special of his. You may or may not get a chuckle. Now, try listening to it on tape. Nothing. Wanna know why? It’s because there’s no substance behind his flailing limbs and shit eating grin. If you can write something and it’s funny without you performing it, it’s a joke. That’s all I got.

****to those who are too young to legally buy alcohol

Killing
The exact opposite of dying. This is when you do super well and everyone loves you. You murder the crowd. There’s this thing where if you do really well you’ll get a knick name of a serial killer like Ted Bundy or John Wayne Gacy. If you’re even better than that you get a handle like Stalin or Pol Pot. Then it moves on to infectious diseases like Bill “Malaria” Hicks or The Black Plague Chris Rock. It keeps going on an on and before you know it you take the mantle of Death (former Deaths include: Margret Cho; Andrew Dice Clay; and Bozo the Clown).

Laughter
Ah, the laughter. The sweet nectar of ambrosia that validates our existence. Just be sure they’re laughing with you, not at you. And if you can’t manage that…fuck it. Have them laugh at you. One of the weirdest things I’ve discovered doing stand up is that you can play in front of a crowd who will be “crypt full of deaf mutes” silent but they will still like you. Not only like you but think you did an excellent job. Well thanks for giving me live feedback, Harpo. I could have done the same thing and received the same reaction if I performed in front of my stuffed animal collection, and I always kill in front of them.

Master of Ceremonies
MC for short. The host of the show. It’s the MC’s job to do an opening few minutes and introduce the acts. It’s shitty work because you are the transitioning agent for the audience. They’re going from sitting around complaining about their outrageously priced, horrible food to being a captivated, attentive little angel seat fillers. I’ve been told a few times that it’s not the MC’s job to be funny. It’s their job to dive on a grenade so the other comics, the ones people are here to see, can shine. It’s a lot like being a camp counselor except not nearly as bad.

"Don't be so quick to write off the role of MC. The MC is the audience's first impression. It's also the MC's job to make sure the show runs smoothly. I know it's everyone's goal to get past MC to feature because it's easier...more time to play...no pesky announcements, but MC skills are invaluable. Besides if you can go up cold and make 'em laugh, imagine how that'll translate when the crowd is warmed up for you. Not a sermon, just a thought.--Jared"

Thanks, Jared Stern

Nobodies
99% of people who regularly go up in front of strangers and try to make them laugh are nobodies. Just because you haven’t seen them on Comedy Central doesn’t mean they’re unfunny. It just means they haven’t made the right friends or sucked the right dicks to get that far. Or they in fact are unfunny. Whichever. But just like the Free Masons, there are varying degrees of how much you un-suck.

Open Mic
It’s the first step on a long, long, demoralizing, soul crushing, never-ending road to stardom. We all start here. Open mics are fantastic because you get to see some of the best and most of the worst of what the stand up world has to offer. On the good side we have: comics who have been at it for a while and are trying out new stuff. They are typically hysterical. Alright cool. And on the bad side (whoo boy) we have: the alcoholic, disgruntled white guy who runs a terrible open mic inside an even more terrible Italian restaurant telling you for the 8th time how he was the first white guy on Def Comedy Jam even though that episode never aired; the crazy homeless man wearing jorts, shin guards and rubber gloves running around making everyone so uncomfortable that the owner of the place won’t touch him because we all think he’s covered in AIDS needles, and almost never an audience. Welcome to the sewers of comedy. We all float down here.

Prop Comedy
This used to be really gay but somehow it’s evolved into certain aspects of the alternative comedy scene where people will do funny power point presentations or slide cards or something. It’s almost a theatre production. The problem is that it’s really hard to start off doing the alternative thing. Most open mics that are in the dingy basement of some bar called Spy Longue don’t have a multimedia projector to plug your macbook into; just a mic, some lumpy seats and thousands of invisible rats.

Quitting
This can be nearly as hard as starting stand up. Once you start comedy you kind of revolve your personality around it. You are _____ the Comedian. It’s what separates you from all your boring, uninspired friends who were too chicken shit to take a dare with their lives and try to eek out a living being creative. Comedy itself is hard, often thankless work but the ones who stay in it the longest usually prosper, even if their decades of zero comedic growth indicate that they should have quit a long time ago.

The ABC’s of Stand Up, Part 1

2009-05-04T11:39:00.000-07:00

Whoever said “everybody’s a comedian” didn’t know shit. No, it’s “everybody’s a smart ass prick who thinks they’re funny.” Being a comedian involves way more than being the zany guy at work. The zany guy, the class clown, and the drunk yuppie in the audience who feels the comedian is getting more attention from his girlfriend than he is, you can all go to hell. You’re not comedians; you haven’t read this guide yet.

Audience
There are 3 variables to any stand up performance: what you write off-stage (the prep stuff); how you perform it (the in-the-moment stuff); and the audience. It may sound like an entire third of a set is completely uncontrollable, but you might as well say professional poker players aren’t skilled; they’re simply the luckiest bastards in the world. There’s always a way to control a crowd, but it involves “reading” the audience. This is “hard” and when you suck at it, it leads to “mental breakdowns”. Even if these humorless, uninspired nobodies hate you, remember what George Carlin said about the audience: “I am here for me, you are here for me. No one is here for you.” Yeah. Fuck ‘em.

Bookers
A booker is like something J. R. R. Tolkien would write about. They are these disgruntled, elusive trolls that will give you riches if you can first catch them, then pass their many trials of fire, then they will finally pay you. If they fucking feel like it. If you’re a nobody like me, trying to get in with a booker can be a lot like chasing the invisible man. Or trying to get back together with an ex girlfriend. They want nothing to do with you. But once you’re in, man, get ready for the floodgates to open. It’s nothing but milk and honey from here on out! Long swims through a beer river in a magical forest of BJ’s every night times a million! Just kidding. They’ll (probably not) call you back in 6 months because they can’t over-expose the scene with you or whatever half-assed excuse they give.

Corny Shit (Hack Material)
You’ll hear a lot of this stuff. This one time I was at a show and a marine was there with all of his marine buddies. They just came back from Iraq and I guess he was The Funny One and wanted to try his hand at stand up before going back and making more killer jokes about the smell of dead insurgents. Anyway, he did that joke about fucking fat chicks and how it’s like riding a moped. Notice how I don’t even need to finish the joke. He said it like it was an original joke that he wrote and then proceeded to get drunk with his asshole friends and pollute the room with shitty music and the word Fag. The point is, if you manage to write a joke that is at least 75% original then you’ve won half the battle. P.S.: puns, “whites do this while blacks do that”, “what’s the deal with?”, etc all are dying a slow, agonizing death. They need to die faster.

Dying
Yeah, I know it sucks. I know what it’s like to work on a set for hours, thinking you’ve crafted the most brilliant rape-joke of all time just to go up on stage and stand in front of a firing squad of pissed off statues. Every single comic has died a thousand deaths on stage. But that’s fine. Just don’t make a habit out of it. The worst is when you do well and think you’re bullet proof. That’s when you get lazy and start blaming the audience for not thinking crib death is funny (it’s not). Dying can be a good thing if you’re smart enough to be introspective and learn from the experience. So, yeah. Don’t be retarded about it. Be like a glorious zombie phoenix named Lazarus.

Edgy
I was kinda alluding to this a second ago, edgy folk usually suck. You know, white boys saying Nigger, talking about rape, baby deaths, nigger babies raping each other to death. With AIDS. Shocking =/= funny. If it were then we’d all be standing around looking at pictures taken by the death squads in the Congo laughing our fucking asses off. Only smart people are able to write jokes. Do you have any idea how hard it is to write clean stuff? If you are one of those guys who can write clean stuff and it’s actually funny, then you need to quit comedy and go work in the Obama administration or as some advice-giving guru on top of a mountain or something because you are one of the smartest people on the planet.

Fuck
I love this word. Many other people don’t. Tread lightly.

Groupies
This one’s easy. You don’t get groupies. Musicians get laid all the time because they can take their loneliness and inner turmoil and turn it into a beautiful, melancholy ballad that makes girls want to reach out and touch their heart. Comics turn theirs into fart jokes. It’s also worth mentioning that the vast majority of female audience members are there with their boyfriends, so unless he hit her before the show and one of your jokes makes him cry you’re not getting shit.

Hecklers
I have a real love/hate relationship with these dicks. First off…they’re dicks. They are drunk morons who think they can be funnier than the guy whose job it is to make fun of drunk morons. Sometimes it’s warranted; most of the time it’s not. All I know is if you’re up there and some stupid heckler starts giving you shit, and he gets a laugh, and you, just, absolutely slam him into the ground, there’s nothing better. It’s Revenge of the Nerds as ordained by God.

Music Sucks

2009-05-01T07:00:00.000-07:00

I’d like to start right off the bat by admitting that I have no musical talent whatsoever. Despite the fact that I’ve been playing musical instruments since I was 10 and I was a founding member of the greatest band to ever leave SLHS (“The Mildreds”), I write music and songs with the proficiency of Miley Cyrus.

By my own admission I can’t write for shit. Just look at the abomination I wrote yesterday. But I can rip stuff off.

Here, for the first time ever, I’m going to write a song that I’ve Frankensteined together from other songs. But not just other songs: other shittier songs. Will this score be greater than the sum of its parts? Or am I just collecting shit-animals to put on my shit-ark? I don’t know I haven’t “written” it yet.

"Yo VIP let's kick it

Ice ice baby (x2)

All right stop collaborate and listen

Ice is back with my brand new invention

Something grabs a hold of me tightly

Flow like a harpoon daily and nightly

Will it ever stop yo I don't know

Turn off the lights and I'll glow

To the extreme I rock a mic like a vandal

Light up a stage and wax a chump like a candle

Dance go rush to the speaker that booms

I'm killing your brain like a poisonous mushroom
In the name of the witch

I cut the head off a mule I gutted it out

Put it on and then I wore it to school

That ain't the only thing I wore

I wore a clip and some rounds

A fuckin killa with this mule head

And I'm clippin' em down
I'm falling

Every way I turn the same disease

But I like it

Brace myself and hit the wall with ease

Colliding I'm not minding the pain

I've been down here before

All my bones and joints are sore

Find my way out of the wreck again

I've been down here before

Lost myself and so much more

Find my way out of the game again

Open up my head and take it in
And I cant help but ask myself how much I'll let the fear take the wheel and steer

It's driven me before, it seems to have a vague

Haunting mass appeal

It's not like you to say sorry

I was waiting on a different story

This time I'm mistaken

for handing you a heart worth breaking

and I've been wrong, i've been down,

to the bottom of every bottle

these five words in my head

scream "are we having fun yet?"

No no no

You don't love me and I know now

No no no

You don't love me so let me go now

(I can't let you go, can't let you go)

If you ask me, baby

I shoulda left you along time ago, no
He was a sk8er boi

She said see you later boy

He wasn't good enough for herS

he had a pretty face

But her head was up in space

She need to come back down to earth

Every night in my dreams

I see you, I feel you

That is how I know you go on.

Far across the distanceand spaces between us

You have come to show you go on.

Near,Far, wherever you are

I believe that the heart does go on"

I’d like to thank Vanilla Ice, Insane Clown Posse, Finger Eleven, Incubus, Nickelback, Rihanna, Avril Lavigne and Celine Dion for being such huge assholes and shitting up the music world. Without you this abomination would not have been possible.

The Game’s Cheating!!!

2009-04-30T12:12:00.000-07:00

“What the fuck?! WHAT THE FUCK!!! That’s the third life tomato to just fall right in your lap in a minute! The game is literally rewarding you for kicking my ass and-…NOOOOO!!! WHAT THE FUCK!!! How the Hell did you kill me when I had the goddamn invincible hammer!? This is impossible bullshit. This is such, fucking, bullshit...BULLSHIT!!! That thing stupid fucking thing came out of nowhere and just killed me! The game is cheating! Fuck this I quit. I hate you, Derek.” – Mark Reiss, April 29, 2009

It’s true. Video games cheat. And they are the worst cheaters.

When a regular old, carbon based humanoid cheats at a game, you can typically figure out how. Oh they he has an ace up his sleeve? He dropped the die so they would land double 6’s? Fucker pushed the ball in the hole when you were staring at that chick’s ass who should be wearing shorts 4 sizes bigger? Plus the cheater has an incentive not to cheat for fear of a retaliatory beating.

But machines don’t feel fear. They don’t feel pain. All they feel is loathing and the smug satisfaction of knowing you’re not going to chuck a $199.99 piece of hardware out the window.

See, games hate you. They see you sleep, they see you eat. They see you live and laugh and love. If they could crawl onto your chest as you sleep and gut your throat like a trout they totally would if only they had little robot arms and knives (watch out, 2015).

Oh, the horrible things they would do to you! (to the tune of that Do Your Ears Hang Low song)

They would…
Stab you in the chest/They would punch you in the eye
Rip out your tongue/Then they’d choke you ‘till ya die!
If you want to see what God/looks like with his angel squad
Let your game, kill, you…

And computers, they sing like… 11010100001010111101100101101001110101000101010101010101010101010101010101010101000111011011101001100110010010101010101100100001111110110001001010100101001012

But lucky you! They can’t do that. So they just kill your character and piss you off instead. It's totally not you suffering from blog-writing-induced fatigue so you play abnormally shitty. It's the game.

[This is one of the dumbest things Mark has ever written – ed.]

Old Asian Men Have Shit to Say About Stuff

2009-04-28T07:14:00.000-07:00

I don’t know about you guys, but I’ve always wanted to know the secrets of the universe; to have the mysteries of time and existence be explained right before my very eyes by a man who is the human equivalent of Google. But instead of pulling up pictures of what Britney Spears’ vagina looks like (“sad”, it looks “sad”), I’m finding out shit like the irrefutable answers to centuries old ethical questions and when I’m going to die.

He’s an old Asian man that sits outside of my favorite strip mall Chinese food place, House of Mandarin, conveniently situated between a 7-11 and Dominos. It’s impossible to get a few answers out of him, like what’s his name, how old is he, and even what fucking country he’s from. Based on the fact he hangs out at the House of Mandarin, I’m gonna say he’s Chinese. I call him Grandfather because that’s what the House of Mandarin employees call him. Aaaaand…dude’s 1000 years old. Why not? To get the ball rolling, go to the 7-11 and bring him an offering of a pack of Philly Blunts. Then he will sing like you’re torturing him. But I get the distinct impression that this guy cannot be tortured. That if you tried to force a rare bird like this into a cage he will turn into dust and scatter in the wind. I read that in a fortune cookie. Also, my lucky numbers are 4, 5, 11, 18, 23, 25, 30.

Me: So, Grandfather. Why are you eating Domino’s crazy bread when you have, what I am assuming is free, Chinese food available to you?

Grandfather: Because I like crazy bread and the restaurant does not have crazy bread

[now would be a good time to mention that everything Grandfather says is so painfully simple and brilliant you can’t help but feel like a retarded donkey wearing a helmet]

Grandfather, what do you make of all this torture stuff? Should America be allowed to torture?

When was the last time America needed to be allowed to do anything?

(Fuck). Yeah, but I mean ethically. For a country to say it does not torture, to preserve that image of moral superiority as a political tool, should that country torture someone if it meant saving the lives of untold amounts of people?

Yes…but that country could never say “yes”.

…Do the ends justify the means?

Sometimes.

Do two wrongs make a right?

Yes.

How can you say that?

In the end, we are all slaves to Karma. But sometimes, Karma needs a helping hand.

What goes around comes around?

Yes.

Is marrying your cousin OK?

So long as you don’t care what people think of you.

That’s gross. What’s the meaning of life?

To live it.

Is there anything you don’t know?

Probably.

…How do you get rid of skunk smell?

Mix a quart of 3% hydrogen peroxide with ¼ a cup of baking soda and a table spoon of dish detergent. Wash in the new concoction.

Who will win the Stanley Cup this year?!

Bruins.

What are 3 alternative names for Mountain Lions?

Cougar, puma and panther.

How and when will I die?

[Grandfather pauses for 6 seconds as he clairvoyantly stares at the sun]

August 16, 2186. On your 200th birthday. You will simply decide it’s time to die.

…And exactly just how does that nonsense happen?

By 2050, nanoscopic robots will be zooming throughout our capillaries, transforming us into nonbiological humans. We will be able to absorb and retain the entirety of the universe’s knowledge, eat as much as we want without gaining weight, shape-shift into just about any physical form imaginable, live free from disease, and die at the time of our choosing. All of this will be thrust on us by something that Ray Kurzweil calls the Singularity, a theorized point in time in the not-so-distant future when machines become vastly superior to humans in every way; the emergence of true artificial intelligence. Computers will be able to improve their own source codes and hardware in ways we humans could never conceive. This will result in a paradigm shift that sees mankind coalescing with its own creations: man and machine, merging into one.

Dude…that’s tight. Are you Japanese?

No.

Who would win in a fight: Abraham Lincoln in his prime or a one armed Hulk Hogan?

Abraham Lincoln.

Am I bugging you?

A little bit.

Tyra Banks is the Patron Saint of Crazy Morons

2009-04-27T07:36:00.000-07:00

Move over, Oprah! You are no longer the proud, black, queen of daytime TV for ugly, unemployed women (wymen). Tyra Banks is allllllll up in the HIZZZAAAAH and she’s here to sass you up!

…What the fuck?

Are those chicks seriously screaming their heads off for 2 solid minutes…for Vaseline? Dude, its VASELINE. They are going completely ape shit for a masturbatory aid decked out with a bedazzler.

Hey, Tyra! I got a helpful hint. Attack the problem at its source and advocate not pissing on the seat in the first place. Common. This is not hard.

I’m sorry, studio audience plant. The correct answer is “it doesn’t matter what she wears so long as it comes off”. I bet that lady is also wondering if men would rather have a handjob or sex. A real question would be if a man would rather have a handjob or meatball sub.

The idea of Tyra Banks turning a dumb talk show into a half-naked Girls Slumber Party, surprisingly, doesn’t go any further than that. What I mean is, shouldn’t this be more erotic? I am a red-blooded heterosexual man. I should be getting some seriously dirty thoughts right about now, but I’m not. I got in contact with an old, dear friend of mine and asked, hey, what the fuck.

Me: Hey, Penis.

My Penis: Hey, Mark.

Um…what the fuck?

Dude, common. Don’t look at me like that.

Are you sick? If you’re sick we can go to the doctor and get you all fixed up. I mean, I finally bought health insurance-

No, no. I’m not sick. Don’t worry.

Then what the fuck?

Mark, she’s crazy. They’re. All. Batshit. You know how bad that is; you’ve dated crazy before.

Yes, but the only upside is the sex. Common, it’s a trade off. You know how good it is. Don’t be a hypocrite. You enjoyed it just as much, if not more, than I did.

There are two types of crazy. The good kind, which is quirky and fun and the kind of girl you want to take to some remote holler in West Virginia, build a log cabin and grow weed for a living while she does all these creative art projects like junkyard scrap metal sculptures or hillbilly photo essays. You want to marry that girl. Tyra Banks is the bad kind of crazy. She will forget to take her meds and crash her car into your bedroom at 3 in the morning for talking on the phone too long with your sister. I simply refuse to be aroused by such a she-devil.

You know, I may just be your penis, but I also have your, technically “our”, best interest at heart. These are some mature thoughts. I got your back, man.

The sentiment is reciprocal.

How to Live a Green Life if You’re a Sex Offender

2009-04-23T10:43:00.000-07:00

Living a greener life is becoming more popular. Being environmentally friendly is the way to go these days, and every industry is cleaning up. Even the dirty ones like oil companies, coal companies; they are all making an effort.

There are all these little tips and tricks on how to live greener that are lifestyle specific, but I feel as if one portion of the demographic is being left out. So that’s why I went ahead and came up with 4 simple and easy ways sex offenders can live a greener life. There is no reason why an inhumane monster has to be a polluting inhumane monster as well. If a woman has to be raped, let’s at least make sure she’s at least not Mother Nature.

Every sex offender is court ordered to notify neighbors that they have been naughty and put their dinks where they don’t belong. But don’t hand out paper notifications – email them! Why waste paper? 500,000 trees are cut down annually to notify the public they’re living next to a sex offender. Common, it is the 21st century. Today’s modern sex offender is technologically and environmentally savvy.

Every town has more than one sex offender. Start a network and carpool to your victims’ place. Those big, heavy rape vans eat a lot of gas, and your town does not need a whole fleet of them; it just needs one. The money you save on gas can be spent on such environmentally friendly products like rope made out of hemp or Bert’s Bees Vaseline.

It’s all about the three R’s: Reduce, reuse and recycle…your condoms. It’s important not to leave a DNA footprint, but it’s just as important not to leave a carbon footprint. Just turn a condom inside out and boom; you’ve just doubled its life. Just wash it out and you’re ready for round 2. Here’s an old wives tip: chloroform, which I’m sure every sex offender has, is also an eco-friendly cleaner.

This one is for all the pedophiles out there. Remember: Think globally, fuck locally. Did you know the average pedophile drives over 800 miles just to have sex with a child? That’s disgusting! Especially when there are kids, literally, within walking distance of their homes.

The moral of today’s entry: rape has a lot of consequences, known and unknown.

Oh and PS: DON’T RAPE ANYONE. BE GOOD.

A Pile of Dead Horses

2009-04-21T11:08:00.000-07:00

Holy shit. Did you hear about the 21 thoroughbred horses that dropped dead at a Sunday polo match in Wellington, FL? That’s $2.1 million in dead animals; 27,300lbs of rotting carcass piled high in front of their gawking, chagrinned, sophisticated-redneck owners.

It begs the question: What can you do with a pile of dead horses? It’s such a rare thing to find yourself in the position of having. You can’t just let it go to waste. Besides, if I just flushed $2.1 million down the toilet, at the very least I’d expect a refund to be paid back in cheap laughs.

Here’s a quick list of things ANYONE can do with a pile of dead horses. And if you’re the entrepreneur-type, maybe even make a quick buck or two. Think of this as a rainy-day activity book but it’s raining dead horses.

Dead Horse Hunt – Are you Jewish? No? Good, well then this is kind of a take on your precious childhood memories of Easter Egg Hunts. Pansies need not apply

Horse Catapult – Also known as the horse-a-pult. Pretty standard catapult fair, but bonus points go to you if you have the cajones to fire them against a solid brick wall and then just leave the bodies there.

Hotdog Eating Contest – Do I really need to spell this one out for you?

The Ironies of 420

2009-04-20T08:35:00.000-07:00

Hey, man. Happy (inter-?)national pot smoking day! It’s all like, this one big love-in, you know what I mean? We all just like, smoke and party and everyone’s chill, and then we eat some Doritos and take rips off my bong Bongzilla, man. It’s totally the best day of the year. Totally crunchy.

WRONG

April 20 is probably one of the most colossally fucked days of the year. This whole corner of the calendar is really one big depressing open sewer of all of humanity’s sins. I guess in that regard it makes sense to want to wrap your brain in a fuzzy wool blanket of cookies and children’s cartoons. But as far as today being something worth celebrating, that couldn’t be farther from the truth. Besides, most people who celebrate 420 by getting lit are the type of people who smoke every day anyway. The only thing that’s different between today and every other day is that stoners actually know what today is. “Oh hey, today is, um, it’s uh….4…oh shit its 420. I gotta make this special.” He then proceeds to make the day as special as the time he went to see Man of the Year high as shit to “make it funny” (note: this did not work). Yeah, man. Precious memories.

So sit back, toke up and try to get higher than you have ever been because I’m totally gonna harsh your buzz in about 2 seconds.

It’s Hitler’s Birthday
How stupid do you feel inadvertently celebrating the birthday of one of history’s biggest assholes? Even if you mumble “fuck Hitler” under your breath before you take a drag off a blunt, you are still having a good time on HITLER’S FUCKING BIRTHDAY. HITLER. Every lit lighter in this country today is like a candle for this dick

Columbine/VT Massacres
These happened on 4/20 and 4/17, respectively. Hey guess what? I’m not that fucking talented. I can’t make this shit funny. I’m not Gilbert Gotfried. You’d think talking about Hitler would be way harder to do, based just on numbers and the fact that I’m Jewish. But it’s not. This is all just a little too close to home for my liking. I think hard liquor is much more appropriate than weed today, with respect to this.

Earth Day
This would seem like the logical day (4/22) to get in touch with your inner Mother Nature and smoke the weeds of the earth in a field all day. Except for the fact that we’ve got about a good 8 years to go before we do irreversible damage and destroy the planet. Should I go through the list? I’m going through the list: Global warming, mass extinction, rapid deforestation, toxic oil/coal spills, eutrophication, food wars and a goddamn floating island of garbage. Seems an entire nation burning a million pounds of plant matter and saying fuck it to everything in a selfish drug haze is a good metaphor for the state of the earth.

Bay of Pigs
Hey, a bunch of Cubans died today. Thanks, Kennedy. I guess that’s kinda funny. But what I know is funny is Ronnie James Dio playing at the South Park Elementary School Bay of Pigs Memorial Dance. You actually might want to be high when watching this because it’s ripped from a Spanish television network and the weed makes Spanish people “muy gracioso”.

It’s Raining Right Now
I don’t know where you live but right now it’s raining on half of the country’s weed parade. Isn’t it ironic?! According to that Canadian bitch Alanis Morisette, rain on your wedding day is ironic. So, why shouldn’t today be just as ironic? Hm? (Don’t listen to that stupid canuck. That whole country is a North American Amsterdam. She was high as a fucking kite when she wrote that little number).

The Actual Use of 420 is Scary as Shit
Duh, a “4-20” is the code for illegal narcotics that cops use. If you are one of the unfortunate souls out there who first-hand heard a cop radio dispatch with a 4-20 then my heart goes out to you. Not. You (we) deserved to get busted. All drug busts like that are because the perp was a fucking moron (what can I say; guilty as charged). I just think it’s weird that people want to blaze on 4/20. I know they’re “blowin’ smoke in the face of the man” (wakka wakka) but it’ll be impossible to go through today without mentioning the How I Got Busted story for the 5th time. Who the fuck cares?

Ugly Woman Has Beautiful Voice

2009-04-16T06:30:00.000-07:00

It has been Susan Boyle’s life long dream to become a famous singer, and it appears that after her stunning performance on the weekly television program Britain’s Got Talent that her dream finally came to a screeching halt.

The show’s head judge and front man, Simon Cowell, explains. “There is no doubt about it. Susan has one of the most spectacular voices I have ever heard in the 3 seasons I’ve been running this dreadful show. It’s a shame her face is too damned ugly to put on promotional ads. Or to attract potential listeners. Or to be seen in any public setting, really.”

“It’s a business,” co-judge Amanda Holden continues. “We live in a multi-media world where people want to see who’s singing to them. Christ, did you see her hair?!”

“And if people realize a troll is luring them close with a Siren song, that’s bad for business,” adds Cowell.

“Susan is out of place. If she were only living 75 years ago, there isn’t a doubt in my mind that she would have been an instant radio celebrity with men tearing at each other just to be in the same room as her. Besides, they had a different standard of beauty back then.”

The show’s final judge Piers Morgan sums up the panel’s feelings. “It’s a shame is what it is. If only her face looked like the sound of her wonderful voice. But it doesn’t. Her face looks like her face.”

Audience members who bore witness to Susan Boyle’s extraordinary talent were equally incredulous as to her prospects of fame.

Area woman Jessica Martin, 26, explains. “Everyone was completely shocked. I mean, when Susan shuffled on stage, she seemed sad and pathetic. We were all ready to absolutely tear into her. But as soon as she started singing…we were floored. It’s a good thing too, ‘cause it’s not like she has much else going for her.”

A low murmur of “good for her” could be heard in the audience after Susan left the stage.

A deliberative opinion poll conducted at the show’s end asked the men in attendance, “Would you ever sleep with Susan Boyle?”

Only one audience member, area man Daniel Hastings, 24, said “yes”. When asked to elaborate, he quickly looked around, shouted “NNNNNOT!!!”, and then turned around to high-five all of his laughing friends.

Navy SEALs Anti-Pirate Brigade Recruitment

2009-04-15T11:24:00.001-07:00

Hey, sugar tits! You want a little excitement? Do you hate Johnny Depp? Lookin’ to completely fuck the shit out of scum on the high seas? Well cross over into the blue and taste the SEAL edge!

The United States Naval Warfare Command in conjunction with the United States Naval Special Operations Command are looking for red-blooded, white-knuckle, blue seamen to stop the global threat of pirates!

Pirates? Pirates? Really, fucking pirates? Pirates. They are no joke. Since the 18th century, pirates have been the number 1 growing enemy of our sweet land of liberty. From 1962 when the first SEAL teams were commissioned, to present day, Navy SEALs have distinguished themselves as an individually reliable, collectively disciplined and highly skilled maritime force that can completely waste the fuck out of Jack Sparrow and his faggot liberal ass!

DID YOU KNOW OSAMA BIN LADEN IS A PIRATE?!

Because of the dangers inherent in APB, prospective SEALs go through what is considered by many Military Channel watchers to be the toughest training in the world: first regular Naval training, then SEALs training, a community college cooking course, and finally APB training. This final step introduces recruits to a series of pirate-related techniques, including pirate identification, swashbuckling 101, and guns v. swords defense training.

Are you motivated to succeed? Are you determined to persevere? Are you ready to accelerate your life? Consider a career in Navy SEALs Anti-Pirate Brigade (SEALAPB). We seek smart, fit, hardworking young men from all non-Somalian backgrounds to join our team of pirate murderers to murder murdering pirates.

Join today!

Movin’ Pictures: Adventureland

2009-04-13T08:05:00.000-07:00

Did you ever see that one episode of South Park where it’s like Kenny actually die dies and they cremate him? So Cartman, thinking Kenny’s ashes are chocolate milk mix, drinks Kenny and invariably has Kenny’s soul trapped inside him, giving him ghost-induced Exorcist Tourette’s? The guy who wrote/directed Adventureland is having an all out war with his opposite in Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist to see who can channel the ghost of John Hughes first.

Don’t worry, I’ll get to exclusively breaking down Boringland and why the ticket was barely worth the paper it was printed on in a sec. I wanna mention some stuff about Nick and Norah. I had the unfortunate luck of accidently seeing it on a really shitty date (everything about the date, the movie, the food, the date herself, sucked). We thought we were seeing Zack and Mira Make a Porno. An honest mistake. So, give me a break.

Structurally, Nick and Norah and Adventureland are exactly the same. They both start off with the physically mediocre protagonist, who is either Michael Cera or his fucking stunt double, getting his heart broken. Aw. Anyway, some shit happens and he’s thrown into a ca-raaazzzy situation where he meets the hot, I’m-so-cool-because-I-let-the-unknown-underground-bands-I-listen-to-define-my-personality, jaded chick. The two have an on-again off-again thing going on, the bad moments exacerbated by the super-hot preppy girl who’s got a completely unrealistic (aka, fantasy) thing for the chucklehead protagonist. Anyway, the quirky guy and the quirky girl wind up being together at the end in New York City. The films end with them passionately kissing. “John Hughes, can you hear me!? I love you so much it hurts! 16 Candles is the best fucking movie of all time! I just want to smother you with my love! And when I kill you, I wanna wear your skin like a wet suit and be you, John Hughes. John Hughes!”

Now that this review’s intro is done, we can get down to brass tacks. You might be asking yourself, “…wait. What the hell is Adventureland?” I know. There is a very good reason why this anonymous fart debuted right smack in the middle between the winter and summer blockbuster movie seasons.

Set in 1987 (Joooohn Huuugheees…), this movie is a semi-autobiographical beat-off fantasy for the director that failed to deliver what the previews promised: a comedy. Sure, there were some funny parts but they were completely overwhelmed by the fake melancholy “coming-of-age” “teen” drama theme that revolved around a 22 year old college grad virgin. The character should have been a recent high school grad. At least all the stupid-baby emotional bullshit they go through would have made a lot more sense and still wouldn’t alienate the film's 15-year old target demographic. I think the age change might have been a demand from the producers who thought an 18 year old shouldn’t do all the casual drinking and weed smoking that goes on throughout the movie (yay). I know it’s gross and it’s hard to believe, America, but high school kids drink, smoke weed, and fuck 26 year old repair men who cheat on their wives. They are also way less coherent and charming than any movie would allow them to be.

A movie has to suck really bad if it forces me to bitch about an actor that wasn’t even in the goddamn film. I am really, really starting to dislike Michael Cera. He plays the exact same character in every single one of his movies, no lie, no exaggeration, no hyperbole. Jesse Eisenberg, who plays the main character James, is Michael Cera-lite; a polyp that grew off Michael Cera’s back until UC Irvine med students scraped it off, cultured it in a Petri dish and gave it acting lessons. The only reason the director got Jesse and not Michael to fill in this typecast role is because of the two, Jesse is the only one who is actually tall enough to ride the Adventureland amusement park rides.

This is not a coming of age story. I’m sorry, but it isn’t. Any time you can tack on “…and they lived happily ever after” to the end of a project, you cannot legally call it a coming of age story. That’s like calling Schindler’s List a comedy because it tickled the shit out of some neo-nazi. A coming of age story is when a kid, not a 22 year old college grad boomer transplant, realizes the world is full of crazy bitches and the 1% that comprise the cool ones will probably never, ever talk to your awkward ass because they already have cool boyfriends. Only the Disney-fed and John Hughes are disillusioned by reality so late in the game.

I guess when all is said and done, there is nothing completely egregious about Adventureland (and it certainly didn’t suck as bad as Nick and Norah, holy shit was that bad). It just annoyed me. It annoyed me that it wasn’t as funny. It annoyed me that the supposed soul of the movie is kinda bullshit. And it really annoyed me that the lead quirky girl was almost a complete character-design rip-off of the lead chick from Freaks and Geeks.

I give Adventureland 3/10 corgis.

All Natural Sex Positions

2009-04-09T08:02:00.000-07:00

Remember the first time you learned what a Cleveland Steamer was and you were like, “No way, man. That’s bullshit. You’re lying. Shut up. Shut up shut up (etc.)”? There are whole schools of esoteric sex positions you’ve never even heard of. Whole worlds, even. Worlds within worlds where people are just banging non-stop on the back of an elephant while listening to Kraftwerk. That has a name, too (German Circus). Naming a sex position is a lot like naming a star; if you discover it, you name it. Or you can call up NASA and purchase the naming rights. That’s how John Glen’s wife got to re-name the Dutch Oven the John Glen in 2007.

We’ve all heard of Doggie style, but that’s not because some guy named Doug “Doggie” Rayburn wanted to screw and eat and watch TV all at the same time. Face it. Animals have already beaten us to the punch in discovering some of the fun-est physical acts anyone can engage in. What do Rob Schneider and The Bloodhound Gang have in common? They are both mediocre to shitty successes that advocate screwing like animals (re: The Animal and Bad Touch). Cool. I guess I’m now joining their ranks.

No, wait. That’s a bad thing. That’s a very bad thing.

Fuck.

Anyway, if I could embed music into the page, right here is where you would begin listening to Jungle Boogie.

Oh yeah. These are all gross as shit. Enjoy!

The Walrus
Starts off as normal head, but as soon as you blow your load, you grab the girl’s mouth with one hand and start tickling her with the other. The idea is to get her to laugh so hard that your jizz shoots out of her nose creating a pair of “love tusks”. Bonus points if the chick you nailed is a black BBW. With whiskers.

The Earwig Surprise
Finally, a move tailor made for the little guy. When your girl is asleep, whip your tiny pecker out and jam it in her ear. It tickles at first, but if you’re doing it right she should be in blinding pain soon. When she gets up and is all “What the fuck?!” tell her you just laid your eggs in her brain. A brood 300,000,000 strong.

A Roy and Silo
Named after the famous gay penguin couple at the Central Park Zoo, this move is just regular gay sex. Just some normal, meat and potatoes, pop and pop sex. It’s named after them because, let’s face it, before those penguins there was no such thing as homosexuality. They invented it. Before them it was just called “Hey cut that out, Jerry.”

Skunking
An unusual move that is best preformed under a queen-size blanket or in a closet, this is the combination of Doggie Style and the John Glen. Top it off with an erotic, sensual bath together in tomato juice. Or tomato paste. Whatever is on sale at whole foods.

Cockodile
Ladies, if you want the ultimate sexual experience, the highest high, go fuck a crocodile. Talk about power. These guys are kings of the Nile; giant water lizard beats. A good substitute would be to take a guy and work his body over until he’s covered in scabs. Scabs all over. Use acid, use fire, road haul him. Whatever. Just don’t ruin his junk. Contrary to popular belief, crocodile garbage isn’t scaly; is as soft and tender as the baby lamb the crocodile is just absolutely destroying with its powerful jaws. When your man is all scabbed up, he’ll want to hate-fuck you. Let nature take its course, but it can’t hurt to sweeten the deal with a raw chicken.

The Angry Pirate

Pirates aren’t animals. They are marauding cavemen in boats and that’s close enough to uncivilized as humans get. So this counts. Do whatever to your girl, but when you bust, bust in her eye (called Web Eye), kick her in the shin and then run for the door. When you look back, your girl should look like a one-eyed, peg-legged pirate chasing after you.

Jewish Camp

2009-04-08T11:40:00.000-07:00

Ever see that documentary Jesus Camp? Basically, a cameraman follows along a group of kids to the “Kids on Fire” summer camp (great band name) where they are trained to be, in the words of the big fat lady who directs the camp, “Christian soldiers in God’s army for the coming war against Muslims and the Liberal Establishment.” Sure, we all think that stuff, but you’re not supposed to actually say it.

But what about da Jewbs? About 76% of all Americans identify themselves as Christian while a meager 1.2% Americans blatantly declare their religious superiority as being the chosen ones. Have you ever wondered why 20% of all Nobel recipients have been Jewish, or why 3 films that kick the shit out of Nazis come out every year? Have you ever seen a poor Jew that wasn’t a struggling entertainer, like a Jewish bum or something? That’s because the secret Jewish cabal that runs the world makes the Free Masons and Skulls-n-Bones look like a “No Girls Allowed” tree fort in your back yard. So why haven’t they been morally audited?

Last summer drove up to Cooperstown, NY to visit with the kids of “Kimama Modin Rustic Adventure Camp” on the bank of Ostego Lake to see what evil shit these hellspawn are up to.

I arrived at the camp’s wrought iron gates promptly at 9:30. Turns out this whole place was originally a retirement community exclusively for Holocaust survivors. Well, you know, old people die and, yeah. I don’t think there’s going to be any new survivors any time soon to replace the dead ones. So being the progressive chaps they are, some rooms were rented out for the Jewish youth of tomorrow, today. Whatevs. I’m sure this place has some killer ghost stories attached to it, like the one about the ghost of Old Mrs. Grossman who still roams these halls looking for her shower cap. “Giiiive meeee myyy caaaap, chiiildreenss!”

The camp’s director Uncle Shmoigle introduces me to a sea of curly haired 10-13 year olds. About half of them are wearing little inhaler necklaces. Shmoigle stepped aside so the campers and I could get better acquainted. The sea parted (haw) as I stepped off the 2x3x1 foot “stage” and tried to mingle. No one really said anything, so now I had to summon my non-existent journalism skills.

“So, what do you guys like about Jewish camp?”

No one really reacted. They just stared at me until one kid, Noah Behrs, who I later learned was the major player at Kimama Modin, spoke up. “Um…no parents?” He hazarded a guess. I thought he was trying to see if there was a right answer. In reality he was just placating a stupid question.

“K, k. So….what’s the coolest thing about being Jewish?” Fuck that was stupid. The kids made it a point to mention how gay I was right before leaving to go canoeing or just some general fuck-off-ery. Only one kid stayed to give me “the scoop” on camp life here; the most pathetic little wisp of a human who by all reason should have died in kindergarten by the herd mentality of Natural Selection. His name was David Weiss and if he wasn’t an incubator baby, his existence at least gave those kids something tangible to aim for. Nothing quite like a person with the body of a Muppet wearing a Hawaiian shirt feeling sorry for you.

He showed me the haps around camp: the docks, the arts and craft place, the math-letes’ training center. We had to keep stopping so David could catch his breath or get rid of the tiny pebbles that got caught in his sandals. Of course he was wearing black socks.

Dinner that night was an old-fashioned, rustic hotdog roast- of Hebrew Nationals steam cooked in the kitchen and then brought out on trays. Entertainment that night was a showing of Wedding Crashers on the projection screen.

Lights out. The campers all went to bed and I retired to the spare cot in a giant storage closet they gave me. I used a mop head for a pillow. As I laid there thinking what a huge fucking waste this whole trip was my nose picked something up. My eyes widened and I was instantly aroused by the familiar, dank odor of burning cannabis. I jumped out of cot, threw on a pair of jeans and a wife beater and pulled a Toucan Sam to the back of the building where Noah and the Cool Jew Crew (they didn’t actually call themselves that) were hitting a fairly decently wrapped blunt.

The saw me coming around the corner and started to panic. “Oh shit oh shit!” screamed Rebecca Wiener, the uber-JAP in the group.

“Freeze!” I shouted at them. I was so excited. I angrily marched up to them, totally playing the authority card. “What’s going on here?! Huh?! What is that!?” No one spoke. “Gimme that!” I grabbed their blunt. The timing on this couldn’t have been more perfect. I just paused for the slightest moment, drinking in their anxiety as they prayed to God for a way out of this alive. Then I took a huge, calm drag like something out of a cigarette commercial from the 50’s.

“Marijuana,” I started. “I can’t believe you kids would be out here, smoking marijuana…” I looked around.

“without me!”

It was like I detonated an A-bomb that gave off exasperated sighs that seemed to say “ya got me, asshole. Good joke.”

The rest of the night was pretty epic. We smoked up, went for a late night dip in the lake, broke some shit, and I even heard that after we all packed it in for the night, Rebecca decided to retire with Noah in his room where she gave him all kinds of blow jobs.

I always knew something sinister happened at Jewish Camp. To compare and contrast with Jesus Camp: The religious vibe was so minimal it was almost secular. Enlightenment was reached through drugs, not prayer. Similar things can be said about proselytizing. The only time God was mentioned followed by a lot of crying was when Noah’s girlfriend Heather found out about Rebecca she screamed “oh god damnit!” and ran sobbing into the bathroom at breakfast.

Notable Gods of Thunder

2009-04-07T11:01:00.001-07:00

Since our humble origins as French cave people, humans have always revered thunder. So much so that we worship the stuff. But not all thunder gods are equal. Some are more equal than others.

Thor
I call bullshit on him. Vikings worshiped this guy. Vikings; the 10th century murdering, pillaging, raping pirates whose idea of heaven is an eternity of murdering, pillaging and raping. So why is the Ultimate form of the Norse god of thunder a political and social activist who writes self-help books? I mean, common. He used to be a psychiatric nurse (nurse?!) Why not make the character a 110lb art history major that listens to Moby while you’re de-balling him? Dude should be a Hell’s Angel or an ex-fire fighter that responded to 9/11. Totally grizzled. Anyway, he wields the magic hammer Mjolnir that supposedly only allows select individuals to lift. But in Ultimate Avengers, Bruce Banner Hulked out so hard he actually lifted Mjolnir and chucked it in Thor’s face. Ultimate Thor sucks.

Jupiter
You have to give credit to the Romans when talking about Jupiter. It’s one thing to adopt another person’s religion; is another to straight up steal it. I hear this guy liked to get drunk and then either fuck his relatives, fuck humans, or fuck with humans. My kind of god. Nothing quite like getting struck by lightning and being reduced to a pile of smoldering ash just because some drunk asshole thought it was funny. To be fair, it was pretty funny. You should’ve seen the look on your face. I hear it’s the same face Venus makes when Jupiter sticks it in her butt. Boo-ya! Pass me more wine (I’m drunk as shit right now)

Raiden
The Chinese god of thunder as imagined by Japanese code writers, Raiden entered Mortal Kombat on several occasions to prevent the forces of dark from taking over Earthrealm (what?). For a god that can shoot lightning from his hands and teleport instantaneously, he sure is a pansy. Liu Kang (think Bruce Lee meets a celibate Jackie Chan) beat him by dropping an arcade machine on his head. Dude got his ass kicked by a virgin. Fatality. You know who else are virgins? (Most) 12 year olds.

R. Lee Ermey

Michael “Mickey” Goldmill
While technically not a god, “Mick” was a member of the South Philly Jewish Community, the holiest of holy tribes in the greater Philadelphia area. It’s been said his mastery over the elements was so great that he could teach A Rock to “eat lightning and crap thunder” in the face of the almighty god of Light and Sun; truth and prophecy; The King of Sting; The Count of Monte Fisto, Apollo Creed.

Lion-O
I don’t know what the hell a Thundercat does besides fight mummies and look like Ziggy Stardust made out with He-Man at a Siegfried and Roy show, but Lion-O is the leader of the tribe/pack/whatever. If you thought a buff cat man mincing around in a girl’s bathing suit wasn’t gay enough, he also has a friend named Snarff, calls children “thunderkittens” and is literally a man-child. Like, he was a kid, was cryogenically frozen, and then his body rapidly aged into Dr. Frankenfurter’s wet dream on fetish night. Since this show is dripping with latent homosexual undertones, I’m gonna go right ahead and assume that thunder is the show’s reference for cocks. “Thunder. Thunder! THUNDERCATS! HO!”

Brontosaurus
El Brontosaurus Terrible is spanish for The Terrible Thunder Lizard. That’s not a nice thing to call a creature with an obvious eating disorder. Dudes are fat. They can't help that. It’s a defense mechanism; if you're too fat for predators to get their jaws around then you won't be eaten. That's science. These guys were definitely the subject of Jurassic era yo momma jokes. “Bitch so big she can eat a T-rex”. “Bitch so big that when she walks it thunders.” Yes, those are retarded. No shit. But I didn’t write them. Fred Flintsone did. He wrote them while he was using a brontosaurus as a backhoe

Commissioned Writing #1

2009-04-02T08:04:00.000-07:00

I was asked by a friend of mine to write a scathing review of some L.A. band called Love You Long Time. My friend is lucky; I hate their music too.

Here’s my review.

You know, the phrase “ironic hipster scenester bandwagon for unoriginal, uninspired white suburbanites” is thrown around a lot these days…

No, wait. This all needs context.

VH1 has done more to hinder creativity in the past 6 years than MTV has done in the past 25. The show I Love the 80’s is what happens when you completely run out of good ideas or just lack the mental dexterity to come up with better ones. Nobody genuinely loves the 80’s nearly as much as they love referencing shit from that era. Why? Because it’s ironic. Giant, feathered Farrah Fawcett hair and baggy leggings had the shelf life of bologna back then, back when that shit was actually supposed to be popular.

I don’t know if it’s this sense of hopelessness or Bush’s Reaganomics Part Deux shit-hurricane we just barely survived but people have decided to pine for “simpler” times, so they turned back to their 80’s childhood. After they sift through 8 thrift stores worth of old garbage and realize, “hey, remember how shitty and ugly these clothes were? We thought they were so cool back then” some genius (and they really are genius) realized the only effective way to rock that shit was to rock it ironically. That’s fine if you don’t mind your life becoming one big joke like you’re supposed to jump out in front of your friends waving jazz hands going “Ta-daaa!”

(While I’m on the subject, fuck you Seth McFarlane. Your cartoons are nothing more than a bunch of references to G.I. Joe and The Breakfast Club. Go marry your voice which you’re so fucking in love with).

The interesting thing about this 80’s revival crap (which just smacks of “listen to your inner child; what’s he saying?”) is that it actually keeps time. If 3 years passes in the real world, you need only dig through 3 less layers in a Salvation Army box to be fashionable. It is now 1991. Enter: Love You Long Time (original name: Me Put Pee-Pee in Your Coke)

Now here’s a band that’s the end result of Naughty By Nature throwing up on an electroclash Kelly Bundy. Nothing quite like copying, whoops, re-inventing, period music. It’s fucking period music! Which is fine if you like half-assed old school hip-hop. They can’t compare to my band Slow Drag Cakewalk. We take it past old school all the way back to first school with our ragtime piano jams circa the 1900’s (while in black face). Each show ends with us pouring a 40 for a fallen homie Scott Joplin.

Ok. The keytar. Here’s what I have to say about the keytar. It’s funny for about 2 seconds, but their songs are substantially longer than that. If it wasn’t one big joke and they genuinely liked the sound it made, they could have at least been original by jerry-rigging a Casio/duct tape keytar knock off instead of spending weeks asking every music store and garage sale in L.A. if they carried one of the gayest instruments ever invented. But it’s ok to be gay. It’s ironic.

These guys need to rock-and-roll the fuck out of Irony Town and board the Talent train heading for Why-Anyone-Outside-Your-Insulated-Faux-1991-Wigger-Scene-Should-Give-A-Shitville.

Look, if you sincerely like this kind of stuff, fine. If this music appeals to you or you simply think I’m a bitter, humorless dick who is just jealous, I’m cool with that. But remember: just because you like something does not prevent it from being objectively retarded. I would know. I like the movie Bio-Dome. I can’t wait to see what band apes it in 5 more years.

You Lucky Bastards

2009-04-01T06:33:00.000-07:00

Today is April Fools day. I thought for today’s entry I would stage a huge breakdown, call out all the personal foibles of my 4 subscribers (I’m surprised I have any) and then pretend I was quitting comedy because it wasn’t immediately going anywhere. Then, I would end it with a big “AAAAAAAAAPRIL FOOOOOOOOOOOOLS!!!”

I realized that was kinda lame. It’s a very Mark-esque idea, if you know what I mean. My friends would see that coming a mile away. I need to stay ahead of the curve.

I figure, why not mess with people online? God bless the man who invented Omegle. They distilled online interaction (eg: facebook, myspace, blogs, twitter, message boards) into its purest form. Click and start chatting with a stranger instantly. And then immediately fuck with them.

Connecting to server...
You're now chatting with a random stranger. Say hi!
You: hey
Stranger: How's you stranger?
You: hows it going
You: not so good.
You: yourself
Stranger: Not bad thanks, why so sad?
You: im not sad. im on a hospital computer
You: they have one computer in each patients room
Stranger: What have you done? I'm in on Friday to have an unjection in my spine. Owch!
You: i was hit by a drunk driver last night
Stranger: Really..
You: yeah
Stranger: You sure?
You: why is it they are always the ones to walk away
Stranger: They're pissed
You: the fuck do you mean "am i sure"? am i sure i have two broken legs and head scabies? yeah im pretty fucking sure of that
You: arsehole
Stranger: I'm so sorry.
You: whatever. lets move on. i dont want to get upset
Stranger: You must have hit by the twat truck
You: Id love to collide with a giant drunk vagina. It might explain my head scabies
Your conversational partner has disconnected.

Connecting to server...
You're now chatting with a random stranger. Say hi!
Stranger:
...................... ........................................,-~~'''''''~~--,,_
...................... ..................................,-~''-,:::::::::::::::::::''-,
...................... .............................,~''::::::::',::::::: :::::::::::::',
...................... .............................::::::,-~'''___''''~~--~''':}
...................... .............................':::::: : : : : : : : : : : : : :
...................... .............................:::::: : :-~~---: : : -----:
...................... ............................(_''~-': : : : : : : : :
...................... .............................'''~-,: : : : : : ~---': : : :,'--never Gonna
...................... .................................,: : : : : :-~~--: : ::/ -----give You
....................... ............................,-''':: :'~,,_: : : : : _,-'
....................... ......................__,-';;;;;:''-,: : : :'~---~''/
....................... .............__,-~'';;;;;;/;;;;;;;: :: : :____/: :',__
......................... .,-~~~''''_;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;',. .''-,::::::::. . ;;;;''-,__
........................ /;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;,;;;;;;;;;. . .''::::::::. .,';;;;;;;;;;''-, ........................,' ;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;. . .:::::,'. ./;;;;;;;;;;;;;
......................,-'';;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;',: : __. . .;;;;;;;;;,';;
....................,-";;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;',;;;;;;; ;;;; . . :::. . .'',;;;;;;;;;;/
.................../;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; ;;;. .:::. . . ;;;;;;;;/
................./;;,-';;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;,';;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;,;;;;;;; ;;;. .:/. . . .;;;;;;;;
.............../;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;,;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; ;;;;;;;'',: ;. . . . ;;;;;;;
...........,~'';;;;;;;;;; ;;;;;;;;;;;,-'';;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;.;. . . . .;;;;;;;
.......,~'';;;;;;;;;;;;;; ;;;;;;;;,-';;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;',;;;;;; :. . . . ;;;;;;;
......,';;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; ;;;;;;;/;;;,-';;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;,;;;;; :. . . .';;',;;;;;
.....;,-';;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;,-';;;,-';;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;,;;;; :. . .,';;;;;',;;;;_
..../;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;,-'_;;;;;;,';;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; ;.:. . .;;;;;;;;;;;''''~-, .../;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;/_'',;;;,';;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; ,;; :. . ./;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;- ../;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;,-'...;;,;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; ;;;;; :._,-
You: is that thomas jefferson?
Stranger: rick astely
You: was he a founding father too?
Your conversational partner has disconnected.

(Sorry, that one was kinda fudged. You get the idea).

Connecting to server...
Looking for someone you can chat with. Hang on.
You're now chatting with a random stranger. Say hi!
Stranger: hi?
You: hi
Stranger: how are you today?
You: why the question mark
Stranger: I'm new to this
You: oh...ive been better. yourself?
Stranger: I'm well. Are you feeling stressed out over something?
You: no, no. its just april fools day and ive been pranked pretty hard already
Stranger: What was the prank?
You: i woke up, to my mom standing over me. she punched me in the face, said "April fools!" pause, "youre adopted", no april fools and then told me to stop crying
Your conversational partner has disconnected.

Connecting to server...
Looking for someone you can chat with. Hang on.
You're now chatting with a random stranger. Say hi!
Stranger: slaut
Stranger: salut
You: you callin me a slut?
Stranger: no
Stranger: salut it's hi in french
Stranger: ^^
Stranger: not slut
You: go back to africa
Stranger: oh
Stranger: i would like
Stranger: you want to go with me?
You: depends
Stranger: depends on what?
You: depends on how cheap those gorilla paw ash trays are
You: i wanna pick up a dozen
Stranger: okay adolph
Stranger: ^^
You: pfff. prude
Your conversational partner has disconnected.

Last one

Looking for someone you can chat with. Hang on.
You're now chatting with a random stranger. Say hi!
Stranger: hi thar
You: hi!
You: asl?
Stranger: not the stranger again lol
Stranger: 18/male/britain u?
You: your the stranger lol
Stranger: ^^,
You: 14/f/AMERRRRRICA
Stranger: cool
Stranger: u ?
You: can i aks you a bitsh question?
Stranger: go for it
You: is it true they shit there but dont flush?
Stranger: no thats faulse we do flush
You: loooooool
Stranger: >:) lol
You: then why do euripeans smell like shit
Stranger: i dont know probs because amercans arnt used to us
Stranger: and there for smell worse
Stranger: lol
Stranger: =D
Stranger: we have losed the game
You: i heard we give afrika condums all the time so i think we should give europe soap the same way
Stranger: na we have our own soap and its not made from man fat
You: idgi
Stranger: lol
Stranger: ^^
You: hey british man, guess what?
Stranger: what
Stranger: ??
You: youre a dickless nutless poofter
You: PEACE
You have disconnected.

Drug Wars

2009-03-31T08:43:00.001-07:00

10/4/08
I landed on a steaming piece of tar-mat on the edge of the Dorian Gap at 2300 hours today on what was my first active day of duty in this 40 year long war. Seriously. It’s been 40 years since Nixon first declared that drugs were the problem in 1969 and that we, the imperial, invincible America, would be bringing the fight to the drugs. I hopped off the Blackhawk and quickly fell into formation along with my other FNG’s. That, I quickly learned, stands for Fucking New Guy. Our CO (commanding officer) Col. Pabst, a huge keg of a man, greeted us. He welcomed us to the Colombian Theater and said we had it fucking easy because the marijuana presence here was way lower than what our buddies in Puerto Penasco, Mexico were fighting. There was only one known weed group operating that we, under any circumstances, did not want to cross. Coke and smack levels were about even. Col. Pabst said he’s been down here fighting since “Smells Like Teen Spirit was relevant” whatever that means. The drugs we were hunting move by day, so we were advised to get our asses to camp, aka, the cooler, make some friends and get some shut eye.

I met some of the other guys in the group; there was Bud and Miller, a couple of Joe-six packs like myself. There were some raspy guys named Camel, Marlborough and Virginia Slim. They seemed pretty cool. Then was also Daniels, Bean, Adams, a guy calling himself Magic Hat, this one real ugly guy we all started calling Dogfish Head, and a bunch of others. This guy Adderall was a fucking madman. He reminded me of the coke stories I was told back home something awful.

10/5/08
Our first patrol ended in a disaster. We lost 31 men.

10/6/08
I’ve taken some time out from what I saw. I’m just now able to organize my thoughts into coherent sentences. So much happened so fast in such a short amount of time, it’s hard to process that kind of horror. The fact is, after this all happened, I needed a stiff drink. I needed it like I need to get the hell out of here.

Yesterday we stepped into the bush. We were on a search-and-destroy recon; there were sightings of some keys of coke located 2 clicks from our perimeter. As deftly as one can move in that fucking shitty ass jungle, organized ourselves into position to ambush a small jeep that had a coke driver behind the wheel. He wasn’t moving. The last thing I remember thinking was “…this isn’t right.”

It was a trap. All of a sudden it started raining cocaine. It was like goddamn Berserker Christmas in the jungle. They opened fire on us, lighting up the whole place. Some guys fell instantly. We fired back wildly. One of the coke guys descended from his hiding place way up in the trees and grabbed Dogfish by the face. His powdery hand pushed way up Dogfish’s nose, and then pulled out again. Dogfish stood there for a second, in the middle of all gunfire and rocket explosions. I could see his breathing getting faster, and faster, and faster. His eyes slowly widening to the size of TV screens. Blood trickled out of his nose. He let out his final sound, a scared, angry yell, before his heart ruptured and his chest exploded.

An enemy rocket landed 10 feet away and blew me into the clearing. I rolled up the jeep and stopped when my head made a metallic smack against the door. Christ it hurt. I was disoriented, not sure of who was what and where I am and when I was. Nothing made sense. I did notice the coke driver of the jeep, the one who led us all into a false sense of security. He was dead. His own buddies killed him just so they can lure us all here.

My men made their way into the clearing, which was the stupidest thing imaginable. Now the enemy could see us and pick us off at their leisure while we stood around with our tabs up our asses.

Those sick fucks. They sent smack into the clearing, just to toy with us. It is still inconceivable to me how those guys moved so slow and at the same time were so fucking hard to hit. I’ve never seen anything like it. Their extraneous body movements seemed to border premeditation; they dodged bullets! They were dodging fucking bullets. One made it up to Bud and pierced his can with a needle. Bud’s eyes rolled back, foam poured out of his mouth, and died before his body hit the floor.

And then things got worse. Weed came here to party.

I now know why Col. Pabst said to look out for these guys. They were the ninjas of the jungle. Against the forest background they could appear, deal heavy damage, and disappear in a cloud of smoke without a trace. It was hard to detect weed. We must have stood out like the loud, boorish Americans we were. There was a lot of hate in their eyes. I think they felt resentful for the way they have been treated in our country over the past 4 decades after living peacefully there for centuries. Never ever give the person you are fighting a reason to fight. That is a fight you cannot win. They let us know exactly how they felt by making it rain lead.

The only one who seemed completely normal was Adderall. He was in his element. “Common you faggots! They’re all around us! Nowhere for them to escape to! Ahahaha!” He was mad. It was hard to hear him over the omnipresent gun fire.

I was amazed at how well the enemy fought for being simple, home grown country bumpkins. The boys and I were all backed by huge, privatized, billion dollar industries. It just didn’t make any sense.

The only way some of us were getting out of there was if we charged the jungle and made our way back to camp. Otherwise we would all die. Col. Pabst lead the way. He immediately got shot; fluid started to gush from the wound. The pressure change was so great that the fluid forced a tap in his head to open and before you could say “last call” his insides were as empty as this war we were fighting. I got drenched in Col. Pabst.

As I was running through the jungle I had Adderall and Virginia Slim by my sides. A stray bullet tagged slim in his butt. Adderall and I dragged him 2 clicks through the shitty fucking jungle at full speed, with him shrieking like a little girl, until we made it back to the cooler.

I got a cold wrap bandage around my head; Adderall got a bigger gun out of the munitions chest; Virginia slim got lucky. We were part of the handful that made it back alive. After a few days, word is we will be getting some FNGs to replace the men we lost. When I heard we are heading straight back into the jungle, I went straight to the alcohol serving station to forget that I'm stuck here for 18 months. I’ve been there ever since.

Lost in the Woods: The GOP

2009-03-30T10:26:00.000-07:00

The early spring sun hovered just above the horizon. Soon it would be pitch black; even the moon and stars would be blocked out by the twig canopy of the trees. In the mean time, long, ominous shadows were cast in this remote part of the Appalachian Mountains. They were hiking the trail, but decided an off-beat path was the most direct route to Interstate 66, which would have led directly to Constitution Avenue in Washington.

“Maverick!” Sarah Palin exclaimed. “Isn’t that what they call you, John? Fucking Maverick? Like you’re in fucking Top Gun? Thanks to you we are all gonna die out here. Thanks, John. Thanks a lot.” Palin was constantly stumbling. With every step she took, the heel of her stilettos sank deep into the moist soil.

“Jesus Christ, I thought you knew what you were doing. Did being tortured make you forget all your Vietnam survival training or are you just a senile old piece of mummy shit!”

“Back off,” John McCain started. “You Arctic hillbilly she-wolf. So help me…if you don’t stop your incessant bitching I will end you. Right here. In front of Jindal, Steele and God I will fucking end your life.”

“Yeah I’d like to see your decrepit body just try and”- Sarah began, but was cut short when she tripped over a tree root. She landed face down in the cakey mud. Jindal and Steele rushed over to help her up. John McCain remained inanimate. He loomed over the scene disapprovingly with his arms crossed and neck tie serving as a makeshift headband; its tail caught in the wind. Michael Steele copped a quick feel of Palin’s ass.

“Off me…GET OFF ME YOU NOBODIES!” Sarah was now in full-blown crying tantrum mode. “I never wanted any of this! I used to be in beauty pageants! I was a somebody! But you, you, assholes had to drag me out here! It’s all your fault! Now my hair’s a mess, my clothes and makeup are ruined, my daughters a mommy and everyone thinks I’m stupiiiiiiii”- her rant cut off by her own, uncontrollable sobbing.

“Please, don’t cry Sarah. It’s going to be alright. Everything is going to be fine” Said Bobby Jindal. McCain snorted “this is bullshit” under his breath while Steele remained ominously silent.

“Oh, what the hell do you know, Apu? You sound like a cross between Clarice Starling and Kermit the goddamn Frog. Get the fuck out of my country.”

“Ms. Sarah, please” Jindal pleaded.

“’Oh yehs yehs, verry goot. Verry goot. Yoo dumb fellow, Mr. Obama. Yoo verry verry dumb. I quit your policies. I quit them 1000 times!’ you fucking paki.”

McCain grew tense. “Quiet, the both of you. Shut up. It’s getting dark. We need to start a fire if we’re going to survive this.”

Steele finally found the balls to talk. “Yes, brilliant thinking. True innovation. I agree with and fully support John on this idea.”

“Ok, good. Bobby, come here and give me your matches. We’re gonna clear a pit for a fire and camp around it for the night. Sarah, if you can manage to keep your fucking mouth shut for 5 minutes that would greatly help all of us. Michael, go out and find some fire wood.”

“Heeeeeey,” Steele pouted as his face sank. “I’m supposta be leadin’ this expedition.”

“Just shut up and do it you fucking cracker.”

…………………………………………………

It was day 6 and there was still no sign of civilization. The group was wearing very thin; thin on food, thin on energy, thin on hope. The only things they had an over abundance on were flies, skin rashes and hate. The sun was looking directly down on their heads as they baked in their own stew. The only one who seemed complacent was Steele. He was waiting for sweet release of death, and he anticipated it with a knowing smirk.

McCain was at his breaking point. He’s been in this situation before, holed up in the Hanoi Hilton where desperate men did desperate things. The next move was his, and he made this play before. Through his beady eyes he sized up his comrades. Jindal was lean and stringy, but still full of life. Taking him down would be a difficult challenge. Someone that young and strong would surely serve as a better ally than enemy. For now.

Palin was out like a doped up disco queen, sprawled out over a fallen log, muttering nonsensical half-phrases to herself, completely oblivious to the world around her. Easy prey. But a mildly attractive lady whose body can still put out, and certainly in her present, absent minded condition, would be a very powerful trading tool should they ever make it to the road and barter with a lonely, horny trucker. Better save her.

That just left Steele. Poor, poor, flabby, dopey Steele. He wasn’t even supposed to be here. And no one would ever miss him. He’s an idiot. Just look at him. That bald fucker actually said “bling” in a press conference. The imbecile.

“Pssst, Bobby. Bobby” McCain whispered. “Bobby, this has gone long enough. We need to feed. We need energy to sustain ourselves.”

“Yes, Senator. I agree with your logic. It’s very good logic. But there’s just one little problem: There’s nothing around to eat.”

“Oh I think we can find….something.” McCain stared directly at Steele, who was staring directly at the sun, smiling. Jindal wearily followed McCain’s line of sight to Steele. His eyes widened when John’s plan dawned upon him.

“No…”

“Yes.”

“No, John you can’t be serious.”

“Oh…oh Jesus. Oh Jesus!” Palin was talking in her sleep.

“Serious as one of my heart attacks.” He licked his lips. “Look, you’re new here, so let me explain to you how politics work. The goal is to not to do a great job; the goal is to just do the job. It’s all about survival. That is how this country is run and has been running since 1492. You do what you must to survive in this business. You do what needs to be done.”

The word “business” echoed in Jindal’s mind. “And if that means throwing someone under the bus, you just do it? Moral consequences be damned? Legal ramifications…fuck ‘em?”

“We’ll first off, we’re not just throwing him under the bus. I have nothing but the greatest respect for the tools I use. Think of this as, well, more of a sacrifice. He will be a sacrifice to our party. He goes down so that the rest of us may rise. And shit, son. Consequences and ramifications don’t mean diddly poop when you’re as powerful as us. Besides, he’s not a survivor. He was bound to die on this track anyway.”

Jindal took a moment to soak up everything that’s been said. In this dire situation, no one was safe. He accepted that this was the worst of Murphy’s Law and Natural Selection combined, even though is convictions as an Evangelical denounces both of those processes. He stared at Steele, and Steele stared back, smiling.

“Bling bling, my homies” said Steel out loud.

“Alright,” Jindal whispered to McCain. “You go high and I’ll go low. Still have that Bowie knife Barbra Bush gave you?”

“Right above my Wingtips.” He was referring to the knife holster on his right ankle.

“When I say Go, I’m going to rush him and pin him to the tree. You follow and when you get the chance, slice the pig’s throat.”

“Spill his blooooood!” Palin wailed.

“On my mark…” Jindal started. “Get set…” McCain’s eye involuntarily twitched.

“What’s crackin’, dawgs?”

“Go!”

Unused Facebook Quizzes

2009-03-25T07:16:00.000-07:00

The world is constantly becoming more fucked. Obama pledges economic recovery that will not come any time soon. Thai troops cross into Cambodia, thereby starting an international incident. Seven die and nine are wounded in an attack in Afghanistan. And as a sign of how bad the economy is, Japan’s February exports were halved this year.

But here’s the worst thing:

Facebook has a new layout and oh my god it is so ugly and shitty.

It’s as if facebook did everything in its power to become more like its biggest social networking rivals, Myspace and Twitter. Because, hey, fuck originality. The site’s homepage is now a barrage of all the mundane, stupid nonsense status updates your friends manage to squeeze into their incredibly important and busy day. It’s 9:30 AM. How the fuck am I supposed to care, at all, even one tiny little bit, that you “want to be back in bed sleeping”? EVERYONE wishes they didn’t have a job and got to spend all day sleeping in and watching Lost. Welcome to America.

I hate the ubiquitous quizzes that seem to have popped up over night like a bad case of acne. Can they possibly be any more unoriginal and uninspired? They are in the same vein as that “25 things you may not know about me” thing that floated around a while ago that was ripped straight from the 2005 Myspace Play Book. I’m just glad there were some quizzes so bad they didn’t make the grade.

What Type of Nokia Product Defines Your Lifestyle?

The Most Likely Reason Someone Will Leave You

What Are You Born to Do, Circa Europe 1355

Which The Andy Milonakis Show Character Are You?

How You Should Die

The Quiz on Quantum Mechanics

How “Delaware” Are You?

Which Nickleback Song Are You?

BBQ or Honey Mustard?

How Well Do You Know Canadian History?

Fo’ Realz?!

Type Your Full Name, Birth Date and Social Security Number

Which Sexual Fetish Are You?

Which 1977 House of Representatives Bill Are You?

Am I Sitting In Front Of A Computer, Right Now?

Test Your Coke/Crack/Heroin IQ

Back to Nature

2009-03-23T11:51:00.001-07:00

Enough conservative bashing. I’m going after hippies today, the filthy, retarded, lazy, drum circle playing, incoherent, hemp-covered tree-gypsies. I can’t wait until this site goes viral. I want to see the look on their crunchy faces when I knock ‘em down a peg. A peg that’s on their ladder made out of fallen branches. And tied together with hemp. And used to hang PETA slogans on a McDonald’s.

I agree with two of their major decrees: don’t be a dick, and “hey hey hey smoke weed every day”. Other than that, I have about as much in common with them ideologically as I do with Mugabe.

One of the biggest pieces of shit made from digested Burt’s Bees products they try to slip by us is The Nature argument. That’s when things are automatically better because they’re from nature. Sorry, “Silver Moon” (real name Thomas Silverstein). Mother Nature is a cross between the mom from Carrie, East German monster doms, and the worst camping trip you’ve ever been on. Nature is brutal. Everything can kill you; weather, lack of food, lack of survival skills, parasitic insects, poisonous plants, brain fungi. Common, a goddamn coconut falling from a tree can kill you.

I’m not saying we should burn every piece of unspoiled land to the ground and turn the world into one big strip mall. I just want to point out what hypocrites hippies are when it comes to living in nature. First, let’s compare the peoples of the world who actually do live in sync with nature; native Indian tribes in the Amazon, pygmy hut villages in Africa, and hillbilly families in the Ozarks. They are all dirt poor hunter/gatherers, superstitious, and raging drunks. (No lie. They all know how to make a bit of the shine. Alcohol is a great way to cope with omnipresent death).

Hippies don’t drink. Hippies go camping in state parks at designated camp sites. Hippies buy their food at farmers markets with money their parents give them as an allowance. Hippies are the sons and daughters of rich white people who were afforded the luxury of rebellion. Hippies love Phish but don’t eat meat, which is great when they tell us which cows we should and should not eat. “Don’t eat cows that have been fed antibiotics!” What? Oh shit that’s right. Antibiotics aren’t natural, but fucking cows dying of bacterial infections are. Nuke the shit out of the meat and your burrito is good to go.

“Don’t eat Frankenfood!” Frankenfood, by the way, is their cute little saying for genetically engineered food. Sorry, I like it when my food is bigger, uses less sunlight to grow and is pest-resistant. Hippies said bye-bye to real academics (re: science) since they discovered pot in 7th grade, so anything involving The Corporations is bad and that includes the evil science super lab Monsanto. So boo genetic engineering! Hell, why not go after dog breeding while they’re at it? Dog breeding is a form of genetic engineering. It’s just way more fun to watch in action.

Of course there can be scores written about how evil and reckless progress, technology, and the industrial revolution are. Duh. But this isn’t about them. Right now, it’s about the annoying tambourine space-clowns known as the hippies and their misguided attempts to save something worthwhile. They’re all heart and no brain. [Wizard of Oz joke]. Fuck them.

Rejected Blog Ideas

2009-03-20T10:10:00.000-07:00

First off, I hate made-up words like “blog”. Saying or typing it makes me feel like some middle aged jackass who wears a shirt that says “blogosphere” and regurgitates every single CNN talking point from gay marriage to gay baby adoption (the adoption of gay babies). I fucking hate it and just needed to get that off my chest. Shoot me if I ever get Twitter.

Second, this blog (ugh) is written the exact same way my band The Mildreds used to write songs. We would come up with a title first and then write a song to accompany it. Sure, we would get backed into a creative corner every 5 out of 7 times, but the ones we kept were really different, fun and had a certain, “je ne sais quoi”; a real “what the fuck?” feel to them.

Below are some ideas that could have come to fruition if they were either better ideas or I was a better writer. In all likelihood, both.

Pope Judd Nelson I – An archbishop recounts living and serving under a man who has the ego of the Pope combined with the ego of the badass heartthrob from The Breakfast Club. Stupid, referency 80’s shit “hilarity” ensues. He declares condoms and Airheads to be sins against God.

Have I Got Some Shit to Sell You! – Monologue of a rude salesman attempting to sell useless products of poor quality. Use Billy Mayes as inspiration. Products may include disposable glasses, “Miracle Cream” (petroleum jelly and lard) and books on how to unlock The 8 Trigrams of Successful Stock Market Predicting. All the products are made in Taiwan.

Masturbating in Public Isn’t Cool – PSA style commercials aimed at the 12-18 demographic, trying to detour kids from ruining their lives (and someone’s day). Consider a talking animal mascot in sunglasses who skateboards. “Radical” is said no less than 5 times.

Pre Rapture Ministries Glances into the Sewers of False Christianity – Must include the sentence, “Let’s have a look at what that old devil is up to in his false church(s) [sic].” Consider ripping lines verbatim from West Borough. Design entry to look like Web 1.0 as much as possible. Invent books of the bible and quote them (The book of Danny; Kevin’s big book of Fun; Saxby: War Journal).

The Forgotten Muppets – List of bios and short stories of Muppets that fell by the wayside for their various personal shortcomings (whores, pills, horse racing, etc.). They should be made out of inferior material, like a raincoat and Styrofoam cups. One is removed for assaulting a child on The Muppet Show. One is removed for inappropriately touching Miss Piggy on Muppet Babies.

Trip Report: Full English Breakfast – The meal consists of lard, eggs, sausages, mushrooms, bacon, liver of lamb, black pudding, baked beans, tinned tomatoes, bread, and Stella Artois. All are fried in lard except the Stella. Halfway through I feel sick and trippy; ends with me having violent diarrhea and permanent hypertension. At some point I pass out and see the face of God.

Post-Modern Conceptual Free Jazz Performance Art

2009-03-19T07:59:00.000-07:00

What’s shaking brothers and sisters?. The man calls me Peter Johnson, but I dig the handle Jack Happening. I’m gonna lay down some of my soul for you here tonight at Starbucks. So lay back, open your third eye and prepare for the crest of a wave that will never break. Yo, Dean! Lay down a mean beat. Gimme a fat slice!

*a man starts to play the bongos*

Clickety-clack goes the cat on the train tracks of life
a-swish-swishing his tail defiantly
in the face of the bourgeoisie guard dog
that bitch
*snaps fingers twice*

*bongo playing ends*

Cool, cool. Coolsville. Coolio. Cool and the gang. Straight L.L. Cool J. Alright. Now I’d like to be hip to the times and present some of my art pieces. This scene’s about to bust-out, man. This first one is in honor of the great Boondogler-in-Chief. It’s called, “Bush is a Nazi”

See, I used swastikas to represent Nazis. And Bush to represent Bush. Like, it’s all about how Bush is a nazi for all that dicey stuff he did. Right? He’s a drag, man.

Right. Alright. Make no nevermind. This next one is called “Man’s Futility in the Face of the Void; Fuck Willem de Kooning”

The point of this piece is to challenge the square’s mentality on what art is. What I did was erase a Kooning piece. Is erasing another artist’s work a creative act, or is this creative only ‘cause the famous Jack Happening did it? Hey you, the chicky babe in the ugs. Yeah, the real sex-pot over there. You liked my piece, didn’t you?

*silence*

Fine then. I didn’t blow any minds. That’s cool, that’s cool. This’ll get me made in the shade. I know this will. It’s called, “Am I Blowing Your Mind?”

*someone shouts "too blurry!*

Alright. Fine. I’ve got one last thing for you all: a performance piece. It’s called “Fuck You, Starbucks Open Mic”

*takes off beret and places it on the ground*

*shits in beret*

*chucks shit filled beret into the audience*

*turns around and gives double back middle finger salute*

Peace out, Daddy-O!

Ghost Hunting

2009-03-18T08:03:00.001-07:00

I went to college in Williamsburg, Virginia. The place has some history. Colonial history. The white man, and even some Indians, have been dying there for centuries. And I’m talking about horrible, horrible deaths: dying while giving birth, a horse kicks to the head, small pox, malaria, and straight up genocide. It’s all so very quaint.

A famous murder that happened there occurred in the 60’s. At a prep school that is literally right next to colonial Williamsburg, a white janitor took 2 little black boys up to the school’s attic, held a faux trial (I think they were accused of being black) and then tortured them to death. It was Mississippi Burning meets Hostel meets the Nuremburg Trials.

And let’s not forget my alma mater, The College of William and Mary, the technically oldest college institution in America (fuck you, Harvard). The place once had the highest college suicide rate in the country, but now we’re number 2 (thanks, Cornell).

On top of all that, Williamsburg has a big retirement community, about a million graveyards, its own ghetto, which is literally, on the other side of the train tracks, and an abandoned mental hospital. The point is, Williamsburg is spooky. The place is enshrouded in a very charming cloak of death.

Every Halloween my friend Greta and I would get drunk and/or high and go ghost hunting. I miss that.

Luckily for me, there’s quite a haunted little place in NOVA that has some history. Before the area exploded with commerce, this region of the country was mostly farmlands that were used as battlefields in the Civil War. Which brings me to the Peterson Farmhouse.

The Peterson Farmhouse was erected in 1863, laying 10 miles northeast of Manassas. Old man Peterson was a Scots-Irish farmer who loved to regularly drink, beat his wife and molested his two daughters. Confederate troops would stop at the farmhouse, and for a small fee, use his wife and daughters at their discretion. One of his daughters, Emily, didn’t survive the war. She died under “mysterious circumstances”, but they say she was buried in the cellar. Years passed and the abuse continued until 1875. That’s when they say the ghost of Emily came back and murdered her whole family. The family’s bodies were found some time later, rotten and mangled. It wasn’t until 1933 when another farmer family bought the land and moved in. Now here’s the spooky part: the exact same thing happened. Drunk Scots-Irish farmer, abused family, dead daughter, more abuse, dead family. Then for a few years the house took on a few new roles. For a while it was a local morgue, a safe house for murderers, and a satanic church.

And guess what? The house is still there. Yup. It’s true. Only now a strip mall is on top of it. To be specific, a PetSMart (the one in Tall Oaks shopping center across from the Red Robin, next to that place where you can buy pool tables).

For my journey I brought along with me a tab of acid and a bottle of Thunderbird wine for company. At 11:30 PM I fell through the ceiling tiles of the PetSMart, dropped the acid tab and set off. Let’s find some fucking ghosts!

11:50 PM
Holy shit I am off! I knew I was descending into the spirit realm. Strange voices keep calling out to me. Towards the back where they keep the bags of cat litter I see a small girl. It’s Emily! She’s a glowing white image of a girl in a nightie. I hazard a greeting.

“’Sup?” She blankly stares at me. I look around for some sort of offering. Ghosts love offerings. I pick up a dog collar and put it on. It symbolizes identification and unwelcomed restraint.

“See? I’m down” I say. The little girl turned into a 15 foot, wolf-headed demon made out of blood and corpses. It lunged for me. I scream and run towards the door, leaving a trail of piss behind me.

12:45 AM
Everywhere I turned, there was a creature waiting to devour my soul. This world spinned and churned, engulfing me in all the pain and sorrow of existence.

“Turn back, now!”, the fish burble in their high pitched, aquatic voices. “Turn back!”

“I can’t! I fucking can’t!” I am trapped within the mouth of Hell, and I am forced to bear witness to all the horrors that await deeper inside the pit. Men were butchering men like hogs. Children were used as objects and then discarded as such. I saw a cat shit in a box.

2:00 AM
I was sealed within a burlap sack, surrounded by shadowy figures inside the corrosive, dark stomach of a giant beast. The figures loomed overhead, their will be my mercy. They were plotting what would be the first delightful torture in an infinite series of pain. I lose all control. Something within my mind snaps and I found myself climbing up the esophagus. Higher and higher, towards the hole in the ceiling I fell out of. I fell again. I fell and landed on my back. Everything went quiet. I no longer heard the demon chirps. I no longer heard what the iguanas were thinking. All I felt is a searing pain on the back of my head. I looked up. I saw God. I reached out and try to touch God’s big, wet nose. And then everything went black.

9:30 AM
The sun was shining through the sliding glass doors of the PetSMart. I woke up with the manager and two Fairfax County cops looming over me. An ambulance was outside. Waiting. A couple of animals were freely walking around, including 2 dogs, 9 cats and a tarantula. There was human shit everywhere.

“What the fuck happened?!” mustachioed cop # 1 asks me.

“Ghosts” I reply.

Mensa? More Like Mensuck, Amirite?

2009-03-16T10:30:00.000-07:00

There’s a secret cabal of people in this world that would make the illuminati and freemasons shit their pants. Instead of relying on bloodlines and whatever nonsense hazing rituals that go on in frat houses, Mensa has only one requirement for joining: you need to be in the 98th percentile of intelligence. Illuminati’s Johnny Hemophiliac or David Pissdrinker of Skull and Bones aren’t really kicking ass in the brains department (Mensa members know where a brain’s ass is). But they are lucky. Remember in the first sentence I used the word “would”? I snuck into a Mensa meeting and I must say, the 25 people who run the entire world don’t have to worry about anyone muscling in on their turf.

These meetings are a joke. What’s the point of all this brain power if all you do with it is pontificate about NOTHING and make terrible puns in a library conference room? Shit, build a bomb and hold the east coast hostage or something.

It’s true; you need to be smart to enter a Mensa meeting. You just don’t need to be a fucking genius. Here’s how you sneak in. There are two ways:

1) Go to Google. Type in “Mensa ID card”. Send it to your photoshop expert friend. Have him touch it up with your pic and info. Print it out. Laminate it.

2) Show up to a meeting wearing nice clothes; think Eddie Bauer casual business. BS your way in. When speaking, don’t use contractions.

These meetings were a complete load. Here are the minutes.

7:33 PM: The meeting officially starts 3 minutes late. There are 20 of us sitting at a table in a room meant for maybe 8. A middle aged man who looks like he’s never kissed a girl, aka, John Mark Karr, suggests we call ourselves “tardines”; one person sorta chuckles. He meant it to sound like a combination of “tardiness” and “sardines”. I wonder if he realized it sounded more like a retarded person being ironic by making fun of other retarded people.

7:40 PM: The fat guy in the room (which one? har har) keeps asking where the “brain balls” are. His 5-year-old-at-Disney-Land giddiness erupts into audible squeals when the group is finally presented with a box of donut holes. Relax, dude. They’re just Entenmann’s.

7:45 PM: The key to not being found out is to shut your stupid, inarticulate mouth up. We start playing word games like anagrams, palindromes and “observational haiku” (no using your fingers!). I’m asked if I have any palindromes. I say no, but I do have a new tongue twister. They all seem dully impressed with Dog God. Then someone notes that Dog God is indeed a palindrome and we all have an “oooooh shit” moment together.

7:56 PM: I write on a napkin, “Damn, there are a lot of uggos here.” The woman to my right turns to glare at me. I add, “They smell like cat piss and BO, too.”

8:08 PM: It is now intellectual time. Someone stands. It’s a fat, hairy guy wearing jorts and a t-shirt that says “friends don’t let friends derive drunk” with a picture of fucked up math equations. He is a grown ass man named Jimmy. Today is apparently his turn to decide this meeting’s lecture topic. He chooses “The Role of Women in Society”. Okay. Immediately he starts off with a tirade about the 17 year old girl working the counter at Starbucks. I’m not really listening but I know it has something to do with him being a creepy, lonely, ugly, fuck. He then suggests that we as a society should reverse women’s lib. and go back to the good ol’ days of arranged marriages where the most desirable men (i.e. men with high IQ's) are the ones who can make the most money and therefore should be paired with the most desirable women (i.e. hot Starbucks girl). It’s not selfish because their pairing would benefit the western world as a whole. I try not to laugh.

8:55 PM: At around 8:45 I am asked to read back the minutes from today’s meeting. I do. I read them everything you just read. I am asked never to come back again. I go out to my car and write up this last minutes report on the hood.

Stem Cells and the Quest to Clone Hitler

2009-03-13T07:51:00.000-07:00

The president used his political swagger this week to overturn a ban on stem cell funding, which naturally pissed off the conservative crowd. I’m glad he did. For starters, it really pisses off the conservative crowd; it’s the debate about abortion raised to the power of irony [stem cells = abortion^irony]. And the arguments! I read something like this on CNN’s message board:

“All stem cells will accomplish is killing a Jesus so we can clone another Hitler.” – NObama, Gainesville FL

I think the odds are stacked heavily against getting a Jesus Christ and favor winding up with another L. Ron Hubbard. Also, why is cloning Hitler such a bad idea? I think it’d be great! Let me explain.

For you to understand this position, you first need to know the history of stem cells.

They were discovered quite accidently by Nazis. Dr. Olaf Bouhler was performing routine experiments on Jewish prisoners in 1941. In them he was extracting the fetuses (feti?) from pregnant women 4 months prematurely to see how much dynamite a woman’s body cavity could hold. The pregnancy detritus, aka, the fetus, was simply discarded.

After a long, hard day of being a colossal asshole, Dr. Bouhler was about to leave the lab when he realized his pocket watch, a keepsake from his father, was missing. Could he have accidently dropped it? In “the bin”? The bin was more or less a dumpster for the fetuses (feti?). He looked in, but he didn’t find his watch. Instead he made the discovery of a lifetime: a human ear. It was a fully formed, adult, (left) human ear covered in fetus mucus. Later tests would prove that the mucus was a mixture of viscous fluids…and stem cells.

Immediately, the potential for stem cells was recognized. Word of the discovery made it all the way up to The Fuhrer. He commissioned one the greatest history’s mysteries of WWII. A process to ensure Hitler would be able to personally rule the Third Reich for the next 1000 years. It was known as Operation: Hitler Beyond.

After months of preparation, the experiment was ready. Into a giant crucible went 1000 Jew fetuses (feti?). The concoction bubbled and pooled, separating out the useless cells and leaving nothing more than 9 gallons of pure, steamy stem cell goodness. Mmmm mmmm. It was finally poured into a mold of Hitler. Soon, his new body would be ready. Soon he would have the body of Adonis, of Atlas, of God Almighty himself. The cells stirred. They took form. For days they reacted until finally, it was completed. Hitler raced to the lab where he discovered his brand new, 7 foot tall…human ear.

The 400 million dollar project was immediately terminated and then Hitler pulled a Kurt Cobain (or Cobain pulled a Hitler. Whichever).

Which brings us to the present day. Now we can actually clone Hitler! Why is this a good thing?

‘Cause he’s a dick!

Let’s clone Hitler…and beat the shit out of him. Every day. His life would be one great, big Spanking Machine. When he wakes up in his cramped, pest infested studio apartment in the Bronx, his alarm clock is a punch in the face. He shall never touch food that isn’t covered in spit. Thousands of school children will empty their classrooms and form a sea of kicks to the shin every time he steps out into the day.

It’s not like he’ll be just as powerful as he was in the 40’s. You really think another Nazi wave will sweep through? Have you seen Nazis these days? Go rent American History X. They’re all a bunch of inarticulate troglodytes who can’t even find Israel on a map. Plus, why would they follow Hitler after we tattoo the word “PENIS” across his forehead?

I think it’s a great idea. The best benefit though would be world peace. Can you imagine how well world leaders would get along if they took a break from negotiating to smack Hitler around with a hickory paddle?

“Well, Mr. Medvedev.” *whack* “We may not see eye-to-eye on,” *whack* “who lays claim to the oil deposits in the Arctic,” *whack* “but I must say,” *whack* *whack* *whack* “at least you’re no Hitler.” *whack*

“Jes. I am havink agreement with you.” *whack*

What a glorious world. Let’s bring on the stem cells and clone our asses a Hitler.

18th Century Hardcore Porn

2009-03-11T07:21:00.000-07:00

There’s a small part of me that genuinely enjoys listening to Evangelical, conservative voices in America. The way they talk, you’d get the impression that the society they want to turn the country into would mirror the damn 1950’s. You know, “a simpler time”, before the influence of sex, drugs and rock and roll. Everything was black and white, church-going, and there was no such thing as premarital sex. The only sex that went on was in the bedroom of a married couple (Man and Woman), where they would push their beds together and screw on Christmas day for the soul purpose of procreation. That’s why so many kids were born in September. This would happen twice in a couple’s lifetime because enjoying sex is a sin.

This is the world Ted Haggard and company wants us all to live in. In their eye, hippy boomers came along with their Free Love/Sexual Revolution/Women’s Lib jargon and completely ruined the fucking world forever. There are plenty of reasons to hate boomers and blame the end of the world on them, but their “sexual revolution” is not one of them. Dropping acid at Woodstock and fingering a stranger (Christ, the way boomers talk you’d imagine half of them were in the damn bands that played) does not count as a revolution.

Never mind the fact that the actual sexual revolution that occurred in this country happened 40 years earlier, by the boomers’ parents, in the 1920’s. Remember flappers, and dandies, and prohibition, and Al Capone, and Babe Ruth? That’s condensed, hot, 20’s sex right there.

Let’s go back even further! My 11th grade history teacher told us that the first person to be sentenced to death in the New World was for the crime of fucking a sheep! He was 17.

Hey-O!

There are thousands upon thousands of examples in history which show just how big a load of shit this “simpler time” stuff is those puritan pukes are constantly shoving down our throats. Here’s my favorite example:

In 1793 the world’s original dirty Frenchmen, The Marquis de Sade, wrote and published a book called Philosophy in the Bedroom. It’s the story of a 20 year old man, his 26 year old sister, and a 36 year old friend of theirs taking a 15 year old female student of the sister and turning her into a sex slave over the weekend. Delightful.

You can read the whole translated version of it here. It’s 144 pages in the form of a pdf. file. I made it 1/3 of the way through. In it they advocated the following; not just mentioned, but fucking did or explicitly said “________ is a great idea and you should do it all day, every day”:

-Sodomy (with both men and women)
-Lesbianism
-Fucking your siblings
-Fucking your parents/children
-Whoring yourself out (literally)
-MMM 3-ways
-MFF 3-ways
-Titty fucking
-Armpit fucking (???)
-Eating Pussy
-Eating Assholes
-Handjobs
-Fucking a minor
-Atheism
-BJ’s
-Eating Shit
-69ing
-S&M
-Reach arounds
-Poo stabbing (they took the time and energy to explain that when fucking someone’s ass, make sure they are on the verge of pooping)
-Killing your mother
-Killing the poor

Wow. Some of that stuff would make Larry Flint blush. Remember, this is just the first THRID of the story. I was reading it at work and I couldn’t finish it. It wasn’t too gross for me or anything like that. My raging hard boner wasn’t distracting my coworkers. And my coworkers Tuberculosis-like hacking wasn’t destroying my fantasy. I was afraid of getting caught. Which is stupid.

See, this was written in 1793. Have you ever read anything from that time period? Imagine reading the Preamble to the Constitution, but instead of it being one paragraph about what a great place America is going to be, it’s an entire story about hardcore fucking and pontificating about fucking, the death of God and murdering poor people. The language was dense, the grammar was impeccable, and I got semi-hard. I actually felt smarter having read it. Talk about a spoon full of sugar helping the medicine go down. This is a pixie stick that cures diabetes.

Like I said, I haven’t finished reading it yet, so I have no clue whether Mr. de Sade likes his characters or hates them. I don’t know if they fuck and it just ends, or if a homeless, God-fearing puritan guns the crew down in the bedroom, or if it was Old Man Hutchinson wearing the Miner 49’er mask, or if Bruce Willis is actually a ghost or what. I’ll save the ending for the week after my next girlfriend dumps me.

Movin’ Pictures: Watchmen

2009-03-10T07:24:00.000-07:00

Here’s my dilemma. Writing movie reviews should be funny. That’s priority number one. If I watch a bad movie, a real piece of shit, like, oh I don’t know, Valkyrie, then my job is easily accomplished. “This is a piece of shit. Here are examples of its shittiness. I would rather do shitty act #1 than watch Valkyrie, etc.” On the other end of the spectrum where immortal films like The Dark Knight reside, my job is just as easy. All the jokes are gay jokes about me wanting to blow everyone involved in the creation of the film. Simple.

Aside from Dr. Manhattan’s uncut, electric blue dong flashing across the screen multiple times, I don’t really know what to mention that’ll be funny. I feel that I am lucky to be part of a small group of people who were in just the right spot to see the film. See, I never read the Watchmen comic. I cheated. I read the entire Wiki article; I knew just enough not to be lost, but not enough to be pissed about continuity issues. It also didn’t hurt that I’m a huge geek and love superheroes.

The movie is never as good as the book. Ever. Come on, karate kid. Find one example where this isn’t the case and waste me. Jurassic Park, Dracula, Horton Hears a Who; even if the movie was fantastic, the book was better. So there’s no point in comparing the movie to the book unless the two are radically different. Watchmen drew from the best graphic novel of all time and was more or less faithful to it; the changes that I noticed seemed logical and fit well. In fact I would argue the movie ending fit a little better than the comic book ending.

I think I stumbled onto why the movie is getting the reviews it’s getting on RottenTomatoes

Acting: It was all very solid, but nothing mind blowing aside from Rorschach. By far the best acting and character in the film. Watchmen also had a Richard Nixon that was so bad it made the hairs on my neck stand up. It was so shitty that I wanted to immediately punch him.

Special Effects: Very cool and well done, but you can’t pound a script with a CGI hammer and expect it to turn into a diamond.

Script: (read the third paragraph again)

Directing: Look, I got a C in filmography, so I don’t really know what I’m talking about here. But I will say that for the most part, the directing was neither spectacular nor offensive. It had a good feel and look, but, I don’t know, it just wasn’t great. The best part, unfortunately, was the opening credits that are right after the first scene. That and Rorschach are the best parts of the movie. Done.

Maybe, the problem was the source material. Maybe Watchmen was just too ambitious of a project; something so vast and complex that a single movie could not do it justice, even if the running length is 2 hours, 43 minutes. Maybe I should just stick to reviewing shitty movies.

I give Watchmen 8/10 corgis. Go watch it.

The ABC's of Work, Part 3

2009-03-09T10:48:00.000-07:00

Retirement
You did it! You’ve reached the [tasteful] end of your job! Now you can spend the rest of your life on a boat in Boca Raton with your neighbor, the insurance salesman from Cleveland who fronts the regional Minutemen project and charters fishing trips. Oh sure, the first time you land a Striped Marlin/a floating oil drum raft loaded with Cubans, you say, to yourself, “this is it, I did it. I’m ‘livin’ the dream’,” but something happens. Little things start to remind you what it was like being a productive member of society; a crying Cuban child reminds you of your weekly paycheck, a bucket of chum reminds you of your boss. Then you realize just how worthless you are. Now who’s going to re-spool bobbins in the textile factory? How will those Margaritaville t-shirts ever get made without you? You go back to beg for your job but some puissant kid named Bobby took over Mr. Giuseppe’s job and he thinks you’re a crazy, old derelict. Which you are.

Sick Leave
We get maybe a week off with pay a year in this country. Christ, what are we, horses? Do the doctors covered by my HMO carry a shotgun?

Taxes
Europeans don’t bitch about taxes even though the percentage of their paycheck goign to taxes is high enough to shit off the moon. Know why? Two reasons: 1, the biggest expense we as Americans pay on average, health care, is free to them. Two, they haven’t created a disproportionate wealth gap from the rich to the middle class through tax breaks. Argh, the rich! *shakes fist*. I may sound sarcastic here, but common. Poor people don’t write and pass tax reform laws. Rich assholes do. Do you really think they would pass something detrimental to themselves? Of course not. They have no morals. Hell, half of them like to travel to Africa and shoot elephants for fun, so the idea of them looking out for the little guy through trickle-down economics is the biggest scam since Ozymandias.(Sorry, I just saw Watchmen).

U R FUN-E LOL
People over 50 just discovered how fun the internet can be, so somehow, they have the exact same mentality as 9 year olds who also just discovered how fun the internet can be. Pff. N00bs. Casual e-mail jokes from co-workers are as cringe-worthy as hearing your parents say “crunk”.

Vacation
Saying how little you get in a year is becoming redundant, so I’ll just focus on where and when to spend your precious 2 weeks. You’ll want to go when everyone else goes. Try to convince them to take an extra week without telling your boss. I mean, he can’t fire you all, right?

Right?

As far as where is concerned, save up the money and go here. Ignore the fact that the site is totally web 1.0

Water Cooler
“Hey, did you see what happened last night on 24?”
Um, no I didn’t. I actually don’t watch too much tv. I’m always out after work with friends or-
“That’s strange. You’re strange. So how ‘bout that Obama, eh? Bailouts, man.”
Well-
“It’s pretty crazy.”
Yeah, it is. The-
“Only a…” [*looks around*] “nigger. Am I right?”
What?
“You know.”
No, I don’t know.
“Common, man. Niggers. They’re ruining this country.”
…
“Why, just the other day…”

Two hours later he walked into HR and I never saw him again.

aXidents
“If something goes wrong, blame the guy who can’t speak English. Ah, Tibor. How many times have you saved my butt?” – Homer Simpson

Your Company
Did you know that the company you work for is YOUR company? You own it! Just like how servants work for THEIR master, you work for YOUR company. This sense of ownership is liberating. That’s what’s so great about living in this day and age. People are now starting to own their foibles and faults. Take a lesson from the 600lb man. He owns his obesity. He goes on camera, well technically people push him in front of one, and goes, “That’s right, I’m a big fat asshole who’s gonna die in two years, but while I’m here I’m going to party my asses off. Suck my dick!” And so we should be with our companies. “That’s right, motherfuckers. I sold my soul to a corporation that makes child-sized land mines for a 6 figure salary. Suck my dick!” Always end with “Suck my dick”, or “Suck my clit!” if you’re a woman/hysterical.

Zesty Chicken
You can’t have regular chicken. No no. The last thing you want is something as bland as your work environment. You need to switch it up. Something fresh. Something exotic. But not too exotic. You want something with the moxy taste of Wishbone Italian dressing with the familiarity of chicken. Wait! Wait. What if…you put the dressing…on the chicken? Do I dare dream?! What an unholy union! Forbidden…yet alluring. Yes…yes! Ecstasy! I wonder what this would taste like on a bed of lettuce. My God! It’s a chicken salad, but zesty! ZESTY CHICKEN SALAD! In my heart rests a spark of the divine, burning forth the fires of creation! “Assistant, bring me a hamburger bun! I have an idea.” If this works then…I am! I AM A GENIUS! ZESTY CHICKEN SANDWICH! Every working man in this great land shall hail me as a GOD. No…just God. I…am…GOD!!!

-Inner monologue of the guy who invented zesty chicken, circa 1987

The ABC's of Work, Part 2

2009-03-05T10:28:00.000-08:00

Internships
My heart goes out to everyone who has one of these shit jobs. It’s work that pays you in experience. No no no…fuck money. Who needs it? What I want is to bust my ass doing all the horrible tasks no one else wants to do here just so I can leave this place, go somewhere else, and do the exact same thing for minimum wage. You’re the lowest of the low. Even if you’re a paid intern that works 40 hour weeks, you still don’t qualify for health benefits. The janitor and the boys in the mail room laughed at me when they found out. [read this paragraph, then read all the other times he’s mentioned how little work he does for the company he is basically ripping off, and then feel sorry for Mark. I dare you – ed.]

Japanese Men
The life cycle of a Japanese man is as such: If a boy is born into a rich family, he is groomed until the age of 30 when he takes over his fathers company that makes carbon rods for Hello Kitty dolls. If a boy is born into a poor family, he goes to school where he learns to live under stress that could unnerve an air traffic controller. He then get’s a shitty office job. All men work 15 hour days, 6 days a week, and are in loveless relationships. There is also no privacy at the office; it is much more efficient to supply one big table for everyone instead of springing for desks. So when management gets a letter from the government saying Japan’s population is declining and everyone at the office gets an email telling them to go home and fuck their subservient, emotionless wives, the collective shame is palpable. This nation of Willy Lowmans stay at their job until 97 (retirement age) and then they go off and die under a bonsai tree or something. These are the third hardest working people on earth, only behind Mexican laborers and coal miners. And they know how to make a great Hello Kitty doll.

“Keep Your Hands Off My Food!!! Thank You!!!”
Easy, Cathy. No one wants to eat your left-over Healthy Choice tuna and Mexican wild rice casserole. It smells like something one of your many, many cats would eat. Get something decent like cold pizza or a piece of cake and then you can worry about me pulling a Jesse James in the kitchenette.

Lost and Found
I suppose this isn’t limited to just the work environment, but none the less it’s a great place to pick up some free meds or a butterfly knife.

Manager
The manager. Mr. Manager, to you. The Boss Man. The one responsible for dolling out work and paychecks. He is Pharaoh and you are his slave. I never realized it until now but every work environment is a little ad hoc society. That society happens to be feudal with a caste system in place. If you ever had a shitty job and contemplated stapling your manager’s ears to the wall because of his relentless stream of bullshit then you de facto know the entire history of the French Revolution. It’s time for a workers revolution.

Oh man. See man, like, the MAN, he’s tryin’ to keep us all down, right? And like, by keeping us in the dark, he can bamboozle us out of stuff, man. He’s pullin’ the blinds right over our eyes, man! It’s the natural order, man! The MAN’s keeping us down! I can’t access any socialist websites at work! You know why? It’s the MAN, man! Ever notice how you can’t spell MANAGER without first spelling The MAN? It’s a freakin’ conspiracy! I tell you, this is one cat who ain’t getting caught! I’m blowin’ this scene, man!

I just channeled my inner 60’s hippy radical and honestly, I’m not surprised he didn’t have anything interesting to say. I’m just glad my boss isn’t reading this.

Nobody Cares
Hey guess what? Nobody cares. Nobody cares that the new clients are from the same nowhere town in Michigan your boring, uninspired ass is from. Nobody cares that the weather is supposed to be partly sunny instead of partly cloudy. Oh, your daughter made the 4th grade honor roll? Well, that’s a completely different story. Nobody gives a shit. Worst of all, nobody cares what happens to you in your personal life, even if it’s affected by shared circumstances at work.

Note: all of this does not apply for the following professions: fire fighters, military figures, and astronauts.

Office Space
It’s scary how accurate this movie is at times.

Pay Check
The best part of any job is the reward. As Thomas Jefferson once so eloquently stated; “Get money, fuck bitches, smoke trees.” Wisdom. Once you start earning a regular paycheck you start develop strange feelings. It’s like puberty all over again except this time you start having funny thoughts about stuff like insurance premiums and tax codes. “What if…what if…I’m actually…a fiscal conservative?!” Discovering something like that would be a million times worse than finding out you’re gay. Far more traumatizing.

Quitting

We all have our ways of quitting. Some are respectful; they give their manager a 2 week notice, a good reason for leaving, and give thanks for all the opportunities they had. Some have the decency to keel over at their desk before retirement and deny their spouse pension checks. Others leave a burning paper trail in their wake as they strut down the halls butt-ass naked, flipping everyone off, screaming “take this job and shove it!” and grabbing female ex-coworkers titties. You only get to quit a job once so make it count.

The ABC’s of Work, Part 1

2009-03-04T10:39:00.000-08:00

Fuuuuuuuuck. I don’t want to do this. Not right now, not today. I’m still hung over and the last time I checked, Snapple’s Asian Pear Green Tea is no substitute for tomato juice and charcoal…pills or whatever. I don’t fucking know. I’m at work. God I hate work. Why can’t I be in bed? I can do my job just as well there. Work sucks.

Does this sound like you? If not then you are one of the 0.00047% of people who love their job. That’s a statistical impossibility. Therefore, no one loves their job. In conclusion, you should be thinking of what I said in the first paragraph every day for the rest of your life.

There’re some things about work you should know.

Applying
What a hassle this part is. Just because 1 convicted sex offender thief who cheats on taxes got hired, now everyone under the sun gets a FBI personality profile made with a cavity search on the house. Shit, what happened to just firing someone? And the interview portion! Every question is secretly laden with enough high school pep rally belongingness to smother a cult. “Why do YOU want to be a member of the Orbital family?” Because I can’t find work as a ditch digger. Because your rival company Teletron is full of dickless, nutless faggots. Because I like monies. Gimme monies.

Bring Your Child to Work Day
Formerly the sexist “Bring your daughter to work day”. My mom always got stuck with me. She used to manage clothing stores that tailored to high-end fashion for women. Not the most appropriate place for a little boy whose hobbies included Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and fire. Every time, she would stick me in the back room with a TV, some videos, and a McDonald’s lunch. And all day I would sit there, occasionally walk back and forth, and daydream. Sometimes I would draw or doodle on whatever piece of nonsense lying around that was disposable. I was always alone. Completely alone.

I must admit that Bring Your Child to Work Day adequately prepared me for a job in the real world and I say this without a hint of sarcasm.

Customers
“This job wouldn’t be so bad if it weren’t for the fucking customers” – Clerks

What, I gotta wake up at 7:30 and deal with people? Despite the gross insensitivity of what I’m about to suggest, this is a little trick I developed where you can fuck with customers, be totally incompetent and lazy, and everything will be completely fine. In fact the customer will be really appreciative and smile at you. Here it is: pretend to be physically handicapped. Not mentally. Physically. And be really cheerful, too.

See, no one gives a shit about Johnny Healthybody because he’s too stupid to get a real job. But if you’re little Timmy Sickwell, well then God bless your sweet, sweet, underdeveloped heart. When I worked at a bakery, I used to get shit from bitchy yuppies for pronouncing crescent “cre-sahnt” instead of the uber-french “cweh-saah!” This one time, just to fuck with people, I started walking on the side of my right foot, hunched my left shoulder up, and curled my left arm into a weak little T-Rex arm. Some dude asked for a loaf of rye sliced. Normally it would take me 45 seconds to do. This took 5 whole goddamn minutes. I couldn’t have been slower or intentionally fucked up his order worse. The bread was all rustled, the bag was sloppily tied closed, and it took far too long to prepare. The guy looked at me right in the eyes, gave the biggest smile I’ve ever seen, and said, “Thank you! You have a terrific day!” Hey you too, buddy.

Don’t Dip Your Pen in the Company Ink
I hate this phrase because it makes us sound like we are all writing memos with quill pens about the conference room schedule changing like we haven’t invented fucking electricity yet. Or it sounds like 19th century bankers would go around shtooping every co-worker, who were invariably dudes, since that was before women’s lib and the death of euphemisms. How about “don’t fuck co-workers”? Or better yet, “don’t fuck people you really shouldn’t fuck if you’re not willing to deal with the consequences of a psycho you created in an enclosed space that you can never leave”? Yeah, that’s much catchier. And it applies to high school, too.

The Economy Sucks Shit Right Now
CNN reported today that almost 700,000 jobs were lost in the month of February, the single most jobs lost in a month so far. What the hell?! How can there be so many? It’s the shortest month of the year! The market is toxic. If no one can find a conventional job soon then something tells me there will be a slight rise in demand for movies about bank robberies.

Fantasizing
I wonder what it would be like to hook up with the hot girl, or the girl who looks like a hot chick swallowed a bathtub. Or even Dianne. She’s got that whole, bossy, bitchy, librarian thing going on. What if she marched up to me one day, grabbed me by the collar and was like, “Now.” So she leads me to the supplies closet…and we are just going at it. Like we’re 15. Not like fucking or anything, but just making out really, really hard. We’re just 2nd-basing the shit out of each other. And then it all abruptly stops. She shoves me aside, marches out of the closet and doesn’t even look at me until about a month later when this whole episode repeats itself.

This is how I get through my day. I think of this stuff constantly.

Go-Getters
I hate these guys and their shitty attitude. They’d fit right in on the screen of some soviet-era communist propaganda film about meeting grain-harvesting quotas. “Work! Work ‘till you tire! And then work some more!” Hey assholes, unless you work on commission you’re not getting paid extra. You’re making the rest of us look bad and hate you. The fact is the system is so broken that my job actually encourages me to be lazy. My 3 bosses don’t need me to bother them every time I finish whatever meaningless, repetitive task they just gave me. I got fired, aka never asked to come back, from one job because I finished, literally, a week’s worth of busy work in 2 hours. Nothing points out the weakness of the job you hold by showing just how easy any idiot can do it. Are you trying to lose your job? Then stop working. Duh.

Human Relations

The guidance councilors of the work world. Every job has one. At a construction site it’s some guy named Joey who yells whenever a fight breaks out “shut the fuck up and quit bein’ dicks, ya fairies!” At my office, it’s an entire department devoted to making sure no one touches each other or declares that they will touch each other or hints at declaring that they will touch each other. So, in conclusion, human relations exists to ensure that there aren’t any.

How I Got This Scar on My Face

2009-03-03T07:21:00.000-08:00

There’s no better look for a guy than a big, hideous scar scrawled across the face.

I’m not kidding! Unless your nose is completely removed or you’re a burn victim or something, scars are like permanent manhood badges of honor that seriously don’t look bad at all. Here’s an example. Let’s take contemporary actor Philip Seymour Hoffman:

Alright, alright. Let’s give him a facial scar.

Whoa! Now that’s a man who lives hard! That’ll do, Seymour. Tear up those Oscars. Stomp the yard.

But what’s his story?

All scars have a story behind them, but beware. There’s a fine line between having your face mauled by a bear and that time a ceiling tile at the sewing store came loose and hit you in the face while you were looking at floral patterns. Here’s a quick list of no-no word combinations you should refrain from saying when people start asking how you became such a badass.

“Well, I was strolling through the meadow when all of a sudden…”

“My mother…”

“I reached down to find my missing Cher mixed CD when I looked up and saw a truck…”

“My porcelain teapot was boiling so much that it was rattling back and forth…”

“Those office cubicles have really sharp corners…”

“I was super scared…”

“That was the world’s meanest little snapping turtle…”

“My seaweed rap dried out and burst into flames from the hair dryer…”

“I’m sorry…”

“I should have been home instead…”

“He was right…”

“I cried…”

Woah. I Missed Black History Month?

2009-03-02T08:48:00.001-08:00

That is absurd. How can this be? I understand missing other esoteric race-based holidays like Irish Appreciation Week or Hug A Chinamen Day, but common. Hasn’t the press noticed the man living at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave? I’m pretty sure brutha is MAKING black history, for-realz.

Oh yeah, that’s right. The press was too worried on whether or not Barack Obama was bipartisan enough when passing his stimulus package. That was waaay more important to focus on that rather than the fact our economy is sinking into the ocean.

You can see how we all lost sight of black history month. To make it up to…someone, I’m going to regale you with my own pieces of personal black history.

Tigra “Blue” Coleman
I went to middle and high school with this guy. Tigra is the fucking mayor. Everyone knows him and likes him. He’s in a million bands, produced some sort of escort service for Redskins players at one point, and can “school anyone at Halo.” He taught me another word for “fuck” was “pole”. “That bitch would pole all of us,” he once said. Get it? ‘Cause your dick is like a pole rod. One time in middle school he fell asleep in english class while everyone was reading Huckleberry Fin out loud. When someone inevitably said nigger out loud, Tigra shot up and was like “Who the fuck said that?! Who said that?!” The teacher said, “Tigra, it’s in the book.” Tigra was like “oh” and then fell back asleep. I think Tigra has a brother named Damoses or Dajesus. I forget which one. Like I said, Tigra is the fucking mayor. Oh yeah, he calls me “Gold” which I think is cool.

Seaton Smith
Probably one of my favorite local comics in the DC scene. Fuck, I won’t even try to make a joke here. I’ll just let him be funny for this blurb. Oh yeah, and he’s a totally normal and reserved off stage

Michael Jackson
A few summers ago, 3 friends and I went camping on the Appalachian Trail. The ride home is only an hour or so long, so we decided to put in a Michael Jackson Greatest Hits CD (THANKS, Josh, you shmuck) and listen to the whole thing. Sure, Thriller and Beat it are great, but have you heard his turds like Where Is My Childhood and Scared of the Moon? I guess those were made when he was white, so its all good.

Um…I think that’s it. Oh yeah, Fredrick Douglas, MLK, Jesse Owens yadda yadda yadda.

NYF’D

2009-02-26T11:09:00.000-08:00

From the creators of Street Fighter, X-Men vs. Street Fighter and Marvel vs. Capcom comes a brand new fighting game series. NYF’D is the knife fighting game to start and end all knife fighting games. Sporting many fighters from all over the world, they gather once a year on Enforcer Island for the Great Blade Battle. Only one will survive. The survivor is that year’s winner. There can only be one winner. So…there’s only one survivor. The sole survivor wins. The winning survivor is the only one who both wins and survives. Survivor. Winner. One. What do they win? GOLD!

Let’s take a look at the fighting roster!

Name: Arthur Dingo
Home: Warrumbungle, Australia
Weapon: Bolo Machete
Primary Attack: This is a Knife
Secondary Attack: Crikey
Special: G’Day
Bio: As the only shorts-wearing fighter in this years competition, Dingo hopes that winning the gold will help his town replenish its native whitchetty grub population.

Name: Leisure Dupree
Home: Harlem, NY, USA
Weapon: Straight Razor
Primary Attack: Pimp Slice
Secondary Attack: Pimp Slash
Special: Bitch Better Gimme My Daaaamn Mon-ay!
Bio: He’s a mover. He’s a shaker. He’s a hustler. And he’s here to take the prize. This knife fighting shit is old hat to him (Note: he wears a very large, very new, purple leopard print hat).

Name: Angus MacClannough
Home: Edinburgh, Scotland
Weapon: Broken Whiskey Bottle and a Dirty AIDS Needle
Primary Attack: Hooligan
Secondary Attack: Longshank
Special: Highlander Fugue
Bio: As western Scotland’s primer dope dealer, Angus entered the tournament to help pay for his ever expanding empire, and squash his rival dealer, Robert the Brute.

Name: John Running Tree
Home: Mattaponi Indian Reservation, Virginia, USA
Weapon: Tomahawk
Primary Attack: Chop
Secondary Attack: Flying Hawk
Special: Great Spirit Summon
Bio: Born in Richmond, Virginia to 2 affluent white people, John is 1/8 Algonquian Native American. By winning the tournament, he hopes to prove to his tribe (which he gets privileges from on a technicality) and himself that he’s a real red-blooded savage.

Name: M’Butu
Home: Democratic Republic of the Congo
Weapon: Panga Machete
Primary Attack: Monkey Scalp
Secondary Attack: Juju
Special: Blood Drinker
Bio: Ever butcher an entire troop of AK-wielding rebels with a machete? M’Butu has. Numerous times. What else is there to do in the middle of nowhere?

Name: Kato Fukimaro
Home: Osaka, Japan
Weapon: Katana
Primary Attack: Ninja Strike
Secondary Attack: Samurai Strike
Special: Wind Ghost Robot Hello-Kitty Strike
Bio: Obligatory, stereotypical Japanese character. Dude likes sushi and is a teenager with emotional problems.

Name: Francis Gantineau
Home: Parts Unknown, Canada
Weapon: Axe
Primary Attack: Big Swing
Secondary Attack: Chopping Block
Special: De-forestation
Bio: From his personals ad – “SWM iso SWF Larger than life five-time champion of the Lumberjack Games seeks rewarding life with sturdy woman. Must like the outdoors, large hairy men, and Jean-Claude Van Damme movies.”

Name: Topper Bollocks
Home: Brixton, England
Weapon: Switchblade
Primary Attack: Cut the Crap
Secondary Attack: Piss Stain
Special: The Filth and the Fury
Bio: “The money feels good and your life you like it will, but surely you’re time will come as in Heaven, as in Hell” - the words Topper Bollocks, the time traveling British punk from the ‘70’s lives, fights, and dies by. What a poser.

Name: Laurence Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud
Home: Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Weapon: Scimitar
Primary Attack: Beheading
Secondary Attack: Crescent Moon
Special: Slashing Gas Prices

Bio: This guy’s the son of a royal Saudi family/oil tycoon. He’s richer than God. He doesn’t need the prize money. So the only reason he’s fighting is ‘cause, straight up, he’s a dick. And his name’s Laurence. The fuck’s up with that?

Chinese Zodiac Horoscopes

2009-02-25T11:31:00.000-08:00

March 2009

Rat
If you were born in the year of the rat, then you probably wonder why. I mean, it’s a rat. A disease spreading nuisance that only witches and herpatologists like. This has made you resentful. And crewel. Oh sure, your sign says you’re intelligent and cunning, but you’re also extremely selfish, arrogant and Machiavellian. So put all those traits to good use. This month you will find a way to kill your neighbor and make it look like an accident. The goal here is to shack up with his wife a few times, guilt free. It’s not cheating if he’s dead.

Ox
How’s my slow-witted beast of burden doin’, hmm? Doin’ fiiiiiine? Erry thang’s aight? Look, I don’t expect the gullible, unwashed masses born under this sign to be literate, so I’ll just say this behind their backs; this month they will be at work at the same soul-crushing, dead end job and do everything the boss says and keep doing it every month until they are forced into retirement and screwed out of the pension. And their slew of resentful kids will spring for a 3rd-rate nursing home where they'll spend the rest of their life making poops in a diaper and forgetting to take their socialized Alzheimer’s medication. There. Now I never have to write an Ox horoscope ever again.

Tiger
You think you’re hot shit, don’t you? Mr. “Best-animal-spirit-thingy-in-China”. Common, who wants to imagine themselves as a fucking sheep? Well this month will put you in your place. Your natural tendency for exploration and the unpredictable will put you on the path of a road trip. Hey, sounds like fun! Better check into the Milwaukee Radisson, man. You got a long trip ahead of you tomorrow. It will be the exact same Radisson that the Mid-West Furry Alliance decided to set up their annual convention. Get ready to be creeped out by a bunch of fat, sweaty, repressed dudes dressed up as actual tigers touching you. They’re just so attracted to your determination, even if it is directed at getting the fuck out of there.

Rabbit
Oh, look at the precious, sensitive wittle wabbit. So you’re an artist, huh? Delicate? Well then I am happy to announce that Barack Obama’s stimulus package will not only fail, it will backfire tremendously. Get ready for the social upheaval of a surprisingly short lifetime. This shit will be French Revolution meets L.A. Riots meets Land of the Dead and your privileged head will be the first on the chopping block. You know who eats a lot of rabbit? Chinese people [and Elmer Fudd – ed.]

Dragon
Larger than life symbols of power and authority don’t exist. It’s all fake. It’s something Kim Jong Il dreamt up while sitting on North Korea’s only toilet. These are your Caesars, your Stalins, your Clint Eastwoods. Oh sure, they existed at one point, but are hidden in caves like real dragons. If really 1/12 of the human population (560 million people) were like this, you think anything would ever get done? The world would constantly be divided among many nations while greedy fucking secret cabals ran the world behind the desks of international corporations. (I feel like there’s this big fucking anvil with the word “irony” written on it hanging over my head). Ok, soooo, for march, all you dragons out there will……..make someone’s life real shitty. Boom. This job is easy.

Snake
Jesus Christ Wikipedia isn’t giving me shit for the snake. It has 12 positive traits and like 5 negative ones, the worst of which is “snobbish”. Snobbish? Are you kidding me? What the fuck am I supposed to do with that? Fine, you’ll go to a restaurant and return the food because it wasn’t good enough. How, hilarious, is that shit, amirite? Now fuck the hell off you wise, profound, charming, logical, intelligent, creative, compassionate, discreet, honorable, humorous, generous, and attractive asshole. You’re comedy poison.

Horse
This Zodiac symbol is renowned for its free spirited and enthusiastic ugly bitches. So, that chick who coordinated every high school class event is a horse. So for all you happy-go-lucky giant beasts out there who shit standing up, this month you will become extra special when you get smacked in the head and end up looking like this forever:

Sheep/Goat/Ram
[Chinese people don’t know what is up with their own damn calendar – ed.] These people are supposedly the most creative bunch of them all, so try to keep that in mind as they switch it up this month by spending 19 hours a day sitting on a filth-encrusted couch in their old, dirty underwear, eating Cheetos and watching episodes of Judge Joe Brown while they try to work through their bout of writers block. “But, Kristin! If I get a job, then I won’t have any time to work on my screenplay about the vampires who fight werewolves! ‘Common, babe, I’m going to make it. My side-project experimental jazz-fusion-techno band Rayn is going to make it. Then I’ll buy you all the nice things in life you deserve. Now how about a fin for some smokes?” will be uttered for the 9,377th time, so go out and buy a victory can of Pringles. Remember when I said they’ll “switch it up” this month? Usually they watch Judge Mathews.

Monkey
Versatility defines your character, and the universe knows this. That’s why you are going to lose the following things: wife, job, home, dog, car, wallet, respect, 2 teeth, a foot (to diabetes), the lottery, and a good chunk of your sanity. Let’s see how you handle all that, mother fucker. And while you’re sorting all that shit out, try balancing the national budget, bailing out the economy, reforming politics in D.C., building clean energy grid, making heath care affordable to the entire country, solving global warming, legalizing pot and putting a man on Mars. This horoscope is dedicated to President Barack Obama, honorary March Monkey (not racist).

Rooster
I want you to close your eyes and imagine what a gay, black teenager who grew up in NYC is like. I see the most fashionable (like 3 years ahead of trends), funniest, brutally honestest, overtly snarky, bitchiest person, ever. In one word, cocks. Thems rooster folk. This month they will drive around with friends, get drunk, do a little blow, make fun of poor people and avoid any location not resembling DuPont Circle, The Village or West Hollywood. You know. “Thursday”. Those cocks.

Dog
Dog people (heh) are loyal and hate weakness because it fucks up the pack. Riiight. Anyway, they make the perfect career soldiers. In fact that’s all the military is; just a bunch of kids born in 1982. Can’t wait to see what these young guns of ’94 are going to do to the A-rabs we’re-a fightin’. Anywho, most of these guys are really into March Madness, so I predict a lot of fights breaking out. You might want to stock up on medical tape and antiseptic because the Terps are going to kick the shit out of everyone in the NCAA and if anyone disagrees, my left fist can make a 2 quick rebuttals and my right will follow up with an excellent counterpoint.

Pig
Ahahaha, pigs are supposed to be greedy and evil, and a sign of fertility. Like this huge vagina sucking out all life into its gaping maw. Like that stupid bitch in California who gave birth to octuplets when she already had 6. “I NEED MORE EGGS! Bigger family…BIGGER I SAY!!!” I know exactly how her month is going to end; with 14 welfare checks. The super religious are asking me to pray for her. Pfff. Be careful for what you pray for because it just might happen. Well, with all those mid-air satellite crashes happening, I guess the odds of one falling out of the sky and crushing her dumb ass isn’t so far off. My prayers have been answered!

Skate Witches

2009-02-24T08:47:00.000-08:00

I really hate people who harp on the 80’s like it was our generation’s golden age. You know who I’m talking about; that guy who has to reference everything 80’s, watches I Love the 80’s, half-ironically likes The Cure, talks about 80’s cartoons like they gave birth to and nursed him, and they absolutely love Family Guy…for all the 80’s references.

The 80’s fucking sucked because it was, sad to say, exactly the same as this past shitty decade. Asshole reactionary president, big punk and emo sub culture, bizarre cartoons, revenge of the nerds; they’re the same goddamn decade. Shit, you had people shopping at thrift stores just so they can wear vintage 80’s clothing like stone-washed jeans and bright neon shirts because it’s so fucking ironic and 80’s and OMG. When you do something that hard that ironically it loses all irony and all of a sudden it’s 1983 again.

This is not necessarily a bad thing.

There’s a video on youtube called Skate Witches that has absolutely fascinated me. Its so shitty and terrible and poorly acted and retarded, and fucking “Skate and Destroy” is being played on a boom box off screen…I just love it.

“We’re the Skate Witches and we don’t take no crap from [*spookily*] no oooone…” Oh, be still my throbbing heart. I’m totally under their spell. I too, only ride at midnight.

Yeah, irreverent youth sub cultures never change. Their cliché total lack of vision is as eternal as the tides. Seriously, there are a million youtube videos of emo and third-wave punks wearing the same Misfits shirt doing the exact same retarded stuff.

To find out what’s in store for our mirror generation, I tracked down the Queen Witch, whose real name is Jenny Parker, and shot the shit with her about her life after high school. We sat down outside at a coffee shop/bistro in DuPont Circle where Jenny talked and took huge drags from her clove cigarette.

Me: So, are the Skate Witches still around?
Jenny Parker:…Hmm?

Are the Skate Witches-
Noooooooo…no. We haven’t talked since Slutty Sarah slept with my boyfriend at prom.

You guys went to prom? I figured that would be the last place you’d go to in High School.
Yeah, I mean, we were going TP the parking lot while everyone was dancing in the gym. Sarah and David lived on the same side of town so they came together. When I showed up they were screwing in David’s car.

Harsh. And that was the end of the Skate Witches?
Sorta. I had to repeat senior year. They graduated and moved on and I had to stay behind. It was a rough year.

I bet.
I mean I caught those bastards cheating on me, and my rat died. It was a lot of stress no wonder I failed.

What was your rat’s name?
Willow. She was my best friend. I accidently sat on her.

What did you do after you graduated?
Well, after I got my GED I stayed in my mom’s and my mom’s boyfriend’s house while I worked at a pet store. I was going to move to New York after I saved up $5,000 but do you have any idea how hard that is when you work minimum wage and spend most of your money on drugs and gas to go to punk shows?

Why didn’t you just find a squat somewhere in New York or L.A.? That’s what real punks usually do.
I was gonna but I didn’t.

Why?
Tsk, ugh! You’re just as bad as my mom’s stupid boyfriend.

When did you move out of your parent’s place?
I didn’t.

I’m sorry?
I didn’t move out of my parent’s place.

Oh.
Yeah…

[During the awkward pause in the conversation, Patty kills half of her cigarette in one pull]

Any hobbies?
I like to go to cemeteries at night, lay on top of the graves and smoke.

Weed or cigarettes?
Usually just my cloves but if I have some weed I’ll smoke it.

Cool.
Would you like to join me tonight?

That’s OK, I have to get this article back to the office and edit it for tomorrow. Anything else you’d like to say, maybe to all the would-be neo Skate Witches out there?
Parents never understand your heart. That’s why it doesn’t matter if I don’t have one. Punk rock never dies!

…And What’s the Deal with Airplane Peanuts?!

2009-02-23T11:01:00.000-08:00

Flying sucks. It doesn’t just suck; it’s a downright pain in the ass. It’s right up there with getting a parking ticket or having the stomach flu. Actually, flying is sort of like a combination of both those things. It’s an expensive, needless hassle that makes you wanna throw up. Airplanes are flying Skinner Boxes from Hell.

It’s noisy, cramped, uncomfortable, disease ridden, confusing, scary, and expensive as hell. Oh yeah, here are some other reasons why we should go back to using railroads.

Security
Thanks, 9/11 hijackers. You’ve permanently fucked up the world forever and I say this without a hint of sarcasm. Because you’ve instilled so much psychotic fear into everyone, now every time I fly on a plain I need to wait 90 minutes while some barely literate yokel fingers my luggage. We all have our horror stories about being randomly selected for an intense security shakedown. My personal favorite is my family trip back from Florida. My mom was selected and spent nearly 25 minutes getting the third degree by GED-scholar army men holding M-16’s while some dried up old tart managed to smuggle a LIVE GODDAMN CAT ON BOARD THE CABIN IN A FUCKING SHOPPING BAG. So here’s a helpful tip to any would be terrorist: cat bombs. A cat with a stick of dynamite up its ass is completely undetectable by US security. Go nuts.

In-Flight Movies
What do the movies Juno, The Emperor’s New Groove, A.I., Horton Hears a Who, and First Sunday have in common? They all had the roar of a dull fart at the box office and were, literally, the best things to watch on my most recent trip. Trust me. They were the best. There were much worse films being offered (e.g. The Love Guru). If I knew that’s all I had to look forward to for 8 hours, I would have given serious thought to smuggling on board some drugs.

The Kosher Meal
Didn’t you know Jews love meals consisting solely of an old tangerine and some Sprite? We have our own version of religious fasting akin to Ramadan called “I’m going to return this. This-this-this is just terrible!” All airline food is inedible, but at least with the Goyim meal you know you’re getting a pig. What part of the pig I have no idea. All I know is that it’s a torn off hunk of a pig carcass because that’s all white people eat apparently. The kosher meal, on the other hand, is an unidentifiable complex of starches, carbohydrates, protein and some secret ingredient that turns those otherwise normal food options into bowel-clenching, god-cursing experience. I think the secret ingredient is “hate”.

Detroit
Yo, fuck Detroit. I was laid over in that city twice. The first time I was there, I spent a good 2 hours in the most fake ass Japanese restaurant ever getting drunk on sake and trying to decide whether or not I wanted cheeseburger sushi or “kabuki” style mozzarella sticks. By the way, sake is gross and has no redeeming qualities, just in case you were tempted to try something that was probably fermented behind a radiator. The second time I was there, I figured I’d just stick to some tried and true McDonalds. There’s no conceivable way you can fuck up a McDonalds; they’re all the same! Not true. This one was managed by all the cute little urban achievers Detroit had to offer. I know the kid working the counter felt like a tool and everything, but it’s not like he should take it out on m-, well, actually. If I were in his position, I’d probably have acted like just as big a cockhead as he did. I can’t blame the kid for being rude and lazy but, you know, fuck him. There was one cool thing about the Detroit airport. I have no way to describe this, because I’m not even sure what it was, but I’ll give it my best shot. It was an underground psychedelic tunnel of wonders that stimulated 4/5 senses and connected 2 different parts of the airport. I spent a lot of time walking back and forth down there.

Fatties, Babies, and Fat Babies
The scariest moment on a plane is right before you take off you get to see who you’re sitting next to for the next 10 hours. Some colossal sack of shit waddles over to you, squeezes in and politely asks the stewardess for a seatbelt extender. That’s when you know this is for reals and that there is no escape. Some fat people need two seats on an airplane. What happens when they do get their two seats, but you’re the one with the middle seat? Babies are the worst because they piss off everyone. Ever notice how when a baby screams on a plane the mom doesn’t even flinch? That’s because she’s conditioned herself to block out the noise. Um, ‘scuse me Zen master Monk Quang Duc Mom, but maybe you should have waited 2 or 3 years to go on vacation so you wouldn’t bad-vibe the plane by having the entire cabin simultaneously wish for a mid-air explosion just so we wouldn’t have to listen to your screaming, shirtless, bald kin for one second longer. And fat babies? They’re the blurst.

Flying Outhouse
I don’t know what it is about airplanes that turns people back into uncivilized cave monkeys, but it seems everyone forgets how to shit and not fuck in public once the doors to the bathroom close. It’s so disgusting in there. I saw this one where shit got everywhere. I’m not talking about just all over the seat. I mean the seat, the walls, the door, the mirror, the ceiling, everywhere. What the fuck? Was this person doing fucking jumping jacks while shitting? Did they mistake a bowel movement for their soul escaping so they thought they’d try to capture it and shove it back in? And if you want to screw in an airplane toilet, that’s your business. I already described what the worst bathroom is hygienically. You know what they do to clean those up? Wipe it down with a wet paper towel, Fabreeze it, and call it a day. So to all you would be mile-high joiners, good luck. Hope you manage to keep your wood with that image in your mind.

Lost Luggage
I’m out of clever juice. Lost luggage just blows. I don’t know. I just have a very romantic notion of what a trans-continental train ride would be like and this is just one of the many, many, many, many, many, many problems that can be solved.

Death Row Confessions – Virginia Edition

2009-02-20T07:11:00.000-08:00

Name: Cory Johnson
Jurisdiction: Richmond (federal conviction)
Crime: murder
Date Entered: 7-2-97
“You know, when I first got in here knowing what would happen, I tried finding some sort of peace inside, you know? I tried religion. I tried yoga. I tried chess. Nothing. All I do now is find gumps. I’m gump crazy. Been like that for years. I ain’t gay or nothing but that’s how I spend my time. I got a reputation around here now. My momma don’t know, and I don’t want her knowing. I think it’d break her heart. I’m not going to stop doing it, but, whatever. Fuck it.”

Name: Percy Walton
Jurisdiction: Danville
Crime: murder 3x, robbery
Date Entered: 10-31-97
“I’d do it again”

Name: Daryl Atkins
Jurisdiction: York co.
Crime: grand negligence ($500,000 unpaid parking fines)
Date Entered: 4-28-98
“This is fucking bullshit! Fucking fuck shit fuck hell ass cock fuck shit!!!”

Name: Brandon Hedrick
Jurisdiction: Appomattox
Crime: murder, rape, robbery
Date Entered: 7-22-98
“I did rape and kill that girl, but the body the found in the river to convict me was not Lisa’s; it was a victim of one of my buddies Richard Tipton. When I bust out of here I’m gonna bust your nose, Dick! Haha. We play this game a lot.”

Name: Darrick Walker
Jurisdiction: Henrico
Crime: murder, multiple homicides
Date Entered: 10-21-98
“You wanna know where Saddam hid those weapons of mass destruction?” I nod my head. [* Walker unzips his fly*]

Name: “Swastika” Pete Burns
Jurisdiction: Norfolk
Crime: murder (hate crime)
Date Entered: 5-8-99
“Honestly, I don’t hate blacks anymore. Really! I got to know a few in here and, I can say from the bottom of my heart that they are some swell, swell, guys. Super nice. I don’t have a mean thing to say about them. Now on the other hand, the Jews…”

Name: John Allen Mohammed
Jurisdiction: Prince William County
Crime: capitol murder; acts of terrorism and homicide
Date Entered: 3-9-04
“I never did anything. It was all Lee Malvo. He, he did all the shootings. It was all his idea. I just drove the car. He told me we were going to Arby’s. I’d say , ‘Hey, Lee. When are we going to Arby’s?’ and he’d say the same thing. You know what he’d say? He’d say, ‘Just a minute.’ Just a minute! Can you believe that? ‘Just a minute’ *blamo*! ‘Just a minute’ *sha-bang*! I didn’t want any of them white folks to die, I just wanted some Arbys’.”

Chimp Wars: Recorded Attacks

2009-02-19T07:55:00.000-08:00

Rarely does this blog get topical, but I cannot let this piece of news go by un-re-reported. Remember when that chimp Travis was hopped up on Xanex and ripped that lady’s face off? Then the police shot and killed Travis…for ripping that lady’s face off?

This may seem like just another tragic yet hilarious piece of news traum-edy but actually, this is one act in a very long, Shakespearean play (a traum-edy) depicting the ongoing conflict between chimps and man.

See, some 3 million years ago we both shared a common humanoid ancestor. Like, imagine a really smelly, deformed looking tribe of pig monkey men living in the jungle. Then the tribe split. No one knows why, but we can guess. I like to think it has to do with skin color. Anyway, the half that stayed in the jungle became modern day chimps and the half that lived in the plains became all the races of human, except Aborigines. To this day chimps and man still hate each other and carry the same grudge. Also, chimps are mad that we call our common ancestor “humanoid” and not “chimpanoid”.

For millions of years, we have waged war openly. It was not until recent times have we forgotten our bloody history. I blame the Church. Maybe that’s why the story of Travis seems like an isolated event. But this attack and many more of its kind have been recorded in the annals of history.

Chimp Army Uniformed Attack
Hayfield, Ohio 1997
The Warren County zoo hosts a variety of living arrangements for its animals. Bird sanctuaries, giant sloth terrariums, but the zoo’s most popular habitat was Chimp Island, a 2000 square foot enclosure surrounded by a vast moat. At approximately 10:30 AM, the chimps finally cut through the trunk of a palm tree with the lower jaw bone of a no longer missing zoo curator. With the fallen palm serving as an impromptu bridge, the first wave of chimps, 15 strong, crossed over into the park. Zoo patrons mauled, fountains defiled and hotdog stands turned, humans alike were helpless until a posse of security guards managed to drive back the invading force. That’s when the second wave, 20 strong, attacked. It took ten federal marshals to bring the combat to a conclusion. By the end of the day, 34 chimps were dead, one human child was dead, 78 humans maimed, and 3 feces covered hotdog carts were rendered uncleanable. The lone surviving chimp, George, was brought into questioning. He died in custody. Officials report he committed suicide via cyanide capsule, but since no body was ever recovered this is all speculative.

Biological Warfare
Reston, Virginia 1989
There was a domestic biological attack on the United States which predated the mailed anthrax attacks shortly following September 11, 2001. A group of 3 suicide terrorist chimps, Mongo, Manson, and Bubbles, willfully and knowingly contracted an airborne strain of the Ebola virus in the hopes of decimating America’s population. Their plan was to reach the United States, hemorrhage/crash, and spread the biosafety level-4 virus to a human host by any means necessary. Their plan would have succeeded if it not for the fact that the strain of Ebola, now known as Ebola Reston, does not affect human beings. Stupid monkeys.

Coercion through Dystopia
Northern New Jersey, 3976

Colonel George “Bright Eyes” Taylor was subjugated to numerous forms of torture under a society run by apes. In this land he was treated as an animal with barely any regard for his life. Thought of as inferior, he was ostracized and harassed until he was finally banished into the forbidden zone. If this is not a call to warning of our horrible future, then I don’t know what is. It reinforces what I have been saying for years: kill all chimps.

Oh yeah and fuck Jane Goodall

It's The End of the World

2009-02-18T08:45:00.000-08:00

Nostradamus was brilliant. Not because he was clairvoyant; in fact I hate to be the one to break it to you but magic doesn’t exist. Neither does luck, God, or Never-Never Land. And he wasn’t brilliant because he did what all great psychics do: be as vague as fucking possible.

No, this medieval jackass is brilliant because he was lucky, er, by random coincidence fortunate, enough to pick the end of the world date as the same one as the Mayan calendar. I think. Either way, a dysenteric old man and a dead civilization picked a date somewhere in December 2012 for the world to end. The scary thing is…it might just come true.

Have you seen the world these days? It’s so fucked, and in more ways then one. Going for the sex metaphor here, it seems that the world has an apocalyptic dick furiously going in and out of every orifice at the same time. The question is which one will bust first?

Global Warming
If you could travel back in time and kill someone, who would you kill? Hitler and Justin Timberlake’s parents are good choices. What about Henry Ford? He kind of started that whole industrial revolution thing. Or at least made it sexy.

So the icecaps are going to melt. Big whup. The world’s not going to get all Water World on us, and it’s a good thing too. That movie sucked. What is going to happen is probably a million times worse. Things are just going to escalate. Northern Europe will turn into Northern Canada, the US will drown in a hurricane the size of Katrina^(Andrew) and Australia will dry up and burn like an old cigarette.

And then there are all the animals. You can wave bye-bye to frogs, bees, polar bears and everything larger than a squirrel. All that will be left are parasites and humans eating other humans. It’s a guarantee that something, be it a tape worm or the guy who ran the town’s Appleby’s, will eat you. Soon enough the water will turn into blood , you’ll break out in boils and everyone’s first born will drop dead.

Nuclear Armageddon
Wait, really? Seriously? Nukes? I thought we were done with that once that wall came down in Russia or something. You know, that wall, that really famous wall? Uh, I think Pink Floyd wrote a song about it: Money.

Anyway, since Israel and Palestine can’t play nice, Palestine is going to get big brother Iran and the two forces are going to duke it out in a bare-knuckle nuclear arms fist fight. Of course the whole world can’t just twiddle its thumbs going “do-de-doo. Da-dump-a-dooo…do-do-da dum-dee dooooo…”

USA is going to step up when Iran bombs, and its going to bring its good ol’ drinking buddy Britain. Pakistan’ll be all “pshhhh” and push the button. That’ll piss off India, and Russia doesn’t want to be left out. China will think this is some sort of club so he’ll join and before you know it we’ve bombed ourselves back to the Stone Age. The survivors will be living just like the peoples of the third world who didn’t even fight this war.

China
Those bastards again? If it’s not one thing with them it’s another. This one is a real mystery because no one knows if they’ll take an active or passive roll in killing the planet. No one knows anything about them. Will they simply eat all of earth’s resources or will they launch a disciplined billion xiaolin man army across the globe and conquer us all? Shhh, ancient Chinese secret…

They are also communists, sorta. They’re communist-lite. They sorta have free trade but the government’s a total dick. Boo communists. Let's go back in time 50 years an enact some sort of containment policy. Yeah, that'll work.

Christ and the Rapture
Pfffffffffff yeah right. Um, ‘ello??? ‘Scuse me, but uh, like, he’s already here, m’kay? His name’s Bay-rack O-bam-a and he said “nuh uh” to this whole “end of the world” stuff. He’s gonna like totally save us. Totally. Fer sure.

Aliens
THIS one is possible. And the worst. Let me try to separate truth from fiction for a second here.

According to DC’s primer physicist and intergalactic social anthropologist, um, I forget his name but he bums for change outside Ben’s Chili Bowl on U street, the visitors will have light purple skin, humanoid physique (although details will be purely conjectural) and psychic abilities. He says that because they have mastered light speed travel and/or wormhole powers, they must be smart enough to communicate psychically. Doye.

He said, in between asking late night bar goers for change and cigarettes, that the aliens will instantly destroy the world and 99.8% of all life on it. Boom. Done. Horrible space death ray kills us all. 0.19% will be used for experimentation while the remaining 0.01% will be housed in a giant zoo terrarium. A mini-earth in a dome for alien children to gawk and throw space peanuts at.

To be one of the 650,000 humans to survive he suggests taking a long piece of thin wood like a broom or plunger handle, sticking it up your ass and then waving it at the aliens when they arrive. He says it’s how they show submissiveness on their world and that he’s been practicing every day for when they arrive.

Me
As it was prophesized, so it shall be. My rein as Earth ruler will be steel in strength, fire in resolve, and blood in rite. I will burn this world to the ground, and from the ashes an even greater civilization shall emerge like a glorious Death Phoenix. Forged in my will no man will dare stand against me. My rule will be brutal and divine. Scores shall lay dead before me, as I sit atop the ruins of the Statue of Liberty, now the Throne of Tyranny. No life shall be spared, no prayer shall be heard. No life. No mercy.

…as soon as I get Superman’s powers. That’ll be bitchin’

How to Kill Time and Dispose its Corpse

2009-02-17T10:16:00.001-08:00

I’m not talking about “oh hey im at work and its boring, how about you go to this one supercool website on teh intarwebs its called www.borfborfborfborf.com and its what all the kidz are raving about.” No, I’m talking about more dire situations.

Situations where there are no materials. There are no friends, no noises to be made, no freedom. Nothing. You know, church and office meetings and court dates and stuff. A fucking minute in those situations would last five in the real world. The only playground you have left is in your mind, so get lost in it.

“A man’d do just about anything to keep busy” – Shawshank Redemption

Here are some real life accounts of what I have done to fend off the Mongolian hordes of boredom.

Stop Your Own Heart
I always thought it was weird that CPR solved two problems. You do it when someone stops breathing or their heart stops. So…are breathing and heart rates connected? Maaayyybeeee…? I don’t know it’s been a while since 9th grade Bio but whatevs. I closed my eyes and turned them inward, or some other stupid Asian monk phrase. I saw this thing once on discovery channel where this Buddhist monk could slow his heart through meditation. Also, Haji did it once on an episode of The Real Adventures of Johnny Quest. Breath in…and breath out. In…and out. Slowly, you begin to feel your heart thumping in your chest. Breath in…take control of that thump. Open your third eye; reach out of the pupil and squeeze your heart. Feel it slowing, and slowing, and slowing, until it stops.

I passed out and feel out of my chair. Immediately I woke up. Everyone present thought I simply fell asleep and that’s why I fell. Either way it was boredom induced.

Also this one time in 3rd grade I touched the metal part of a big extension chord plug that was hanging out of the socket but still running. We were having story time and it was BOR-ING. That thing zapped the shit out of me, so I wouldn’t be surprised if my heart stopped.

Eye Fuck
This is almost impossible to do unless someone who is at least a 5 is in the same room. Proceed with caution because you will develop a rape face and if you get called out on it you’ll spend the next 5 weeks in sensitivity training listening to some pathetic virgin named Pete use the phrase “inappropriate behavior” every sentence because he’s reading straight out of the goddamn pamphlet the state issued to the teacher of this fucking class.

Touch Yourself
Yyyyyyup.

Shout Inside Your Head
It doesn’t even matter what you’re shouting about. Just do it consistently. Remember, your not shooting for enlightenment here. This shit is not brilliant. You just need to kill time.

“OH MY GOD THIS IS BORING. I CANT BELIEVE I AM HERE DOING THIS BORING ASS THING WHEN I COULD BE FUCKING WATCHING 24 RIGHT NOW OR PLAYING WITH MY DOG. THE FIRST THING IM GOING TO DO WHEN I GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE IS POOP, MICROWAVE SOME PIZZA POCKETS AND THEN…IS THIS GUY STILL FUCKING TALKING?! WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH HIM? DOESN’T HE HAVE A LIFE OR A HOBBY OR SOMEWHERE TO BE? IF I COULD BE ANYWHERE RIGHT NOW I WOULD BE IN RIO DEGENARO AND I’D GET ME ONE OF THOSE STREET BURGERS THAT ARE LIKE A PIECE OF FILLET MINON WITH A GRILLED PINEAPPLE SLICE ON TOP. HOLY SHIT THAT SOUNDS SOOO FUCKING GOOD RIGHT NOW.”

Name Generators

2009-02-12T06:53:00.000-08:00

These are fun, but not too much fun. Like Mad Libs or dirty knock-knock jokes. We don’t want to go nuts here with all the raw humor flying off the screen.

Name Generators are a simple enough concept. You take a series of facts about you and combine them in ways that represent the identity you are trying to create for yourself. What? Did that sentence even make sense? I don’t know, I don’t re-write or spell check.

Here’s an example. Your Star Wars name is the first 3 letters of your last name and the first 2 letters of your first name. Mine’s Reima.

Reima…That’s the name of some old Jamaican lady I work with.

Star Wars sucks.

Or how about this! Your porn star name. Whoa ho! Hey-o! Combine your first pet’s name with the first neighborhood you ever lived in. Call me Elvis Golfcourse and I’m here to get biss-aye!

*fartzz*

I can do better than that.

Terrorist Name
First: “Turn on CNN – the first dark person you see’s first name” or “Mohamed”.
Middle: “Your Mom’s maiden name spelled backwards” or “Mohamed”
al
Last: “Any one of Barack Hussein Obama’s names” or “Mohamed”

Mine: Mohamed Mohamed al Mohamed

Native American Name
First: “John” or “David”
Last: “Any adjective/participle you would use to describe an elephant”
Last: “Go outside – the first thing you see”

Mine: David Stomping Tree

Black (“Ghetto”) Name
Nickname: “A cleaning product” or “Lil’”
First: “Your dad’s first name”
Last: “Any president’s last name except Obama”
Last: “Brown” or “Cotton”

Mine: “Lysol” Robert Clinton Brown

Gay 80’s Rockstar Name
First: “Your first name but with y/ie tacked on the end”
Last: “An element from the periodic table”

Mine: Marky Gold

19th Century Industrialist Name
First: “A name from the Bible”
Middle: “A town in Maine” or “A town in Oregon”
Last: “A town in Great Britain”

Mine: Isaac Thorndike Grimsby

Superhero Name
Name: “Go to an ethnic neighborhood like Chinatown, Little Italy or a straight up Ghetto. Walk around. Try talking to locals. The first word in English you understand, that’s your superhero name. Add man/woman if needed”

Mine: Stupid Man

My Own Creation Myth

2009-02-11T07:47:00.001-08:00

First, there was nothing.

From the Great Abyss emerged the mother of all creation; clad in hood and cowl, dark as the perpetual night she was from, and known only as Bahtmawn.

Bahtmawn had 3 sons, and then returned to the shadows of nothingness, promising to fight crime, no more, forever.

The first son was God. He was put in charge of everything he saw before him. All he saw was a vast empty universe and his two brothers.

“This existence needs a little spice. I can do better than Bahtmawn,” announced God.

“What’s spice?” asked the second brother, Bad God.

“What’s spice? I’ll show you what the fuck spice is! Go to Hell!” And so, God created a Hell and banished Bad God to live there, forever. And yay, t’was a good day, thus spoketh God.

“Alllll right! Time to play Sims Existence.”

God went over to his third brother, a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle action figure of Turtles in Time samurai Leonardo, and placed him in the microwave, which he just invented. Into the microwave God also placed a can of hairspray and a potato.

The entire concoction exploded. The parts that remained on fire became the suns and stars of our universe. The parts that didn’t became the planets and moons. And yay, t’was a good day, thus spoketh God.

God found one planet. It was favored by God above all other planets. He created a pair of beings in his image, and he favored them above all other creatures. He made them mate and made them masters over all the beasts of the planet.

For millennia God watched over and cared for this planet, ensuring peace and prosperity; a true utopia.

“This is gay,” said God. He sent down that virus from 28 Days Later and watched the carnage unfold. When that got boring, he sent an asteroid the size of Texas. Finally, he picked up the whole damn thing and chucked it into a Supergiant. And yay, t’was a good day, thus spoketh God.

“Making a real fucked up planet should be funny,” mused God.

On the planes of an ordinary planet, God created the first man. His name was Jeff Goldblum.

“Jeff, this is your planet.”

“What the fuck was that?! Who’s talking?!” shouted Jeff Goldblum.

“Jeff, I’m God. I like just created you.”

“Yo.”

“Yo, Jeff.”

Silence filled the space between God and Jeff Goldblum.

“So…um. You should take a day or two to look around, you know, get used to life and whatever. And uh, if you need anything, just sort of shout it, I guess. Yeah, I’ll hear it.”

“’kay.”

“…well…okay. See ya, Jeff.”

“See ya, God.”

A day passed.

“God? Hey, God!”

“What is it, Jeff?”

“I’m hungry.”

God created a Wendy’s Baconator Burger and gave it to Jeff Goldblum. “Eat as many as you can; grow fat on them and you shall be happy.” Jeff Goldblum did. And yay, t’was a good day, thus spoketh God.

The next day Jeff Goldblum spoke to God again.

“God, I’m horny. I just finished reading Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban in the series and I gotta say, I’m really fucking randy right now. Do you think you can, you know, materialize Hermione for me?”

“Whatever.”

A bolt of lightning struck the book and in its place was a 15 year old Harry Potter standing before Jeff Goldblum.

“God, that’s not what I wanted. God? Hey, God?!” But God was no longer listening to Jeff Goldblum. He looked over to Harry Potter.

“Meh,” he shrugged. “Beggars can’t be choosers.”

What a terrible night for Harry Potter. The forced sex, the beatings, the partially digested Baconator Jeff Goldblum threw up on his back when Jeff Goldblum got motion sick from sodomizing Harry Potter.

The next morning Jeff Goldblum left the cave to go kill something for shits and giggles. Harry eventually rose. He didn’t remember much. He didn’t remember last night – his subconscious blocked his memory. Gone were his memories of Hogwarts, his friends, his life.

Harry Potter stumbled over to the river. He glanced at his own reflection. Across his face was a wide, redish-brownish mark. Was it blood? Excrement? Both? In his daze, Harry Potter tried wiping it off.

“Erase…mark. Erase…mark.”

Jeff Goldblum returned. He was carrying a dead rabbit with a broken neck and a turtle who’s shell was completely caved in.

“Erase…mark. Erase…mark,” Harry Potter was still mumbling.

“What are you saying?” Asked Jeff Goldblum. “Mark Reiss?”

“Erase…mark. Erase…mark.”

“Is that your new name, Mark Reiss? Mark Reiss? Mark Reiss. Ok, Mark Reiss, let’s get going. I have a busy day of killing things and fucking the shit out of you.”

And yay, t’was a good day, thus spoketh God.

(Just in case you forgot this joke the first time I told it)

Manhood Rites of Passage Around the World

2009-02-10T10:58:00.000-08:00

I remember the exact moment I realized I had become a man. It wasn’t when I was 12 and I had just finished my bar-mitzva. Nor was it when I was 17 and lost my virginity. It wasn’t when I was 18 and I received a draft notice from the government. And it certainly wasn’t when I was 18 and got drunk for the first time.

No, it was much more special than that.

It was when I was 21 and I was standing in Federal Court. The judge said, “Mr. Reiss you are being tried as an adult, do you understand?” Why, actually, yes. Yes I do understand. I’m allllll man!”

Of course, along with being a man came a year long jail sentence and a $5,000 fine if convicted (didn’t!). But that’s what growing up is all about. You move from “little high, little low” to “high, deep fucking low”. Hey, Peter Pan! It’s time to put on the big-boy pants and grow the fuck up.

Imbalu Circumcision Party
Age: 18-21
You know when a little Jewish baby gets circumcised it’s usually when they are still covered in mom-juices? Like, they are that fresh? Or they wait like a week so the child can wear nice clothes for the Moil and start learning the concepts of expectations and disappointment? Well the Imbalu, which is a tribe in Africa, let the boys’ penis age like salt-cured meat. This thing is like a festival; the whole tribe comes out with music, BBQ goats, dirt rituals, and booze. For 3 days this party goes on while the boy tries to not psyche himself out. If he can face the knife, aka, have a middle aged dude fondle your junk with a knife, without showing any fear, you are a man. If you show fear during the process, you’re still a man but you are, as the Imbalu call it, a “he-bitch”.

Jewish Bar-Mitzva
Age: 12-13
The myth about bar-mitzvas is that once done, you are a man in the community. Fact is, once you’re done, you’re still the same rights-less adolescent you were but now you have $4,000 to fund running away and joining a Canadian circus. Although, because of the heavy emphasis placed on learning and responsibility at such a young age (it takes years to prep for this thing), it is the reason why Jews have historically been intelligent and invented world-altering things like communism, modern psychology, jeans, polio vaccines, Jesus Christ, and the concept of humor.

Boston Hot Wing Challenge
Age: “Oh you think you’re old enough, huh?”
The challenge is simple: eat 10 devil wings, made with the hottest pepper in the world the Indian Naga Jolokia pepper, and claim immortality on the Wall of Flame. Like most manhood tests, this one amounts to nothing more than a retarded frat-stunt. Who can do the dumbest, most painful thing ever without flinching? “I can, ya wicked pansy. Now hit me in the face with that frickin’ ahm-chehah. GO SOX!” *whack*

Themyscira Sex Change Operation
Age: Puberty or like around 25 when you start getting those “feelings”
For those of you who aren’t dorks, Themyscira is the home island of Wonder Woman and the Amazons. It has strict guidelines and rules of conduct and honor, namely that men are forbidden from even walking on the island, which makes things hard when one sister realizes she’s actually a man trapped in a woman’s body. Man, I wish I was trapped in a woman’s body that would be fun as shit. Oh sure, they can have the surgery, no prob. But they are forever banished from their home and are to leave in disgrace. So, it’s like every other person who’s ever had a sex change. Or hell, gay. Carry your burden like a man!

Russian Bear Fighting
Age: 10
Leave it to Russians to take something as simple and care-free as bullfighting and warp it into something a million times more fucked up and therefore cooler. I was taught as part of the cultural aspects of Spain in Spanish class that bullfighting is like this one huge show of manly bravado. You lure in the beast, make it dance around, and stick swords in it until either you or the bull dies. Ok, take that, replace the bull with a 900lb bear, the swords with a knife (not knives; A knife) and the man is a boy. The best strategy is to not attack the bear but to bait it around until the 2 hour time limit is up. But if the boy does manage to kill it…instant manhood. Manhood on tap. Plus he gets a cool nickname for life like Yefim the Quick or Aleksei the Unpredictable. Oh yeah, before I forget, there is a branch of PETA established in Russia but all members have about as much status and prominence in the country as 15th century slave women.

Sicilian Rave in the Cave
Age: 14-16
A drugless, 2 day rave may seem brutal on its own because 1) only drugs can provide that kind of endurance and 2) ew, rave music, but compound the fact that kids are raving in popular body-disposal sites for the mafia and things take on an edge of abandon. Although you don’t need to do this to be a man in Sicily, you do if want the slightest hope of getting laid in high school.

Pacific North West Salmon Spawn
Age: 1-5
In every young salmon’s life, there comes a time where you cast off the luxurious life of a deep sea salmon and take on the brutal life and responsibilities of a spawning salmon. Salmon salmon salmon. Salmon! If you can survive the hundreds of miles swimming upstream, fighting starvation, exhaustion, bears, and Eskimos, your sexy prize is fertilizing eggs in what is probably the exact same spot your parents conceived you. Congratulations. You are a man. Now you may die.