You don't want a blog like this. You need a blog like this.

Thursday, September 20, 2007

Moving

New blog is at outersanctum.quiblit.com.

Freedom From Speech

Pranks, punk'd, hijinks. It's all good. Sorry to belabor the point, again, but I think this time it's justified, if for no other reason than to see the trees instead of the forest.

I prefer oranges to apples. They're more delicious and better for you, you could argue.

When I was in undergrad, a buddy and I were enjoying a lovely early evening stroll around campus when we decided to conduct a sociological experiment. We spotted a campus security rent-a-cop, all 5'4"/300lbs. of him, before he spotted us, and we started running away from him. Mind you, we'd done nothing wrong, nothing at all, which means by virtue solely of our running he gave chase.

4 hours and 7 junior pigs later, they never found us, and to this day are probably still wondering just exactly what it was that we didn't do that caused us to flee the scene. Good times. The virtue of a well-spent youth, I suppose.

But let me see if I've got this right.

Some asshole with a camera gets grabbed, restrained, hauled away, restrained some more, held down, cuffed, tasered (I prefer the extra syllable), held down some more, tasered again, hauled away, arrested, booked, put in jail, and arraigned because he exercised bad manners and poor etiquette?

It's my understanding that he was grabbed, restrained, hauled away, restrained some more, held down, cuffed, tasered (see above), held down some more, tasered again, hauled away, arrested, booked, put in jail, and arraigned because he was attempting to incite a riot.

Well I gotta say: That's some really terrible riot inciting attempts. Here's a tip: If everyone in the room hates you because you're an annoying dickhead with delusions of grandeur, then there's a pretty good chance that none of them will have your back when the campus gestapo decides to "sweep the leg Johnny". You're welcome.

Let's see: Kent State, Chicago's 1968 DNC, Birmingham's summer of 1965-ish, no taxation without representation... Hmm. Those were the days.

Sacha Baron Cohen's a genius and he's funny, 2 things our young Meyers isn't. Some of the stunts Borat pulled nearly got him killed. And the only reason he's not dead or in jail is because during filming, Larry Charles, the director, had an army of young lawyers in minivans making sure he was well within his rights to be doing what it was that he was doing. Meyers didn't have that luxury.

The cavalier attitude some of you hold with regard to your civil liberties scares the shit out of me. I guess I care a little bit more about my freedom to speak my mind. I never do it in a theater, though. But I love going to horror movies with a cinaplex full of black people because they'll have conversations with the characters on the screen -- heated, extended exchanges -- and it's usually more entertaining than the movie. Is that racist?

Anyways, those of you balking at the severity of personal infringement Meyer's stunt provoked leads me to believe you got exactly the political administration you deserve. Enjoy it, by all means. I guess we can thank the baby-booming hippies for all their hard work getting hippies elected mayor and paying for sandwiches with songs.*

I will say this: When it comes to outsourcing democracy to countries we've accidentally invaded again, would it be too much to ask if, every once in awhile, we went ahead and practiced a little democracy here on our own shores? Practice it till we get good at it, you see.

Meyer's real crime was taking an ideal opportunity to be brutally funny and squandering it for the sake of misplaced disobedience. For that? Yeah, lock him up and throw away the key. His exposing our illusion of freedom and security may have been accidental, but that's just because the means really do justify the ends.

(Man. This water I'm sitting in in this giant frying pan is starting to get uncomfortably warm, by the way.)

*Patton Oswalt

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Today We've All Been Tasered

College Pigs Deck Campus Loudmouth At Non-Event
HELP! HELP ME! SOMEBODY PLEASE HELP ME! or not
Former Presidential Hopeful Pleads [For] 5th (Of Bourbon) Mastering Art Of Speaking While Still Asleep (At The Wheel [Again])
America's Future Looks On And Laughs At Totalitarianism

Oh well. It's only freedom. So I'll try to keep this brief.

Was Meyer an annoying little prick who was out for attention? Probably. He's a journalism major. How could he not be? Was he out of line and out of line? Looks like it. He's a journalism major. How could he not be? Did some of those cops want to punch him in the face? I know I did. Journalism's been on vacation since 1972.

Still, there's a pretty big difference between wanting to punch someone in the face and actually punching someone in the face. It's called democracy. Democracy is probably the worst form of government on the planet, earth, because it's both really hard to maintain and nearly impossible to enforce. Democracy is having to listen to someone advocating things that make you sick to your stomach while at the same time lobbying till you're completely spent for that person's inalienable right to be advocating those very things that make you sick to your stomach.

I.e., it's not that this whole thing is a slippery slope. It's that this whole thing means we've already slid down the slope and are currently trying to claw our way back up the slope while some mongoloid storm trooper is, that's right, tasering us in the gonads.

Don't get me wrong: I'm one of those adopted southerners who'd like to see "Separate but equal" given another shot at primetime. But if you're at all familiar with Gainesville, then you're at all familiar with the people I work/play/live with. In other words ("i.e."), they'd would've laughed at someone, and let's not by coy about this, being tortured with an electrical device.

I'm no lawyer (Word on the street is that there may be 2 or 3 ambulance chasers posting right here on The New Fray!) , but the last time I checked, you couldn't be cuffed by Johnny Longarm for being annoying. If that were the case, then Best of the Fray would look like Dispatches From the Martha Stewart Trial. (I miss it. I really do.)

That whole "freedom of speech" bit? I'm against it. You should already know that. If you don't, you're reading the wrong people.

Perhaps a better approach [apologies/thanks to ThyGoddess]:

"Hi, Senator Kerry. I wore flipflops in your honor. I have 3 questions:

1.) Why didn't you contest the election results in South Florida, where, just like back in 2000, black people became felons overnight?
2.) If you can't impeach the president for invading the wrong country at the wrong time, can you initiate impeachment proceedings based on the fact that he's an idiot?
3.) When you were in Skull and Bones, was there some initiation process in which, when you're laying in that coffin masturbating, you have to pledge to be spineless turds for the rest of your life?

Thanks in advance for your candor. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go get tasered by people too stupid to realize it's their fundamental rights I'm trying to exercise. Didn't realize I'd actually be exorcising them."

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

O.J. Casino Video Transcripts Leaked

Juice Caught With Hand In Sports Memorabilia Jar
IF THE JERSEY FITS IT'S GOODBYE RITZ
Marsha Clark Recruited To Screw Up Open-Shut Case Completely, Totally
What Happens In Vegas In Bars Stays In Vegas Behind Them

Uh oh. Don't look now, but word on the street is that O.J. Simpson may or may not have tried to steal back all his worthless sports crap that he sold in order to pay off the family of that blond gal and her male gigolo he murdered over ten years ago, creating motherless children again. Packing heat and some extra muscle, even. I guess his next book will be Just Exactly How Stupid Am I?

Man. That's a well you don't go to more than once. Karma. I don't care if you've got "slave feet": Nobody but nobody outruns the Vegas P.D. Not his best Ocean's Eleven moment, to say the least.

Unless you haven't heard it yet, TMZ.com has a recording of O.J.'s confrontation with the hotel casino concierge attempting to thwart a robbery. It's not pretty and may not be suited to our younger readers. Many boat hands died for this information. Proceed at your own risk.

"Concierge: Good evening, sir. How may I help you?
O.J. Simpson: Hi. I'm O.J. Simpson. You may recognize me from those TV commercials where I jumped over all the airport seating to catch a flight.
C: Hmm... I don't recall those.
OJS: Really? I used to play football. I'm quite famous.
C: Were you in Roots?
OJS: No, but I was in the first 2 Naked Gun movies. Wait. Was I in the second one? I know at one point I got pushed off the deck of a boat in a wheelchair. Funny stuff!
C: I'm not familiar with that film franchise. Now what is it I can do for you?
OJS: Well, see, here's the thing: A bunch of my stuff is in your vault, and I kinda sorta need it back in order to get to the bottom of who killed my ex-wife, finally.
C: Oh, now I remember: You're the dude with the ill-fitting glove and the baked surfer dude living out back. Say, whatever happened to that guy? Didn't he have a talk show at one point?
OJS: He's currently painting pictures on turtles in San Jose. Anyways, about my stuff. Can I have it, please?
C: Let me check the manifesto... Hmm... It says here that the contents of our vault are the property of several other people, but I don't see your name amongst them.
OJS: Well, if you went and got my stuff you'd see that my name is on most of the sports memorabilia. If it's not mine, then tell me why it's got my name on it.
C: Your name being on the merchandise has nothing to do with it. Possession is 9/10ths of the law.
OJS: Did you actually think I was going to come into a hotel casino in Vegas and demand the contents of its vault without some backup? Just how stupid do you think I am? Wait. That's catchy, might make a nice follow up to If I Did It. Darnell, write that down. Now, where was I? Oh, right. What if I told you that I and my 2 associates happened to have guns in our pockets?
C: I'd ask, 'Or are you just happy to see me?'
OJS: Don't do anything funny.
C: Sir, armed robbery is no laughing matter. I'm afraid I'll have to deny your request.
OJS: Then I demand to see your supervisor.
C: Very well. [click] Steve, could you come to the front desk? Someone claiming all that useless shit in the vault is his because it's got his name on it would like to speak to you. [click]
OJS: Now we're getting somewhere.
Assistant Night Manager: What seems to be the problem here?
OJS: The stuff in your vault is mine. I'd like it back. I'm in a bit of a time jam and I'd appreciate your cooperation.
ANM: Your name, please?
OJS: O.J. Simpson. I'm a football player.
ANM: Really? You look a little long in the the tooth for the gridiron. You look familiar to me. Were you on Dancing With The Stars?
OJS: No, but I competed in many Battle Of The Network Stars.
ANM: Battle of the what what?
OJS: Battle Of The Network Stars? When TV stars would form teams made up of actors starring in some of television's favorite shows back in the 70's and early 80's. Farah Fawcett, Mike Farrell, Dan Haggerty, Richard Hatch, Gabe Kaplan. You know, the giants. They'd compete in obstacle courses and things of that nature. And the grand finale would be the tug-of-war contest between the top 2 teams of the 3 networks. PBS could never throw a team together. They'd try to put together a crew, but Louis Rukeyser would always pull out at the last minute. He was their baseball dunk ringer. Anyways, I need my stuff.
ANM: So you're a TV actor?
OJS: Er, sort of. You may have seen what's turned out to be the 1st reality TV show over 10 years ago. It was called Oops! I Just Killed My Wife! It was genius. Someone plants my dead ex-wife in the kitchen, blood everywhere, a knife, bloody footprints, latex gloves...
C: Weren't you Benson on Soap?
OJS: No. Seriously? You don't remember? The white Bronco low speed police chase? [makes steering motions in air] 'If it doesn't fit, you must acquit'? The trial that lasted over a year? I'm the most famous bullet dodger on the planet. I may or may not have chopped my wife's head off, but I told a whopper, just like Queen Elizabeth's Diana plot, or our current president.
ANM: Not ringing any bells. I'm afraid I'm unable to meet your demands, Mr.... Simpson, was it?
OJS: Then I need to see your supervisor.
ANM: Very well. [click] Dan: Could you come to the front desk please? [click]
Head of Security: What do you want, O.J.?
OJS: Thank god. You know me. But wait: You're black. The head of security is black?
HoS: Thanks for taking the time to notice. You have a problem with that?
OJS: As a matter of fact, I do.
ANM: Why?
OJS: Because when a black man is found innocent of killing a white woman when it's obvious he's guilty, white people don't riot in the streets. Unless it's the deep south pre-civil rights, in which case there's no trial; he was just lynched.
OJS: Fuck you.
HoS: Fuck me? I grew up watching you play football. You were like Baryshnikov in cleats. Performance art at its finest. An incredible role model for black youth. How ironic that it turns out you're little more than an ignorant thug. You're no better than these rappers that talk about hos and bling and killing cops. You may have beat the rap, but i'd rather 50 Cent babysit my kids.
OJS: Fuck you. We've got guns.
HoS: Really? You pin cushion your wife and now you're trying to rob people? I wonder what Jackie Robinson would think.
OJS: I wonder what Jesse Jackson would think, nigga!
HoS: I bet you do. Listen: Do yourself a favor, leave, sober up, call your agent, get your acting career back on track, take a page out of Wynona Rider's book. Anything to prevent yourself from embracing your self-fulfilling destiny as a small time has-been. Think of the kids.
OJS: I'm O.J. Simson. I won the Heisman trophy. I shredded my ex-wife's face with a carving knife and got away with it. I can do anything I want. Now give me my shit.
HoS: This hotel is equipped with 123,597 hidden cameras, 239 of which are currently pointed directly at you. Just exactly how stupid are you?
OJS: How stupid am I? Stupid enough to kill my own wife and get away with it. That's how stupid. It'll all be in my new memoir. Darnell? Are you getting all this?
Darnell: No, but I think that little microphone in those flowers might be.
OJS: Oh. Right. Can I have a copy of that?
HoS: Sure. But something tells me you won't be the only one getting a copy.
OJS: Excellent. Nothing like a little pre-released buzz to raise some cash. Daddy needs a new lawyer. Could you cc it to Entertainment Tonight? I know a guy.
HoS: Congratulations on your finally having achieved '10-foot pole' status. Loved the book, by the way."

To be continued...

Thursday, September 13, 2007

Deadwood: Season 3, Part 3--Some Final Thoughts

David Milch
559 Movie Magic Lane
Glamourville, U S of A
90210

Dear Dave,

Well, if you guessed that I'm spent, you'd be right. The last 2 episodes of Season 3 alone sent me spiraling into a tailspin of "emotional embezzlement", and I don't think, 1 whole month later, that I've even recovered yet. 2 hours of perhaps the greatest television ever, cable or not.

However, this bullshit about Deadwood being too expensive to provide its rabid fans with a little bit o'closure strikes me as, well, bullshit. And retarded.

Listen, David Lynch Junior: Ending a series before you've told the entire story is terribly bad form. Terribly bad. I mean, the Earp brothers are in, like, 2 episodes and they don't really ever do anything but look askew at each other and all those around them; I still don't know who or what a "Pinkerton" is; the gay guy and the fat chick never got to put on a big show (yes, that was the Dennis Christopher, everybody); they've not even started construction on the new school; Jane and Joanie just barely got to explore their own inner lesbianisms; and we never find out why Octavius put a shiv in that Plutonian's gluteus maximus. (Er... Wait.)

I haven't seen that many loose ends since The 2005 Gay Pride Parade Home Coming Queen Court staged a live game of Thong Twister on the Moulin Rouge float. Good times.

(Though Ellsworth did get his head blown off. So that storyline is pretty much a dead end.)

Anyways...

So, yeah, you're gonna hafta out-Lynch Lynch (or lynch Lynch, as the case may be) and make a full-length feature film released in theaters that wraps up all the storylines but doesn't unravel itself in masturbatory self-musings the way Fire Walk With Me did.

You'll make 5 bajillion dollars in the first weekend alone. It will pay for itself in about 10 minutes. Hell, start a donation campaign and it could be all for-profit.

So please, Dave: Do it for Deadwood's fans; do it for Deadwood's cast; do it for Deadwood's memory. But for godsakes, just do it. But you'd better do it well, or you'll be the one getting David Lynched.

Yours sincerely,

switters

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Iraq Is So Not Vietnam

Okay, this one should be pretty obvious, kids. I feel really bad that I have to point these sorts of things out. It makes me feel very sorry for almost every single one of you.They're not even the same country!?! Southeast Asia and The Middle East are not contiguous.

The Iraq campaign may or may not be many things: illegal, immoral, wrongheaded, poorly thought out and planned, mismanaged, inappropriate, illegal and stupid.

But one thing we can be relatively certain about is that Iraq is so not Vietnam.

In Vietnam, we were looking for "Charlie"

And "gooks". In Iraq, we're looking for Achmed, and "sand niggers". 2 completely different sorts of folks. "Gooks" have slanted eyes with weird eyelids, greenish-blue skin, pointy teeth, and black hair. "Sand niggers" have wide-eyes with massive eyebrows, brown skin, no teeth, and kinky hair. Idiots.

We haven't secretly invaded an adjacent country

Like when we went into Cambodia and Laos without ever really telling anyone. You don't see us stumbling over there to Iran without at least letting someone know where we are, do you?

Our involvement in the Vietnam conflict started way back in the early 1960s, lasted over a decade and killed over 30,000 G.I.s, many of whom were drafted

We've only been in Iraq a little over 3 years and we haven't even lost 4,000 G.I.s, all of whom are volunteers, such that inner-city black youth with go-nowhere futures and rural white trash meth-head losers with little education could be called "volunteers". A mere technicality, John Kerry Junior.

The Vietnam conflict was fought in the jungle

The Iraq police action is being fought in the desert. That's practically the opposite of a jungle. Jungles are filled with exotic trees, bugs, monkeys, and it rains a lot. Deserts are arid with very few trees and mostly just scorpions and things of that nature. And it rarely rains in the desert. Newsflash!!! That's why it's a desert. Is this thing even on?

In Vietnam, we had a clear objective, which was to hold off those ugly commies from spreading their lies in the region

We haven't the faintest fucking clue what the hell we're supposed to be doing in Iraq. That's what makes it so very American to be there. Do try to keep up.

The president during the end of the Vietnam War was a raging alcoholic drunk on power, used the constitution as a coaster, spied on his own people, and drove the presidency so far into the ground that he just as well could've been running for the presidency of China

George Bush hasn't had a drink in 20 years.

Vietnam vets got Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and when they came home they got spit on

Iraq vets got Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and when they came home they got pissed on. Sure, it was their own piss, but piss couldn't be more different than spit no matter how hard piss tried not to be.

In Iraq, we've got almost as many (if not more) "mercenaries" than we do soldiers

We didn't have any mercenaries in Vietnam. Back then they were called "CIA", and there weren't nearly as many not there as we've been led to believe. You might want to brush up on your American history, dumbass. Seriously.

Some Vietnamese civilians, many of whom were blown up into millions of tiny little pieces, didn't want us there

Some Iraqi civilians, may of whom have been blown up into millions of tiny little pieces, do want us there. Badly. It's just that those that do want us there aren't as vocal as those that don't. That "silent majority" I mentioned in my "FOX News" post nobody read.

But note that antecedent up there. Of course many Iraqi civilians want us there. It's just that they want us in Vietnam. Double check the fine print, pinheads.

Iraq and Vietnam are in different time zones

Jesus-rimjob-Christ! Am I saying this? Am I actually having to say this out loud?!? Vietnam is currently residing in the Where Are They Now Sub-Standard Time, while Iraq has been reduced to 1645 A.D.-ish. It's been in a couple papers.

Apparently Vietnamese hookers played an important role in the life of our pre-disco G.I.s

Looks like Iraqi hookers don't play much of a role in the lives of our post-grunge G.I.s, because the last time I checked, Iraqi hookers are 1.) much more discrete than their Vietnamese counterparts; 2.)--wait: There's no such thing as an Iraqi prostitute; 3.) Iraqi women who are only allowed to have sex if it's in the torture chamber of your date's dad's summer palace (3rd door on the left off the main foyer); 4.) not Britney, who bombed at the MTV Music Video Awards in Las Vegas ("Let it go, Dutch. Let it go."); 5.) of the mind that in Iraq, safe sex is considered illegal unless it's in another country with a not Iraqi guy; 6.) Iraqi women who are only allowed to have sex if it's in the Rape Room of their date's dad's winter retreat (down the stairs, 2nd door on the right past the laundry room/anal probe station); 7.) not really "hookers". They're "future suicide bomber semen receptacles". A little red-blooded American,er... blood could only enhance the sheer pointlessness of it "all". Take that, Swift Boat Retards For Bullshit.

The War In Vietnam was real!

The War In Iraq is a video game on CNN.

So, to sum up: Iraq is so not Vietnam because of racial profiling, ray shawl pro filing, proportional first responders, global raining, automatic laugh tracks during news conferences, the wisdom to know the deference, the Jane Fonda syndrome, Walter can't read, nation exploding building, Mei Lei-esqueness, except on the west coast, "me love you long time", and Play Station 2.

Oh well. At least nobody was lied to this time already, again.

Tuesday, September 11, 2007

Bill Clinton Caused 9/11

[Anniversary rerun. As I told skitch, it's a little ironic that I had to copy/paste this from kos. Ouch.]

In our month long celebration of all things 9/11, it seems warily appropriate to get all the cards on the table. 5 years after this disaster, we still don't know whose fault it is. Until now.

With a presidential record that reveals that Clinton was more interested in the domestic health - economic, physical and social - of his fellow citizens than he was in "nation building" and "marching freedom spreading democracy" like a wheat thresher, it becomes abundantly clear just how asleep at the wheel our 42nd president (42? Have there been that many already? Really?) was, exactly.

He failed to catch bin Laden during the movie Black Hawk Down

I mean, come on. Obi Wan Kenobi practically had him in his sights when he took out that one tank thingie with a grenade launcher in order to help save the dude from Pearl Harbor. Not him, the other one. No, you're thinking of the dude from Troy and Munich. I'm talking about Colonel William ("Wally") Sharp from Armageddon.

He was soft on terror

After the incident in Somalia, all of the awe and fear we'd built up over the years made the first Gulf War look like the Bay of Pigs, literally.

He was a moderate Democrat

I.e., "pussy". But what would you expect from someone who was...

A draft-dodging faggot who never saw one day of combat

Could someone please explain to me, preferably slowly, why we would elect someone who had never fought in a war? It verges on the comical!

His vice president was an insane lunatic

All that weenie Al Gore did for 8 long years was to yammer on and on and on about the environment, predicting that if we didn't ease back off on all the consuming we'd suffer massive fluctuations in the weather, causing unprecedented natural disasters. I'm still chortling at that one, retard. Newsflash! Tsunamis and hurricanes are not caused by the weather, doofus. They're caused by God. Everybody knows that. I guess the last laugh's on you, pinhead!

He spoke thoughtfully and in complete sentences when not reading a teleprompter

Just who the fuck does he think we are? Marshall Scholars? Quit that "reasoning" and "oratory" and "presidential rhetoric" and give us the meat and potatoes. (Better: pork skins and Schlitz.)

He was sexually active

Face it, folks: the last thing we need in the Oval Office is a president engaging in various sex acts while he's "the most powerful man on our planet, earth". It sends the wrong message, i.e, "I am a human being." Is that really the image we want splattered all over the world for all its inhabitants to see?

He was so busy running the country that he forgot to run for office

You just don't do that, kids. You just don't. When the majority of politicians' time is spent vying for the opportunity to spend the majority of their time vying for the opportunity to spend the majority of their time doing just that, it creates a Zen-like flow of psychological open-endedness and participates, via its circularity, in the very circle of life that they talk about in The Lion King. And who wouldn't want that?

On the other hand, actually getting things done creates a vacuum and the illusion that you're no longer needed. That's bad (for) business.

He wasn't fanatically Zionist

You can't achieve peace in the Middle East unless you're prepared to suck some kosher dick. Israel is the only, and I mean the only sane nation in the greater Middle Eastern metropolitan area. If Middle Eastern Peace were a restaurant, then Israel would be the uppity maitre 'd, and he'll be happy to inform you, after saying, "And you are...", that reservations are required months in advance, even years for larger parties. "Perhaps you should try that new place, Iraqi's Quagmire, just down the street," he'll say. "That may be more in your price range. And if I'm not mistaken they do accept reason and logic."

You don't talk to those people with reason and logic. You talk to those people with cruise missiles and artillery shells, RPGs and landmines, IEDs and SUVs. The language of anti-personnel devices and collateral damage is the only language those desert apes can understand. And you know it.

So, to sum up: Bill Clinton caused 9/11 because of Armageddon (not the movie this time), John F. Kennedy, moderation, AWOL (Absent With Out Leaving), "global cooling", stupidity-as-empowerment, productivity, and anti-Semitism.

Truth hurts, doesn't it?

Thursday, September 6, 2007

Great News

She called last night.

I didn't answer. A buddy from work called, too, and wanted me to come over to watch the Roddick/Federer match (he's got cable, obviously). I probably should've gone.

So, no, I didn't answer. But it took all I had not to call her back. She left a message, something about having had a slight sinus infection related to her new (tooth) veneers. Funny. Sweet. Like we'd just talked earlier in the afternoon or something. I'm beginning to wonder if her obtuseness is some sort of pathological condition.

There's a Thai restaurant in Crestline (high end suburb of The Ham, part of Mountain Brook, "The MILF Capital Of The Southeast", you might say). Down the street from the restaurant is a nearly life-size chess board, with pieces to match. One of the last times she and I went there (stoned, obviously), we played a game after dinner. I let her win. It was sweet. Endearing.

Why call? Seriously? Why the fuck call?

This may come as a shock to some of you, but I really like to make people laugh, especially you people, because you're so goddamn smart. It makes me feel good to make smart people laugh while stupid people just sort of sit there, reading (I presume they kind of can) with that scrunched up, furrowed brow and the mouth half-open.

I try not to talk about my own posts, but I was surprised at how much anger there was in that one about the 4,000th dead American G.I. Anger not directed particularly well nor executed properly.

(You may recall that my musings with regard to the 3,000th dead G.I. didn't go over too well. Speaking of which, it makes me nervous when daveto takes so much heat. I don't get it. He's one of the most cogent, observant, thorough, thoughtful, perceptive and funny posters. [Confession: He's funnier than I am. Remember "I'm every-fucken-where"? 'Nough said.])

My alleged hatred of Jews, my Zionism, my bigotry with regard to blacks and Mexicans (really, anyone not white), my homophobia ("homophobia"? I'm not afraid of the gays; I just don't like them) and my misogyny -- all are both real and imagined, only the way they could be and only the way they could work for "the greater good" (and "the greater funny"!) in an online context. And I continue to be stunned that all y'all get it. How fucked up is that?

Listen to more Patton Oswalt.

But honestly: Why the fuck call?

We all get the "You know, you look like what's-his/her-name" bit when we go out to eat. I've gotten Heath Ledger (whatever), Matt Damon (hardly) and Glen Ford (pretty accurate, actually). But the one I get most often and most consistently is, "Hey, you look like that one gay guy who gets the shit kicked out of him in that Jack Nicholson movie with the gal from Twister," which I take as a compliment. This is the dude who cut his teeth on Talk Soup, for heaven's sake. I recently bought Mystery Men when I ordered The Mystery Guest online for august's book club discussion. It's a perfect movie. I don't know why it doesn't make more Top 10 Lists, frankly. Stiller, Azaria, Macy, Gerofalo, Herman (Reubens), Waits, Izzard, Rush, and Kinnear.

I hear Greg's killer in Little Miss Sunshine (it's in the Netflix queue). But he's nothing short of astounding in Mystery Men. Astounding.

So I guess I'll just keep trying to piss certain people off and make certain people laugh ("Ronald Reagan Caused 9/11", "Blogging The Mystery Guest", "Top 10 Disasters Of 2007"). It's the least I can do.

I miss my dad, which is a good thing, because I think it's an excellent testament to the sort of father he was. And he was funny, only the way midwesterners can be. I miss him.

(Thanks, by the way. I wonder if you guys will ever know just how much I appreciate you, in the strictest and most substantial sense. And I gotta believe that that's not unhealthy, considering the context/format/media. I'll never forget all the times y'all have made me laugh. The one that tickles me quite a bit is when I harken back to the original Regulation Hottie Retard Smackdown, when 7th (Seventh) Heaven got cancelled, and Faithbased lit up like a tackily decorated whitetrash X-mas tree, and rundeep and bright-virago basically traded 1-liners for the better part of an afternoon/early evening with idiotically insane lunatics. You just can't script that. [Okay, you can; but it's not easy and shouldn't be tried at home without supervision {unless you're me}.])

(Drinking to remember, indeed. I've always found Ben Folds terrifyingly profound. That sucks. Maybe in a good way.)

Tuesday, September 4, 2007

Funk Slumps

Autumns are spectacular down here. August slowly melts into September, and by its 3rd week, the golden light created by Birmingham's nationally ranked air pollution eases into orange and purple sunsets, the temperature and humidity recedes, and October sees consistent days of dry, mid-70-degree weather. Though the days get shorter and the calendar slowly swirls into the toilet bowl that is the holiday season, it's not unusual to wear a T-shirt in January.

Hit a bit of a low this weekend. Didn't do much of anything except watch tennis, obviously. But I was very unproductive, lethargic, and self-medicated.

One of my favorite posters on the fray, Slate's message boards, bright_virago, says that I need to move. I've been in Birmingham over 10 years now, longer than I've lived anywhere ever. I definitely see her point. The problem is that even if I were to move, I'd still have to take myself with me.

What I seem to be in the middle of is full-on all-out depression. As far as I can tell, it's not being caused by anything specifically, and it comes and goes, this overwhelming feeling of despair, hopelessness, pointlessness, anxiety. You know, all the fun stuff.

I need to quit smoking. When I quit successfully over 3 years ago (or whenever) for just over 9 months, I was on Zyban, which, if I'm not mistaken, is a mood stabilizer. I'm pretty sure I should be on something, and that beer and pot aren't doing a lot to improve my demeanor.

I haven't heard from the-one-that-got-away in a week. I'm sure that has something to do with my mood. I hesitate to mention her because I get the sense that people are a little tired of hearing about her and that my ignorance on the subject verges on the exhausting. (I'm thinking specifically of another favorite frayer, rundeep.) But not having heard from someone who for the last 6 months would call me every day is not necessarily single-handedly responsible for the chronic blahs and slight panic attacks. I wish there were a pill that made everything seem fine, like Prosium in Equilibrium (Great movie!). I would so take that drug and not even complain. Who cares about art and music and prose and poetry if all it does is make life worth living, anyway?

My diet's improved, but I'm still about 15-20 pounds underweight. But I'm not sleeping well. (That's the beer talking.) Though I don't look like Christian Bale in The Machinist. Yet. (Though I've not committed vehicular manslaughter that I know of. Yet.)

So I need to move, but not literally. Clearly what I do need is change, whether it be in routine or state of mind or drug abuse or alcohol abuse or whatever. Because it's become pretty obvious to me here of late that the self-medication regimen I've got myself on just ain't workin'. I've been spending a lot of time by myself, which, while not catastrophic, doesn't exactly make for good conversation all the time. I mean there's only so much you can tell 2 dogs and a cat before you start saving all the newspapers and make forts out of them in the basement. (Thank god I don't have a basement.)

It's not so much that I'm only happy when I'm miserable. It's more like I'm only miserable when I'm happy. It's just that the whole thing is so demoralizingly stupid because it's all my own doing, my own accord.

Perspective. Yet another of my favorite posters, Isonomist, lost a son to leukemia not long ago. And here I am bitching about nothing in particular. I mean, honestly: I'm reasonably healthy (Chortle!), I have a decent job (though severely underpaid), I have a great family (whom I never seem to find the time to visit), good friends (whom I blow off on a regular basis for no reason in particular), I have a decent sense of humor (I'd have to; it's either that or just crying all the time), and I have a huge alcohol tolerance. Everybody wins.

Oh well. Thanks for listening. Again.