HOT GARBAGE!

TWO QUICK THINGS:

2009-06-21T12:56:00.000-07:00

1) I'm going to take a break from this blog for a while.

2) Made a new blog to document Chicago stuff. It's called "little bohemian", because the title "my life of abject poverty" was already taken.

CHECK IT OUT, YA DOOFUS!

UPDATE: I THINK THE COMMENTS ON THE NEW BLOG ARE WORKING NOW! YEAH YEAH YEAH

"XULCHIBARA VS. THE SHIRT WRANGLER"

2009-05-27T15:08:00.000-07:00

"Would you like some frozen yogurt?"

I honestly didn't feel like having any, but Barry seemed insistent upon it, so I begrudgingly accepted a cup to shut him up. He was always trying to grease the wheels, to make sure everyone had everything they needed. "I'm the one that enables other people to make the magic happen" he'd say (sometimes when no one else was in the room to hear him say it). He kept a quart of good scotch in his desk. I guess his wheels needed greasing, too.

"I'm so glad you could fly down" he gushed. "The director was supposed to be here for this, but he's been having a bit of, ah...trouble. Some third-act rewrites. I'm sure you understand.

I nodded gravely. "From what I hear, your trouble goes beyond rewrites," I said.

Barry grimaced. He looked browbeaten, like a dog that had been kicked one too many times. He quickly pulled the scotch out of his desk and mixed a generous amount into his frozen yogurt.

At that point Barry's troubles were the hot talk amongst the who's who of Tinseltown. The film in question was The Reich Stuff, a historical drama about the Nazi's second attempt to launch a bomb-rocket at the moon. It was a summer tentpole movie, and Paramount had sunk nearly two-hundred mil into pre-production alone. But principal photography been delayed, the film was running over budget, and Barry suffered a rare compound ulcer as a result. It all boiled down to one major problem, the same problem Barry flew me down to Peru to discuss.

"I heard about what you did for Brad and it's amazing, simply amazing," Barry said. "I hear he's completely recovered now, hasn't touched the absynthe in nearly three months. Quite the turn-around, quite-"

I cut him off abruptly. "What I did for Brad was a personal favor, I'm not looking to make a career out of this." I casually pushed my half-eaten frozen yogurt onto the carpet to emphasize my point.

Barry sighed. "It's McConaughey," he said. "McConaughey won't keep his goddamn shirt on." His eyes seemed to get glassy and pensive above his yogurt-dipped moustache.

Barry quickly brought me up to speed.

Much to the chagrin of the rest of the cast, Matthew McConaughey had been cast as a young, time-traveling Joseph Goebbels. But McConaughey surprised everyone. He showed up to the first day of principal photography with a nuanced take on the Goebbels role, and had even bothered to learn a flawless, lilting German accent. He was great, Barry claimed. Seemed to be taking to the role seriously. Ready to break into the sub-genre of authentic period-docudrama sci-fi romance, and seemed primed to earn a few awards for his trouble.

But things got worse once photography shifted to Peru to shoot the climactic Incan temple sequence. McConaughey seemed to regress, taking his shirt off constantly, ruining entire rolls of film in the process, including take after take of the film's musical number ("We're Kristallnach't Gonna Take It Anymore").

He began to forget his lines. Every morning he'd start a campfire inside his trailer and began sleeping in a nest made from Kashi boxes and strips of torn, soiled linen. Craft services claimed that he demanded pig's blood instead of his typical wheatgrass smoothies. Things, Barry exclaimed, were "getting a bit out of hand". But as strange as Barry's yarn was, I got the feeling that he wasn't exactly on the up-and-up with me.

"The studio's sunk a boatload of money into this so far and it's too late to replace him. I could give a shit what he does when he's off-set or in his trailer, but when he's in front of that camera, he's our property, he's our little trained dog, and I need him on his mark and in costume and I need you to help us do it. I need you to help us keep a shirt on Matthew McConaughey."

We discussed my payment. Barry offered to throw me some kind of Co-Producer credit, but I didn't bite, so gave in and offered me an ungodly amount of money. He jokingly claimed he'd put me in the credits of the film as "Shirt Wrangler". I pretended to laugh and signed the contract he slid in front of me.

He gave me three days to assemble everything I'd need. When I left, he hugged me for what seemed like hours and and came up with a laundry list of different ways to say "thank you", acting like I'd saved his life instead of agreeing to keep a shirt on someones back.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Four hours later I got a voicemail from Barry.

His voice was shaky and I could barely hear him over the chaotic noises in the background but he begged, pleaded for me to immediately come back to the set and take care of McConaughey because there'd been a murder and he just didn't know what to do because McConaughey didn't seem to be McConaughey anymore. Then there was some kind of guttural growl in the background like to sheets of metal scraping together and before I had the chance to think myself out of it, I pulled a quick U-turn in the SUV and headed back to see it with my own eyes.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The craft service table, overturned. Dozens of croissants scattered across the floor like errant seashells on a beach. Wreckage from broken boom mics and steadycams strewn across the set. No one in site.

"Barry?" I shouted. My words echoed back from the vertical wall of the nearby Incan Temple.

That's when I saw the blood. Gallons of it, making set dressings into black curtains with a glossy sheen. I turn and find half of a man's torso wedged between a tv monitor and a foot locker. Bits of teeth and bone, clumpy shreds of scalps complete with raven-black hair. Madness in three dimensions.

A Texas drawl with an out-of-place German lilt called out from the dark. "Was it Barry that sent you?" McConaughey says, stepping out from behind a rough-cut rock pillar. McConaughey, with his square-jawed smile and his unkempt, tangled hair. Strange glyphs and runes drawn across his bare chest with the blood of others.

"Good God, McConaughey, what's happened here?" I hardly recognize my voice; it sounded hollow and fragile like it came from a woodwind instrument.

"We aren't McConaughey anymore," he said. His voice was different; the timbre and pitch suddenly dropping like a mercury thermometer during a flash-freeze. "We are Xulchibara, the Incan High-Priestess, the Lord of Ether. We are all that was, and all that will be again."

"What happened to McConaughey? What have you done?!"

"McConaughey was weak. An unbeliever trapped in the slow amber of Vanity. We lured him into the temple with the whisperings and trappings of childhood, and took hold of his vessel when he drank from our pool; the Pool of Xulchibara. We are him and he is Us."

Just then McConaughey/Xulchibara's ribcage began to swell. I heard a wet ripping noise, and his/it's sternum cracked and tore open, pulsing and swelling rhythmically, his exposed, yellow ribs glistening like loose teeth set in a strange vertical mouth. McConaughey fought the transformation, his dead hands clutching into tight fists at his sides. A strange velvety light seemed to envelope him, lifting him into the air. McConaughey's face alternated between a twisted grimace of agony and a horrible, cracked smile.

"What do you want?" I screamed.

"We want...a Co-Producer credit. And a percentage of the gross."

I paused.

"We've also got some ideas for a rewrite of the third act," the re-embodied Incan High-Priestess said. "And, we want a trailer. A big trailer, with a hot tub inside of it."

BIRD'S EYE VIEW OF POVERTY: MEMORABLE THINGS I'VE SEEN FROM THE BALCONY OF MY APARTMENT IN GHETTOVILLE

2009-05-20T14:14:00.000-07:00

In the late autumn/early winter, the old man living across the road used to give lemons away to neighborhood children. At first it seemed rustic and somewhat nostalgic, but over time I became convinced that he used lemons to lure children into his fruit cellar (which, of course, I imagined with a primitive dirt floor). In my mind, the seemingly friendly old man murdered the children and buried their small bodies beneath the lemon tree, thus recycling them into the lemons which would be enjoyed by his next batch of victims. I'm almost ninety-percent sure that this might/might not have happened.

Every night while I smoke cigarettes on our balcony, I'm forced to listen to the strained conversations between our militaristic neighbor and his out-of-state girlfriend/wife. Like clockwork, he appears in the adjacent parking lot dressed in casual camo fatigues and yells at her via his annoying bluetooth while he pounds Keystones and smokes Swisher Sweets. We rarely acknowledge each other's presence.

Recently Steve and I developed a borderline-obsession with the gripping sport of throwing poorly-made water balloons at a street sign that's placed about a hundred feet from the vantage of our balcony. This works far better than throwing full beers into the frequently busy road, which is something I've also attempted, and no, this is not a sad indicator of how much free time I find myself with. Anyway, I was making my 60th attempt at hitting that goddamn street sign, and I almost (directly) hit a young hispanic kid on a bike. He gave me the finger, and I laughed.

About a month ago, I watched an overweight Native American family saunter towards their water-damaged Ford Windstar. Their chubby son must have realized he left a Sugar Daddy in the car or something, because he made a break for it, hauling ass and swinging his sausage-like arms like frantic pendulums. But the grass was wet (courtesy of the sprinklers), and as soon as his feet hit the lawn his legs slipped out from under him. He soared. His back, parallel to the ground in mid-air, before landing. Hard. The air was driven out of his lungs in a quick wheeze, and I roared, laughing hard and slapping the balcony and spilling lukewarm Coors all over.

I'm really going to miss this apartment.

MAN, MY SON CAN REALLY DANCE...

2009-04-11T19:41:00.000-07:00

This is the offical video for the Black Eyed Peas' new single "Boom Boom Pow".

"LORD SAVE THE RINGS, I AM WAY TOO VAIN/ LISTENIN' TO THAT KANYE AGAIN/ I PLAY THE GAME LIKE I MADE THE GAMES"

2009-03-26T01:23:00.000-07:00

"CLOUDY WEATHER ON CHAMPAGNE SEAS"

2009-02-16T17:45:00.000-08:00

THE INCIDENT HAPPENED on day twenty-two of our month-long vacation; I turned to Brad and asked, "Brad, what's it like to be so beautiful?" He looked over the rims of his designer sunglasses, shrugged in that particular laconic way, and sighed.

That's Brad for you. I'm referring, of course, to Brad Pitt; acclaimed actor, philanthropist, and close personal friend. At the time, we were nearing the end of our annual pleasure-cruise in the amber waters of the Champagne Sea, an exclusive, man-made ocean designated for "celebrity use only" (I am not a celebrity, but Brad vouched for me). With his schedule being what it is, the cruises have become more difficult to organize, but somehow, we always manage.

For me, the cruises are a taste of the good life: endless four-story cheese and wine buffets, days spent playing holo-chess in hyperbaric chambers, and a troupe of scantily-clad swimsuit models painstakingly re-enacting my favorite battles from the Revolutionary War. But for the first time, I enjoyed these pleasures alone. For some reason, Brad had become more withdrawn during the course of the trip. While I played racquetball with Brad's steam-powered personal trainer, I saw Brad watching from the crow's nest with a jaded look of grim satisfaction. It seemed like he could no longer fully enjoy these toys of the mega-wealthy, but I think he enjoyed the fact that I enjoyed them.

For Brad, the cruise was not only an escape from his trappings of fame, but also, from himself. During our time at sea, Brad not only forbid the use of mirrors aboard his sail barge, but also prohibited the sizable crew from uttering the following words and phrases: "Brad Pitt", "Angelina", "Brangelina", "People Magazine", "Sexy", "Benjamin Button", and most of all, "Beautiful".

So, you can begin to understand the gravity of the situation surrounding my seemingly innocent question regarding Brad's beauty. Manila, Brad's resident mixologist, dropped a crystal decanter of absinthe and gasped as soon as the question left my lips. She'd seen Brad shoot men in the belly for less.

"Brad", I patiently repeated, adding an element of gravitas to my voice, "Tell me, what's it like to be so...beautiful?"

He sighed again. "I don't know," he said, smiling. "I should be asking you the same question."

"Cut the crap, Brad," I said. "You're being evasive. You know it, I know it...even Manila knows it."

Brad quickly shifted his gaze to Manila. She was using club soda and a damp rag to gently dab up the absinthe she'd spilled on the polar bear rug, but the moment her name was mentioned, she squeaked and ran into the walk-in fireplace.

"Listen, Brad...I know what you're doing," I began. "I may not understand it, but I can recognize it. It doesn't matter how many Champagne Seas you sail across or how many different kinds of prosthetics you disguise yourself with...you're still going to be the Sexiest Man Alive, goddamn it! Stop running from your birthright!"

Brad broke down and started to sob.

"You don't know what it's like! You don't know how it feels!" he howled. "You think I asked for this? You think I wanted to be this beautiful? No! No!!! I just wanted to make little movies and be an actor, a great actor! But I'll never be a great actor because whatever talent I have will be obscured by this!! This!!!"

His hands began tugging at the smooth skin of his face, contorting it into a horrible sneer, a parody of his handsome good looks. I suddenly realized Brad has some really fucked up image issues, and I was in way over my head. I regretted the four-hour coke party we'd just finished, but at the same time, I wished I had more coke. I decided I'd try to distract him.

"So...how about that sport team?" I ventured. But Brad was still trying to pull his face off like a mask while sucking absinthe out of the bearskin rug.

I walked over, dropping to my knees, cradling Brad Pitt's slouched form in my arms like some kind of fucked up Pieta. "Listen, Brad...I know you think being a modern Adonis is some sort of curse, and maybe it is. I'm sure it must be rough, to feel like beauty is your only contribution to the world, but you're wrong."

"I am?" Brad whimpered.

"You're goddamn right you are. Your beauty serves a crucial purpose: to make less attractive men feel inadequate. To make ugly people realize they're ugly! I mean, without such a flawless example of the masculine form, every Joe Regular would have self confidence! And we can't have that, can we?"

"No, we can't!" Brad exclaimed. I felt a warm feeling of accomplishment, but honestly, that could have been the coke.

"Thank you," Brad said. "Thanks for...giving me a bit of perspective."

"No problem, Brad. It's the least I could do. So, do you want to go feed frozen yogurt to baby birds to see how they handle lactose?"

"I thought you'd never ask," Brad said, smiling.

"SIX THINGS I'VE THOUGHT ABOUT IN THE LAST SEVEN DAYS"

2009-01-30T21:34:00.001-08:00

One of my co-workers recently discovered her neighbor is a prostitute. After hearing four separate instances of suggestive moaning within the span of a single day, my co-worker listened through the shared wall seperating her and her oversexed neighbor; she reportedly heard a young man say it was "his first time doing something like this". The next day, my co-worker and I found an ad in the "Erotic Services" section of craigslist, as well as an attached picture of said neighbor-of-the-night crawling naked across the floor in a pose that was supposed to be alluring. SO TOTALLY BUSTED.

One of my neighbors gives away free lemons in a way that's totally Rockwellesqe. Seriously. There's even a sign stuck into his lawn that says "FREE LEMONS" in an old-timey scrawl next to two full crates of goddamn citrus. Regularly, I watch cars stop for lemons from the vantage point of my balcony, and it is mundane and normal and makes me feel considerably less tense and anxious in a way that I cannot totally explain to you. SO TOTALLY AMERICANA.

I do not mind being single; I do, however, mind being around couples who constantly remind me that I am single. Last weekend I watched The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Slumdog Millionaire back to back. I did not realize that both of these movies are love stories. As a result, there were more joined hands and lips in the theatre than in a goddamn Siamese Twin convention, and I felt small and forgotten and poignantly bitter. As a perceived remedy, I went to see Taken tonight, because people don't go to see Taken to hold hands and kiss; they go to see Taken to see Liam Neeson get his motherfucking daughter back from those motherfucking foreign dudes. SO TOTALLY VENGEFUL.

Build-A-Bear is woefully lacking in the area of ironic teddy bear accesories (and puns). While I was incredibly intoxicated in a Build-A-Bear Workshop last Saturday night, I mentally ran though a list of possible "Celebrity Bears": "Bear-rack Obama", "Bear-ry Manilow", "Bear-ry Bonds", "Bear Grylls", "Bear-ly Legal Teens" (for mature adults only), "Bear-foot Contessa", and "Large Hairy Man Existing in Gay Culture, Commonly Referred to as A Bear". This is called "Marketing Synergy", and I'm still waiting for Build-A-Bear to return my damn call. SO TOTALLY LACKING.

Silent Hill 2 is the best survival horror game ever made. Case in point: It's the only video game that's made me scream out loud; it's the only video game that's made me want to turn the Playstation off and turn the lights back on "just to take a break for a while"; it's the only game I've played that's featured monster-on-monster rape as character development; it's the only game that I've actively dreaded and eagerly anticipated at the same time. I finished it a few days ago. As a palate cleanser, I'm now playing Lego Batman, which is a much better game that it deserves to be. SO TOTALLY PYRAMID HEAD.

Ayn Rand looks like a feminine version of Gollum, but with Down Syndrome. Just finished The Fountainhead after dragging through it for months. It was moderately impressive: all the characters spoke with a ridiculously stylized snappy dialogue, sort of how I imagine Spencer Tracy talked to Katherine Hepburn when they were alone together. But the book was probably 200 pages longer than it needed to be, and came across as really preachy and overwritten. I tried really hard to identify with Roark and recognize some of myself in him, but mostly I just felt like I was Peter Keating. SO TOTALLY OBJECTIVIST.

SKETCHBOOK HELL: "ZOMBIES"

2009-01-28T18:10:00.000-08:00

NAS- "BLACK PRESIDENT" (LIVE)

2009-01-21T10:47:00.000-08:00

"INAUGURATION: MOVING IN, MOVING OUT"

2009-01-20T20:56:00.000-08:00

A stillness had draped across the entire neighborhood since the disappearance of the “For Sale” sign, and by the time the moving vans arrived, that stillness had evolved from the sound of an audience holding its breath into the quiet roar of an impatient, curious crowd.

The telephone lines sagged beneath the sheer weight of gossip. Ms. Fillpot cradled her receiver between her shoulder and ear, speculating on the history and good looks of the mysterious new neighbor with Mrs. McDermott. Her husband, Mr. McDermott, was on a separate line with Mr. Fitzsimmons from the Kiwanis Club, both of them rhetorically wondering how the arrival of this new neighbor was going to affect the property value of their homes. No one knew anything for sure.

Meanwhile, the subject of their synchronized conversations had arrived early, without fanfare, noticed only by a stray cat that starred with unblinking grey eyes. The stranger walked past, his glossy leather shoes clicking a quick syncopated beat across the cold sidewalk. He’d come to pick up the keys to the house from the previous tenant himself.

The realtor tried to warn him against it.

“You don’t understand,” the realtor said, nervously running his thin fingers along the length of his narrow tie. “It’s best to do these things through an intermediary. Some people, when it’s finally time to pack up and leave, they get second thoughts. Especially when they’re face to face with the new owner, y’know? Some people just don’t want to leave.”

The realtor patiently established this again and again between long sips of cold coffee, but the stranger persisted. He’d insisted on handling the transition himself.

The stranger came to a stop. He stood before the house, looking it over again, and its appearance seemed oddly final. This belonged to him now, he reminded himself. His eyes traced over the familiar shapes and forms of it, analyzing it piece by piece as a doctor would examine a familiar patient: the sagging shutters, the chipped cornices, the cracked moldings and the long strips of peeling grey paint that festered like open sores.

A moving van idled near the curb, gorged with overstuffed sofas and dinette sets and anonymous boxes scrawled with the same sloping handwriting. If he’d arrived a half hour earlier, it would have been too soon, and the previous tenant would have been struggling with the moving company, signing an invoice or supervising a moving team. As it stood, however, he’d arrived at the perfect time. He only needed the keys now. The stranger breathed deeply and moved across the lawn towards the open screen door.

Inside, George stood with his back to him.

The stranger let his eyes wander across the interiors, mentally redesigning the house: knocking down walls to create a greater flow in the cramped entranceway, replacing track lighting with free hanging can lights, envisioning a granite floor in place of the pumpkin-colored shag carpeting.

“Looks bigger in here without all the clutter, doesn’t it?” George said suddenly. “I mean, it’s like I spent my whole time here movin’ so much stuff in, I forgot what these damn walls even look like, you know?”

Months ago, when the sale of the house was looming, the realtor tried to explain George to the stranger between sips of coffee.

“This guy’s taking care of house by himself for the last eight years, and it’s starting to get to him," the realtor said. "I mean, a house this size, it’s too much for one guy, right?” The realtor sighed and looked plaintively into the stranger’s eyes, silently asking him to reconsider.

As George turned, the stranger saw what the realtor meant. Crow’s feet tugged at the corners of his sleepy eyes and his grey hair looked like dirty cotton that had been tussled and pulled apart by children’s hands. The way his clothes hung from his stooped frame reminded the stranger of wet laundry hanging from a sagging clothesline.

“I’m here for the keys,” the stranger said.

George remained silent. He walked past the stranger, motioning towards a bare wall marred with a series of level gashes.

“See here?” George sighed, turning to meet the stranger’s eyes. “Here’s where we used to measure the kids. You know, their height? Line ‘em up against the wall, and mark the top ‘a their head with a pencil or something. Not anymore, I guess.” The stranger could smell beer on every word.

“Is there anything I can help you with?” the stranger asked.

"Everything's done. Everything's all ready for you now. I cleaned her up as good as I could." George's eyes dropped to the dirty carpet, his voice a whisper. "You know...I feel bad about you movin' in with her looking like this. I mean, hell, she's gonna need a lot of work, and...I just want you to know that I tried."

The stranger said nothing.

"Shouldn't that count for somethin'?" George shouted. His voice carried through the empty halls. "I mean, sure, I didn't do the best job with her while I was here, but goddamn it I tried!"

The stranger looked deep into George's reddened eyes and saw something in them, the kind of thing that doesn't have a name or an emotion to describe it, a deep thing that tinged the very colors of the man and softened whatever hostility the stranger held for him. It was the first time that he'd seen George as a resident of the house and not just another wall to knock down inside of it.

"Don't you think I tried?" George croaked. His voice was tight like a guitar string, ready to snap. "Don't you think I even tried?"

"I think," the stranger began, measuring his words carefully, "I think it's time you stopped thinking about what you tried to do, and start thinking about what you did...and what you're going to do. I think that's what men like you and I should be thinking about. What we're going to do."

George nodded absently. "What we're going to do," he echoed. "What we're going to do." And in a voice that was almost too soft to hear, he added, "I hope you can do it. I really hope you can."

He stepped forward, quickly pressing a brass key into the stranger's palm, and walked away to meet the waiting moving truck.

And suddenly, to the stranger, the key felt so impossibly heavy.

"ORCA"

2009-01-15T00:13:00.000-08:00

"PEANUT AND MR. MARMALADE"

2009-01-12T22:39:00.000-08:00

I was totally going to do stuff tonight. But then this came up.

EFFECTIVELY KILLING MY HIPSTER CRED

2009-01-10T23:47:00.000-08:00

So, for the past week or so, I've been neurotically reading the dozens of "Best of 2008" lists floating around. This includes (of course) the 100 Best Tracks of 2008 according to Pitchfork, that oh-so-humble and self-effacing bastion of music journalism.

Overall, I disagreed with things. Santogold popped up twice with "Lights Out" and "L.E.S. Artistes", but fuck, man, "Creator" is better than both of those songs combined. And Vampire Weekend? Fuck Vampire Weekend. I got stuck listening to that album during a long car ride, and I wanted to jerk the steering wheel sharply and crash into a ravine.

But goddamn, it was honestly a bit of a shock to find out that I've only listened to fourteen of the 100 Best Tracks of 2008. Just fourteen.

That's fourteen percent, my friend.
I am only fourteen percent cool.

These lists, these "top tens", and whatnot...they are Barometers of Credibility, no? They allow us to judge our own opinions against the better, more correct opinions of the skinny-jeaned masses, subsequently modifying/maiming our previously held opinions in order to conform. If so, how was I supposed to feel after realizing my only fourteen percent of my taste coincides with the tastes of others?!

And then I though, "Wait a second...why do I fucking care?"

OFF-TOPIC SOLILOQUY: I find it hilarious and horrifying that the rebellion of youth has now become a kind of conformity in and of itself. You talk about indie kids, but goddamn it, what's so independent about wanting to be exactly like everyone else? I feel like young rebellion is a dying (or perhaps mutating) thing right now; without the negatively polarizing figure of Bush looming over us, who are we going to unite in brotherly hatred against? Are the recently disenfranchised Young Republicans going to become the New Radical Malcontents?

Anyway, I'm starting to sound like an episode of The McLaughlin Group, or someone's cranky Grandpa. In summary: don't compromise your opinions for pretty people with delicate bangs and Rivers Cuomo glasses; Vampire Weekend is still pretty miserable; and I'm only fourteen percent cool.

Also, here's my favorite song of 2008:

Machine Gun - Portishead

REGARDING MY RECENT POISONING

2009-01-04T15:30:00.000-08:00

Here's how the menu at McGrath's (a local seafood eatery) describes the dish I ordered last friday evening:

"Macadamia Mahi Mahi- Mahi Mahi Rolled in a Macadamia Nut Crust, Grilled and Presented over a Pineapple Beurre Blanc."

Sounds delicious, doesn't it? I sure thought so. Except the description was a bit misleading, and should have been revised as such:

"Macadamia Mahi Mahi- ~~Mahi Mahi~~ Possibly-Spoiled Mahi Mahi, Rolled in a Macadamia Nut Crust, ~~Grilled~~ Inadequately Cooked and Presented over a Pineapple Beurre Blanc. Served with Hours of Crippling Stomach Pain, Cold Clammy Sweats, and Hours Spent Dry-Heaving into a Toilet".

I'm sure it was just an accident, though! I don't hold any hard feelings towards McGrath's (a local seafood eatery). I'm sure it was just an honest mistake, probably a total fluke. Definiately not the result of improperly stored ingredients and cross-contamination caused by the kitchen staff of McGrath's (now with three valley locations). It's not like I'd try to convince my friends and family to avoid McGrath's (N. Scottsdale Rd & 101 - 7000 E Mayo Blvd 85054) at all costs.

It was pretty much like that movie "Valkyrie", only people were trying to kill me instead of Hitler, and instead of using a bomb, they used fish, and instead of an eyepatched Tom Cruise, the bomb/fish was delivered by what seemed to be a 15-year-old boy. It was actually nothing like the movie "Valkyrie".

In the last two days, I think I've talked more to a toilet than to real people. How was your weekend?

BANKSY IN NEW ORLEANS

2009-01-04T02:57:00.000-08:00

Banksy is an anonymous British graffiti artist who specializes in political and social satire. His street art has been found in New York, London, and (as seen below) New Orleans. Interesting side note: most of the paintings seen below have either been painted over or physically removed to be placed in private collections or sold at auction.

Enjoy.

"WILD WILD WEST": AN IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS

2008-12-29T21:08:00.000-08:00

It's time to ring in the New Year early by celebrating the ten-year anniversary of a magnum opus!

That's right, everyone! I refer, of course, to Will Smith's instant mega-classic "Wild Wild West"! So join me as we take a bizarre, seven minute excursion into the pointless frivolity of Hollywood excess!

NOTABLE MOMENTS:

0:03- "Oh thank God, it was just a dream! I had a horrible nightmare that I was the star of a shitty movie with Kevin Kline, and we were both cowboys, and...oh sweet Jesus, the nightmare continues."

0:20- "You're sweaty...I'll get you a towel". This might be me, but perhaps Will Smith is sweaty because of the eighteen thousand candles in the room.

0:41- I just realized that we're nearly forty seconds in, and not a single bar of that sweet, sweet music has hit my ears. Is this even a music video? Did Will Smith somehow trick me into watching a direct-to-DVD sequel?

1:00- Notice the blazing fires surrounding Will Smith as he raps. Undoubtedly, his penchant for being surrounded by hundreds of candles has destroyed an entire old-timey town.

1:23- Hey! It's Kool Moe Dee! At least Will Smith is giving him a cameo, y'know, since he pretty much stole this entire song from him. But damn, he looks swell in a cowboy hat.

1:25- Check out Will Smith's sassy shoulder lean!

1:31- Will Smith, rapping in front of a gigantic flaming "W", while dressed as a cowboy. The only thing I love more than this video is nothing. Also, isn't he supposed to be saving Salma Hayek or something?

1:46- Just when things simply cannot get any better/more ridiculous, Sisqó appears! And he's singing the hook inside what looks like the mechanical inner-workings of a a giant cuckoo clock! And he's wearing leather chaps, a fedora, and a leather vest with nothing underneath!

2:48- The ballroom scene features possibly the most awesomest assemblage of celebrity cameos in a single music video. Enrique Iglesias, playing some sort of prince! Babyface in a top hat! Stevie Wonder, who, sadly enough, will never be able to watch this video and realize how ridiculous it is! And most importantly, Alfonso "Carlton" Ribeiro.

3:09-3:28 This is the best part.

3:47- If I was a Make-A-Wish kid, my only wish would involve the staging of an elaborate performance of this dance, with me taking Will's place. Worth it?

4:13- Okay, settle a bet for me. Is this really Kenneth Branagh reprising his role as Dr. Loveless? Or is it just a guy that looks like Branagh from the back? Because, honestly, who would refuse to be in this music video?

6:04- Just when the cinematic rescue sequence gets boring (and, frankly, starts to feel like the movie), Sisqó's back! And he's taking that vest off! Looks like we're going straight to the Wild Wild Chest...of Sisqó!

I hope that's the first horrible joke you hear in 2009. Happy New Year.

SOMETIMES "THE FOUNTAINHEAD" READS LIKE A COMEDY

2008-12-28T18:11:00.000-08:00

"Howard's a friend of mine," he said happily.

"A friend of yours? You know him?"

"Do I know him! Why, we went to school together- Stanton, you know- why, he lived at our house for three years, I can tell you the color of his underwear and how he takes a shower-I've seen him!"

LOLZ.

MY PROBLEM WITH "GREASE"

2008-12-27T20:21:00.000-08:00

There are very view movie-musicals that I begrudgingly respect, and Grease is indeed one of them. However, this limited respect gets totally obliterated by the film's final scene:

During "You're the One That I Want", our hero Danny dresses like a jock in order to impress Sandy, and Sandy dresses like some weird Van-Halenesqe whore to give Danny an erection (and she smokes cigarettes, too!).

This transitions into the big showstopper "We Go Together": a wonderful "Gift of the Magi" song-and-dance number where our heroes realize they don't need to change in order to be loved, and they were indeed meant to be together. Conflicts are resolved. Hundreds of extras dance in front of a carnival backdrop. So far, so good.

And then, Sandy and Danny fly away in a magical flying car. And that's seriously the end of the movie.

I've got a couple of problems with this.

First of all, no one is even remotely surprised when the car suddenly starts to fly. Sandy gleefuly waves goodbye to everyone, and the look on her face totally says, "thank god I finally get to ride in this magical flying car I've heard so much about!"

But if all the characters knew about the flying car the entire time, why does it only appear in the final thirty seconds of the film? Let's face it: a car that can actually fly is much, much more interesting than a tale of impossible, torrid love between two teenagers in the 1950s. It's not even close.

Think back, and imagine how previous scenes of the film would have been vastly different had this flying car been acknowledged and utilized.

"Summer Lovin'" wouldn't have been about "summer dreams, ripped at the seams"; it would have instead been about a long-distance relationship made possible through the magic of a flying car.

Oh, and that car race that happens in the middle of the film? Doesn't even feature the flying car. Not even for a second.

This massive oversight enrages me, and will continue to do so until the release of Grease 3: The Continued Adventures of That Wacky Flying Car.

"SWALLOWED"

2008-12-24T20:25:00.000-08:00

THE WHITE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM

2008-12-21T20:51:00.000-08:00

It's really hard to pick gifts for: a) total strangers, b) normal people, and c) people I have no sympathy/empathy for. This was why I failed at my work's "White Elephant" gift exchange, held at (of course) Dave and Buster's.

While picking out my gift (in a Walgreens, ten minutes before the gift exchange was scheduled to begin) I frantically wondered "what is the perfect gift?" What is something everyone gets excited about? What is coveted by all people of the world, everywhere?

Answer: the Mini Robosapien.

Everyone loves robots, right? Doesn't everyone love toys? Things that light up? Doesn't everyone love things that walk in a jerky, mechanical fashion? Honestly, I thought this was going to be a slam dunk. Two plus two is four, gravity makes stuff fall down, and everyone loves robots; these truths are self-evident.

Cut to the gift exchange twenty minutes later. People are starting to unwrap gifts, and much to my surprise, none of them are robot-related. Lots of tins of chocolate. Cans of roasted nuts. I see at least two porcelain angels, and I'm thinking, "thank God...I was worried everyone was going to stumble on the obvious idea of the Mini Robosapien."

Then, I look at all of my co-workers, and mentally note that most of them are approximately 20-40 years older than I am. And I'm looking at all the gifts that have been unwrapped, and I'm thinking, "Oh, shit...these are normal holiday gifts. These are gifts that older, normal people give to other old normal people. This is definitely not a Mini Robosapien crowd."

And then poor old Kevin reaches for my gift. Kevin: his sizable paunch tightly packed in a salmon-colored shirt complete with red and green suspenders, sitting next to a woman that he's repeatedly assured me is "just a friend"; Kevin: who is definitely in his early sixties and wearing thick glasses that make his eyes look like they're staring through a fishbowl, especially when he blinks, and he's always, always blinking, like he's a hostage trying to signal for help via eyelid Morse Code.

And Kevin unwraps my gift, and I can actually see all of his Christmas spirit die within six seconds.

Kevin doesn't even have any grandkids to pawn my Mini Robosapien off on. He looks around to see if anyone is watching and manages a couple of fake laughs, but his crushing disappointment is fairly obvious. He looks around at other people's gifts; gifts that should've been his. His eyelids blink out a distress signal, and, in my mind's eye, a couple of tears.

I would've traded him my box of chocolates, but he left the party fairly quickly. It's a shame. I'm not even going to eat the chocolates.

The divide between co-workers (i.e. "normal people") and I: growing exponentially.

Is this a bad thing?

MIXTAPE OF THE NIGHT: "MIXTAPE ABOUT NOTHING"

2008-12-03T22:55:00.000-08:00

How is Wale not already successful?

Seriously, my friends. It seems like he's been billed "the next big thing" for oh, three years or so, but casually dropping his name in conversation results in blank stares. After his song "Nike Boots", I thought he was going blow up. After his mixtape "100 Miles and Running", I thought he was going to blow up. After "W.A.L.E.D.A.N.C.E.", I thought he was going to blow up like a national landmark in Independence Day. Bottom line is this: dude's been knocking 'em out of the park for a while, but nobody's keeping score.

But oh man. All those previously listed achievements are nothing compared to this summer's "The Mixtape About Nothing"; mainly because Wale's lyrical skills and Best Kept Secret's production continue to get better and better, but also because it's a mixtape about "Seinfeld". Seriously.

Everything works: the naming conventions, the intro/outro, the casual sampling of "Seinfeld" dialogue...a mixtape based upon a tv show that ended production ten years ago should fail miserably, but it doesn't. This inspires me to finally finish recording my "Night Court" album asap.

SICKEST VERSE:
I'm the best, even when I'm cynical
angle these beats like a pentagon
whenever my pen is on
ain't nothin' here minimal
countin' my bread
my account, like a brunch at a synagogue.
get it y'all? that's a whole lotta bagels
see me out the bay with san quentin in a beige coupe
a very bad man, you can ask babu
i get seinfeld with these rhyme skills
i'm larry david, gimme my paper
this'll cost mo like jerry sein's neighbor
my cost stanzas stand like phantoms or maybacks
you won't get elaine if you came wack
i hate rap like kramer hates blacks.

Listen to this mixtape here.
Download this mixtape for free over here.

And judging from Wale's success with a themed mix, I honestly hope/fear that he's currently working on another one:

THE CONDOM PURCHASE

2008-11-28T11:58:00.000-08:00

WHY IS the act of buying condoms so incredibly embarrassing? Is it just me? Because honestly, it's pretty mortifying.

It should be a jubilant act! A cause for celebration! Presumably, you (the purchaser) are going to (probably) have sex soon! And, you're going to be mature and responsible about it; you don't want your gentleman's parts to blacken and fall off post-coitus, and you don't want your ladyfriend to squeeze out a baby. Condom-purchasing should not be embarrassing; it should instead prompt other shoppers to give you high-fives and fist-bumps. Sadly, this is not the case.

So, recently, I decided to buy some. This was prior to the Las Vegas adventure, and while I'd been informed that "what happens" there "stays" there, I felt fairly sure that this did not include sexual diseases and unborn fetuses. So I went to the ghetto Fry's with prophylactics on my mind.

Step one: find several nondescript items to buy, so a large box of condoms isn't the only thing in the shopping cart. A cantaloupe? Sure, why not. A gallon of juice that I probably won't be able to finish? Yeah, totally.

Step two: think of clever things to say if a fellow shopper or cashier decides to comment on the condom purchase. I came up with the following:

-"They're for the kids!" (This one works on so many levels.)

-"Oh, these? Well, they were plum out of water balloons, so I felt like these would do in a pinch!"

-"I run a Home for Troubled Teens."

Step three: obtain condoms, and discreetly head for the self-checkout. But totally hit a snag when I realized that in the backwards world of ghetto Fry's, condoms are kept under lock and key in a large glass case.

What in the everloving fuck? Where is the logic in this? If I were the owner of ghetto Fry's, I would not be worried about people stealing condoms. In fact, judging from the sheer number of single teenage mothers I saw wandering the store with their dead, glassy eyes, I would blatantly encourage people to steal condoms. I would fire condoms at single mothers and teenagers with an air-powered cannon. I would discreetly hide condoms inside of shopping bags and baby strollers, under windshield wipers, and even amongst the swaddling clothes of currently existing babies to prevent future mistakes. Wal-Mart sadly has a much better system in place: I'm told that the condoms are kept suspiciously close to the Mexican Culture section. Seriously.

"Excuse me," I politely said to the pharmacist. "Could I please get the key?"

"What key?" he asked.

"The um...the key for the cabinet over there?" I was attempting to be casual and discreet, seeing as there was a sizable line of people behind me.

"The key for which cabinet?" he replied.

Goddamn it, I thought. There's only one fucking cabinet that requires a key, but he's going to make me say it.

"The key for the...condom cabinet."

"Excuse me?" he said. "You'll have to speak up, I can't hear you." His grin widened, and I wanted to disappear.

"The condom cabinet, dude! There, are you happy?! The cabinet with condoms inside of it. I'm going to buy condoms, and I'm not going to use them as water balloons or give them to troubled teens, I'm going to use them, while having sex, so deal with it, but please give me the goddamn key."

He relinquished the key, and it was a minor victory.

LAS VEGAS: A STATELY PLEASURE-DOME DECREED

2008-11-23T21:52:00.000-08:00

So, I went to Las Vegas for the first time this weekend.

Much of my time was spent wandering up and down The Strip, because goddamn, every last inch of it is total seizure-inducing eyecandy. Every architectural style is stitched together into a single hulking bastardization of all world culture: the Eiffel Tower protrudes from the ground directly across the street from a modernized Grecian Garden and an Egyptian pyramid casts a shadow over a Pizza Hut as a fifty-story likeness of Donny and Marie look on, eternally smiling. I constantly found myself wishing I could time-travel back to pre-revolutionary America, grab a founding father, bring him to present day Las Vegas, and scream, "this is what will eventually become of your democratically idealistic young country!" Then, said founding father and I could have gone to a buffet together and eaten lots of snow crab.

I saw three just-married couples. I saw a street performer/homeless man dressed as Captain Jack Sparrow feel up some young girl. I saw an overweight man in a motorized wheelchair (who was dressed in a sequined Santa Claus outfit, by the way) writhe obscenely. I saw scantily-clad women dancing, walking, and falling down drunk in the street. I got drunk, and then got subsequently lost. I suffered through an increasingly horrible piano bar, and felt compelled to leave when the piano player (after taking a request) loudly and happily exclaimed, "looks like Mr. Twenty Dollars wants to hear a little bitta Nickleback!" I ate Eggs Benedict, which is horrible, and quickly made a "Benedict Arnold" quip; it was not well received. I was served many, many vodka redbulls by a bartender who resembled a young Liam Niesen. I lost five dollars, made twenty five dollars, and then lost thirty dollars (not in that order). I went to a buffet, and ate sushi, mashed potatoes, tilapia, crab, spring rolls, french toast, watermelon, and spiral ham at the same time.

And I got to see Kids in the Hall live.

It was great. I was worried that they'd be old, that they'd be cashing in on former fame. This was only moderately true; many of the sketches dealt with their age, skewering their image a bit, but the overall quality of the show hadn't declined at all. They did an hour and a half of mostly new material, combining videos with stage sketches, punctuated by occasional monologues. It was unexpectedly awesome to watch new, topical sketches from the group, as well as call-backs and character sketches. And man, watching them break onstage and make each other laugh, I felt like the previous fourteen-year-old version of myself that would rush home from school each day to be able to watch Kids in the Hall reruns on Comedy Central.

Near the end of the trip, I watched the Bellagio fountains from afar. The fountains sprayed and danced to "Luck Be A Lady", punctuating each note with dizzying backlit columns of water, and in a twisted Las Vegas way, it was oddly beautiful. Thunderous arcs fired into the sky, dwarfing even the hotel beyond it, and fell to earth in shimmering waves. And just when I was feeling oddly moved by this, a sign-truck drove by on the strip, obscuring my view, and the sign advertised "FREE 24 HOUR SEX SHOWS", accompanied by a sun-bleached image of a stripper spread-eagled on her back. It totally ruined whatever personal moment I was having. I laughed and walked away.

"Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair!"

100TH POST BLOGSTRAVAGANZA

2008-11-09T02:15:00.000-08:00

This is the 100th post of Hot Garbage! With that in mind, I'd like to thank a few people who've made it all possible.

I'd like to thank the dozens of writers, copy editors, page designers, layout managers, storyboard artists, stuntmen, caterers, and professional sexologists that have worked on/contributed to the blog over the last sixteen years. You guys are the best crew I could have hoped for. I'd like to extend a shout-out to the late Russ Davenport, an assistant intern who lost his life during the making of Post #20 ("CUBA GOODING JR,; PAST, PRESENT, FUTURE"). May God grant you the peace you never found in life, dood!

I'd like to thank our sponsors: Pringles™, "Last Call with Carson Daly", and Subway™, along with a series of generous donations from Diddy (donations mostly consisting of office supplies, seashells, interesting stories, and copies of the debut album of "Da Band").

I'd like to thank all the great modern contemporary authors who've inspired me to pursue the craft of writing. Tom Clancy. Dean Koontz. The guy that wrote Tales of the Bounty Hunters. Anne Rice. The guy that writes the nutrition facts on the labels of all the food that I eat. In the immortal words of a great mind (probably the guy that wrote Tales of the Bounty Hunters),"if I have seen further, it is by standing on ye shoulders of giants."

But mostly (and most honestly), I'd like to thank you for reading. I'd especially like to thank those of you who also write blogs of your own. I enjoy reading them very much. This whole blogging thing is nerdy and a bit pretentious, but it can also be sincere and involving and quite lovely. Keep doing what you're doing, I'll keep doing what I'm doing, and one day we're both going to be so so famous.

Also, a couple of changes are in order. I'm going to attempt to post more regularly. Also, I'm looking to avoid posting so many pictures/videos (because it's cheap and lazy), and instead try to create more original material (hopefully some longer, non-fiction essays, some comedy, and some visual art). If you have any suggestions regarding what you'd like to see more or less of, post them all up in my comments, Cajun-style.

And now I'll leave you with the first thing you'll be seeing more of over the next hundred posts: sexualized pictures of werewolves. Thanks again for reading.

"BUSH SUCKING DEMOCRACY DRY"

2008-11-06T20:22:00.000-08:00

When famed comic book artist Alex Ross isn't painting Superman's crotch or a very shiny Captain America, he paints things like this.

Yes, please.

"WHEN DID YOU BECOME A ROBOCOP?"

2008-11-05T23:55:00.000-08:00

Kanye's new album 808's & Heartbreak drops in a couple of weeks, and man, am I excited.

I was underwhelmed by Graduation. It felt inferior to Late Registration: some of the production was a bit lazy, Kanye's verses were (as always) a bit uninspired, and the "college theme" seemed pretty played out to me. Luckily, Kanye's gone pretty crazy since then. I'll let one of his blog posts (regarding criticism of his Bonnaroo set) prove my point nicely:

"I'm typing so fucking hard I might break my fucking Macbook Air! Call me any name you want... arrogant, conceited, narcissistic, racist, metro, fag whatever you can think of... BUT NEVER SAY I DIDN'T GIVE MY ALL!"

Y'know, dude, if you're just going to go around breaking Macbook Airs all willy-nilly, you don't deserve to own one, and should give yours to me. Only conceited narcissistic racist metro fags break expensive computers "just because".

These frequent meltdowns combined with the unfortunate passing of his mother (and his breakup with some ridiculously attractive supermodel he probably purchased from a Japanese mail-order catalogue) could indicate that Kanye's new album will be insightful and emotional, exploring yet-unseen depth and newly-acquired maturity.

One thing's for sure, though: the album is going to be really fucking weird. Here are the facts I've gathered thus far:

There's little to no rapping on the album. Seriously. I'm told it's all singing, or, at least, "Auto-Tune singing". Yuck.
Not only is there a track titled "Robocop", but said track is being sent to France in order to be mixed by Herbie Fucking Hancock. (!!!)
Every song has an 808 drumbeat.
The track "Coldest Winter" incorporates parts of a Tears for Fears song. (!!!)
In an MTV News article, album producer Mike Dean not only reveals that Lil Wayne sings on the album, but also claims that he "sounds a lot like Axl Rose." Is this a good thing?

I've listened to rough versions of a few of the songs and so far, I'm digging them. The synthesizers sound like they belong in a cheesy horror movie from the mid-eighties and the drum patterns are window-rattling. Rad.

The album drops on November 25th. Until then, enjoy this clip of Kanye doing his thing on Ellen(which is totally the television program I'd appear on to promote my forthcoming album).

HEY, REMEMBER THAT TIME WHEN BATMAN BEAT THE PENGUIN? THAT WAS NEAT.

2008-11-05T16:48:00.000-08:00

SONG OF THE DAY: PITBULL FT. LIL' JOHN, "KRAZY"

2008-10-28T00:00:00.000-07:00

"Krazy" is actually a pretty horrible song. That doesn't stop me from loving the shit out of it, though.

Literally, the first part of the chorus contains this priceless gem: "Latinas they get crazy/Blanquitas they get crazy/Negritas they get crazy." What, pray tell, is a "blanquita"? Is it a tropical fruit? Is it the horrible yellow drink they keep trying to sell to me at the Filipino market? That's exactly the point, my friend. In order to understand this, you have to be krazy!

From there, the song descends into a bizarre rap song about a Sliders-like parallel universe where Kanye has "no style", Katt Williams has no "jokes" (i.e. anecdotes about pimps), and M.C. Hammer is "still rich, not broke." Really, Pitbull? You're talking shit about M.C. Hammer? Seriously, that guy's been through enough. I mean, really, given our current economic situation, I think you could muster up a little sympathy for a guy who previously rode in carriages made out of dinosaur eggs and fist-size rubies, only to loose it all to the cold embrace of bankruptcy.

Anyway, listening to this song is like huffing paint-thinner while someone pours an energy drink into your ears. If you can convince a girl to have sex with you while this song is playing, I'll personally give you fourteen dollars.

Blanquita.

BONUS QUESTION: Who can wear top hats better...Lil' Jon or T-Pain?

COME ELECTION DAY

2008-10-26T22:23:00.000-07:00

You know what's fucking stupid? By voting early through the mail like a really responsible, forward-thinking fellow, I am deprived the pleasure of receiving a "I VOTED" sticker come Election Day.

Doesn't that suck?

I mean, come Election Day, I'm going to be hanging out with my co-workers, my friends, my family...all of whom will be proudly wearing "I VOTED" stickers. My co-workers will inquire why I didn't briefly leave to visit my polling station. I'll feebly claim that I voted weeks ago, and these claims will be rebuked with scoffs and throat-clearings. "Where's your sticker?" some mouth-breather will invariably ask.

I live in a red state. I live in John McCain's fucking hometown. I realize that my one vote for Obama isn't exactly going to sway the election. I mean, fuck, there's no way Obama is winning Arizona so it's a pretty futile gesture.

Here's what I'm saying: basically, the only reason I'm casting a vote is to receive a sticker. If you want me to do something demeaning or time-consuming or worthless, offer me a goddamn sticker, and I'll do it in a heartbeat. Ideally, the early ballot should come with a sheet of "I VOTED" stickers that I could put on my shirt and my car and my forehead. Maybe even throw in some Dora the Explorer stickers for good measure.

If only there was a prop I could vote for that would make this gilded dream a reality.

POSSIBLE HALLOWEEN COSTUMES I'M CONSIDERING IN ORDER TO RUIN YOUR HALLOWEEN PARTY

2008-10-13T21:21:00.000-07:00

COSTUME IDEA #1:
-As "Boy With Diabetes", I will attend your Halloween party in character as a fourth-grade child named Doug who has been recently diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. I'll act tired and lethargic, and longingly stare that the Reese's Pieces and Bit O' Honeys I'm no longer capable of eating. Also, every half hour I'll ask a different party-attendee to help me take my blood sugar while I audibly sigh. A lot.

Necessary Equipment: Insulin, Portable Blood Tests, and a frown.

COSTUME IDEA #2:
-More of a "performance art piece" than a "costume", this idea involves me dressing up as Lee Harvey Oswald and a confederate of mine dressing up as Jack Ruby. As "Lee Harvey", I will arrive at your Halloween party at a predetermined time, and upon my arrival, "Jack Ruby" will jump out of the crowd and promptly shoot me in the stomach.

I will lay on the ground for five minutes, after which I will get up, leave the party, re-enter, and once again immediately receive a bullet in the gut from "Jack Ruby". This will be repeated until A) we run out of fake bullets and blood capsules, or B) you ask us to leave.

Necessary Equipment: Fedoras, a greasy pistol, and a photographer to capture the moment with an old-timey flashbulb camera.

COSTUME IDEA #3:
As "The Vegan Hamburglar", I will portray a version of the popular McDonald's burger-thief who's been forced to give up his carnivorous lifestyle after increasingly high cholesterol and a double-bypass.

For the first half of your Halloween party, I will beg forgiveness from guests for my criminal cheeseburger-stealing past. I'll advocate healthy living and exercise, and in order to demonstrate all the weight I've lost, I'll hold up an oversized pair of striped black-and-white pants next to my new svelte waist.

Things will be going well until another guest enters dressed as Mayor McCheese (who will, of course, be another one of my confederates). I will begin drinking heavily, and after mumbling to myself for a half-hour, I will tackle "Mayor McCheese", hold a knife to his throat, and begin chewing on his foam-rubber head while crying beef-scented tears.

Necessary Equipment: A sense of self-loathing.

COSTUME IDEA #4:
I will dress up as Paris Hilton's Singing Vagina. This is fairly self-explanatory.

Necessary Equipment: Lots of paper mache, a talented ventriloquist, and a photographer to capture the moment with a grainy night-vision camera.

BUILDING MY MULTIMEDIA EMPIRE

2008-10-08T16:30:00.000-07:00

You know what?

I don't post videos because I'm looking to share them, nor because I'm trying to spread these great things to my friends. Nope. I simply post videos here because I am lazy, and it's a lot easier to watch them from this blog than going through the excruciating tedium of actually going to Hulu again and again, searching and typing and clicking until my fingers bleed.

But with that out of the way, these sketches are really funny. If you haven't seen them, watch them now. If you have seen them, watch them again.

QUESTION: Is it just me, or is SNL better than it has been in a really long time? I mean, I've not only watched the last three episodes, but I've planned my Saturday around them.

OTHER QUESTION: Don't you think Andy and Kristin are the strongest cast members right now? Especially Kristin. She's adorable.

DISCUSS.

TONIGHT, I APPLIED FOR A JOB...

2008-10-01T23:56:00.000-07:00

...simply because one of the perks is a "free on-site masseuse."

I would get absolutely nothing done.

Fingers crossed.

"WHY PRINGLES.COM IS MY HOMEPAGE"

2008-09-28T16:12:00.000-07:00

1. It provides constant updates regarding new and exciting flavors of pringles! I was walking through the market the other day, passing the intersection of Cola Corner and Snack Street, and was simply flabbergasted to find "Spicy Guacamole" Pringles! "Guacamole Pringles?! What kind of snack-food utopia have I fallen into?!" I wondered aloud.

After quickly scanning the packaging I was astonished to find that this particular flavor had been available for over three months! "Why wasn't I notified of this?!" I screamed at the manager as I shoved him into a cola display. "Why do you feel the need to keep Pringles enthusiasts in the dark, goddamn it?!" After nearly thirteen Pringles-related violent outbursts, I'm happy to say that I can stay up to date on newly available flavors (including "Screamin' Dill Pickle", "Chili Cheese", "Bacon Ranch", "Veal", and "Warm Beer") from the comfort of my own home! Thanks, Pringles.com!

2. The games! Pringles.com offers two different Pringles-related games: "Snack Attack" and "Groovy Glider"! Oh wow! I couldn't play "Snack Attack" for too long because it kept giving me really bad seizures, but "Groovy Glider" is certainly addicting! In the game, you control the disembodied head of the Pringles mascot (who will be referred to as "Mr. Pringle" from now on) as he flies a potato chip through a swirling vortex of dangerous Pringles cans and dancing ingredients! I like to pretend that this is an accurate portrayal of how Pringles are made.

But be warned! "Groovy Glider" is so darn fun, it makes you lose track of time! By the time I finally got to the Cool Ranch level, I realized that I'd missed six days of work, become severely dehydrated, and soiled myself three times! Thanks, Pringles.com!

3. The Safety Tips! If I had a nickel for every time I've gotten a Pringles can stuck on my hand/wrist, I'd have approximately 80-120 nickels! Thankfully, those snack wizards behind Pringles.com have posted some helpful safety tips to help stop "can-hand" (trademark pending):

"If Pringles Can is stuck on your hand/wrist:

DO NOT remove it with can-opener/steak knife!
DO NOT remove it by thrusting it into an open fire!
DO NOT cajole wild animals into chewing it off!
DO NOT remove can via magnets, pulleys, industrial presses, car doors, circus strongmen, bungee cords, ceiling fans, old-timey bombs with wicks, acid, or electric current!"

If I'd learned these helpful tips three year ago, I wouldn't be wearing this prosthetic hand! But thanks anyway, Pringles.com!

LAST NIGHT I WANDERED THROUGH THE CITY, AND ALL I WAS LOOKING FOR WAS YOU (ALSO, CRACK).

2008-09-25T21:06:00.000-07:00

I have blatantly disregarded you, blogosphere! I have scorned you and taken you for granted and embraced my mistress (i.e. "alcohol") in your stead!

In other words, I've been a total loser lately and haven't been doing anything besides drinking and feeling faux-existential, so, it's time to re-up and reload and be a (somewhat) productive member of society (but not "real-society"; I actually mean "wallflower-head-in-the-clouds-internet-make-believe-society").

So, yeah. Hi.

I want to do more things. One of those things is photography (especially night photography), because it is something I'd very much like to become mediocre/slightly good at. So here are pictures.

SKETCHBOOK HELL: "BALLOON"

2008-09-14T21:09:00.000-07:00

"WHO AM I?"

2008-09-12T21:02:00.000-07:00

It's Friday, so I'm having an Identity Crisis.

"Who am I?!" I wonder. Am I the same person I was five minutes ago? Am I merely the sum of the culture and media absorbed by my atrophied brain, or am I a beautiful, unique snowflake? Am I me? Am I you? Or am I really an overweight Korean woman suffering from a severe head injury?

Luckily, the internet is here to restore my sense of self.

I just did a google image search for "Brian Street". Most of the results, of course, are pictures of predictable street signs, which I quickly threw out. I am not a street sign. Or am I?

Besides said street signs, here are the pictures signifying the internet presence of me, Brian Street, according to google. Let's enjoy them together!

According to the internet, "Brian Street" is a wine-sipping, pasty-skinned date-rapist. Actually, this version of me is apparently a professor at King's College in London, and as the picture proves, he has a very menacing stare. He is perhaps the most famous "Brian Street"; perhaps six or seven pictures of him turned up during my search. This proves that him and I are destined to battle one another for name-supremacy.

According the the internet, "Brian Street" is actually a semi-professional British Race Car Driver. This is more like it. According the the website this photo came from, Brian Street was the second-place winner in a racing event called "SUPER SALOONS". I have no idea what that means, but it sounds really, really wacky.

According to the internet, "Mr. Brian Street" is an elderly British soccer player to injures his groin constantly. Whereas other "normal" soccer players strive to "score goals", "Mr. Brian Street" seems to aim to injure his groin as often as possible in a single game. I applaud Mr. Brian Street for his originality, his ability to think outside the box, and for his masochism. I can relate.

According to the internet, "Brian Street" is a creepy mustachioed 45 year old dude who fell in love with his 17 year old step-daughter who later went on to burn down his house. You know, I think back to the last job that I applied for (but did not get), and I wonder if this version of Brian Street came up during the background check. I'm going to blame all of my failures in life on this guy.

According to the internet, "Brian Street" is an eccentric older man who loves three things: his myspace profile, .gif files, and exotic birds. I don't want to know anything about "Project Child Smiles". I'm afraid the knowledge will make me an accessory to a horrible crime.

So, I think I've learned a little about my namesake. I'm made up of equal portions of Race Car Driver, Wine-Sipping Professor, Bird Fanatic, Sex Criminal, and Geriatric Soccer player. They are the lions to my Voltron. They are the zords to my Megazord. They are me, I am them, and we are Brian Street.

"THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH"

2008-09-10T20:38:00.000-07:00

Just rediscovered this, and felt like sharing. If only real church was like this.

SKETCHBOOK HELL: "VANITY FAIR"

2008-08-27T23:08:00.000-07:00

details:

"THE TRANSCRIPT OF A REAL PHONE CONVERSATION I JUST HAD"

2008-08-22T21:56:00.000-07:00

RingRingRing.

ME: Hello?

HIM: Hey Brian, it's me, Steven.

ME: Nielsen? You don't sound like Nielsen. You sound...not gay.

HIM: No, actually I'm Steven Spielberg.

(brief pause)

ME: You're...Steven Spielberg. Right.

MR. SPIELBERG: Yep. I'm Steven Spielberg.

ME: Alright, if you're actually him, then tell me something only Spielberg would know.

MR. SPIELBERG: I directed the movie 1941, starring John Belushi, and I've never even seen it.

ME: Really?

MR. SPIELBERG: Not even the opening credits. It's that bad. Or at least, I hear it was that bad, you know? While we were filming, I had my eyes closed the whole time.

ME: Yeah, I heard that movie was pretty shitty. I guess you really are Spielberg.

MR. SPIELBERG: Yep.

(another brief pause)

ME: So, what can I do for you? Are you calling to apologize for that last Indiana Jones movie, or what?

MR. SPIELBERG: I'll cut right to the chase, Brian: I want to buy your blog.

ME: (spits out mouthful of water in a comical double-take) Whaaaaa?!

MR. SPIELBERG: Yep. I want to buy your blog, and make a movie out of it.

ME: Man, you must be pretty desperate.

MR. SPIELBERG: You have no idea.

ME: How the hell would you make a movie out of a blog? I mean, there's no narrative, no story. I'm sorry Mr. Spielberg, but it's mostly comprised of bitching and whining. Just dumb ideas that metastasize in my head and come dripping out of my fingers onto the keyboard.

MR. SPIELBERG: Precisely! It's that tone, that voice, that I'm looking to capture. "Metastasize in my head, dripping out my fingers", the way you liken creative thought to disease and excrement, that's what the cinema needs.

ME: Maybe the cinema needs more Shia LeBeouf swinging from vines. With monkeys.

MR. SPIELBERG: Alright, alright, enough about that movie. I needed the money. But I'm telling you, your blog needs to be a film. It would be a visual treatise of modern life for a young man. An exploration of romance, of disillusionment, of violence...pursuing the ideals of art and beauty in our modern times.

ME: You're dressing it up a bit, Steven. It's just escapism. That's all fiction is, too: escapism. Make-believe. Self delusion.

MR. SPIELBERG: No, it's art.

ME: Fine, then art is escapism! That's all it is! Art is escaping your mental hospital by painting Starry Night before you ultimately realize how fucked up the world is and cut your own ear off as a result! Art is just delusion, a worthless placebo that temporarily relieves symptoms. Fuck art. Fuck fiction.

MR. SPIELBERG: I really hope you don't mean that.

ME: Seriously, Mr. Spielberg. I do.

MR. SPIELBERG: If you really believed that, you wouldn't be writing this.

ME: What do you mean? I'm not writing. I'm talking on the phone with you, Steven Spielberg. We patiently established this minutes ago.

MR. SPIELBERG: There is no "we", Brian. I'm not Steven Spielberg. I'm just a fictional conceit used to display doubt in one's self. Lately, it seems like you've been having a lot of doubt, so, I was summoned.

ME: Like a genie?

FICTIONAL CONCEIT USED TO DISPLAY DOUBT: Yes.

ME: Do you mind if I keep calling you Mr. Spielberg? I mean, "Fictional Conceit Used to Display Doubt" is kind of a mouthful.

MR. SPIELBERG: Sure. My point is this: if you no longer believed in writing, or art in general, you wouldn't be writing this right now.

ME: Alright, I'll accept that. It just feels so worthless sometimes, you know? It feels like, once the act of writing is over and done with, everything just kind of...fades. The color drains from it, and instead of being an idea, instead of being wrath-like and incorporeal and altogether beautiful, it just becomes another part of the world. And is therefore disappointing.

MR. SPIELBERG: What about the subjects of the writing? Aren't they worth recognizing and celebrating?

ME: You know, I used to think so. But fuck, man. I feel like the ideas of beauty and art I once had are swiftly coming to an end. They feel like childhood dreams, like a favorite pair of pants that I'm awkwardly outgrowing, but still try to wear. I mean, if I try to write about something beautiful, it never lives up to the idea of beauty, you know? And God, trying to find real examples of beauty in the world...that seems to get harder and harder each day. It's just escapism, Mr. Spielberg, and I can't escape forever.

MR. SPIELBERG: What makes you feel this way?

ME: I dunno. I mean, getting punched in the face probably broke my rose-colored glasses, but I can't blame that entirely. Like I said before...things just seem to be losing their color. I don't want to sound emo or anything.

MR. SPIELBERG: You already do.

ME: Is it really worth writing about, though? When things seem this bleak and worthless, is it really worth it to try to create?

MR. SPIELBERG: Brian, this reminds me of when I was filming Temple of Doom. I was having a real hard time with things. I'd just suffered through a divorce, I was getting panned by critics, I'd turned to drugs. And it showed, you know? The movie ended up being quite dark, much darker than the previous film. But while we were shooting, I rediscovered my love of filmmaking. I remembered how much I loved Indy, how engrossing it was to follow him on his adventures.

ME: I really love that movie, but what's your point?

MR. SPIELBERG: My point is this. When it seems like there's nothing beautiful in life, when it seems like creation is a worthless endeavor that cannot ascribe to its noble ideals...those are the times when it's up to you to create your own beauty. Find beauty in the misery and depression. Find comedy in the tragedy. And in doing so, you'll be creating, and the cycle will continue. You said that things seem to be losing their color...well, it's up to you to breathe color back into it.

ME: To colorize it.

MR. SPIELBERG: Colorize the world like fuckin' Ted Turner.

ME: You've got a point. You really do.

MR. SPIELBERG: Of course I do. I'm Steven Motherfucking Spielberg. Now, would you like to get some frozen yogurt?

ME: I thought you'd never ask.

"THOUGHT BUBBLES"

2008-08-20T13:57:00.000-07:00

Here are some things I've been thinking about over the previous forty-eight hours:

-I'm not sure why they named a horrible canine-disease "Parvo", because "Parvo" is either A) a great name for an adorable dog, or B) a great name for a leading brand of dog food. But no. Instead, it's an intestinal disease in dogs. Way to go, science.

-What happened to Michael Keaton?

-The other day, I dealt with a crazy client named Sharon, and this conversation between us is worth recording here:

ME: "So how've you been lately, Sharon?"
HER: "Oh, not so good"
ME: "I'm sorry to hear that. What's wrong?"
HER: "Oh, I got diagnosed with a mental disorder."
(fifteen second pause)
ME: "Oh yeah?"
HER: "Yeah, I hear voices."
ME: "What...kind of voices?"

My thought being, of course, that the kinds of imaginary voices you hear really makes a difference. You could hear a dog talking to you, like David Berkowitz, or you could hear God talking to you, like Moses. It's really all in the details.

-In terms of writing and publishing, it's now one of my goals to get a piece accepted in Cat Fancy magazine.

-The other day, I was cleaning out papers from under my bed and I found a television pilot I wrote a year and a half ago. I was clearly very intoxicated at the time, and have no memory of writing it whatsoever. The script was titled "Bernard and Quackers in Mormonville"; it was the story of a misogynistic Mormon superhero (Bernard) and his sassy, streetwise best friend, who also happens to be a duck (Quackers). Over the course of the pilot, Quackers gets into various scrapes, and is consequently bailed out by Bernard and his vague, ambiguous superpowers (which may involve steam, lead trains, and astrology, but this is never directly specified). There's also a few sub-plots that don't really go anywhere, involving Warren Jeffs and how he's really a machine, Bernard's white-hot hatred of women, and a magical, living tree. Anyway, CBS bought the show for six figures.

BIRTHDAY CARD

2008-08-17T23:11:00.000-07:00

This is what I wrote inside of my dad's birthday card:

Dad!

Did you know that you share the same birthday as Steve Martin? I think that's pretty cool!

Love, Brian.

Here's what I wish I'd written instead:

Dad!

Did you know that you share the same birthday as Steve Martin? I think that means that you get to be a wild and crazy guy, maybe even a dirty rotten scoundrel, but it doesn't mean you get to be the jerk! It's a good thing birthday candles are cheaper by the dozen, because you're getting older, and because of this, your cake is requiring more candles, each of which represents a year of your life! Sgt. Bilko!

Love, Brian.

There's always next year, I suppose. Happy Birthday, Dad.

FOR YOU AND YOUR CREW! REPRESENTIN' THE MOTHERFUCKIN' WU

2008-08-11T21:51:00.000-07:00

My close associate Michael has informed me of a most

excellent concert opportunity, and you need to be there:

GZA/GENIUS. Performing "Liquid Swords". Live.

At The Clubhouse in Tempe. September the 17th. Doors at 8.

Possibly "with Special Guest". (perhaps Method Man?!!).

Nebulous details can be found here.

I expect to see you there. The thought of hearing a live version of "Gold" has me all hot and bothered.

"ERA OF WASTE"

2008-08-10T23:40:00.000-07:00

In this era of waste, everything is recycled.

The food I eat is preprocessed and prepackaged, prechewed and predigested. The air, stale, circulated weakly by fans that create the illusion of wind, but I get the feeling that the real winds are gone and they're never coming back. The air tastes and smells of oily smoke, of mechanical pollution and carbon dioxide and waste and the stale smell of other people and the sad thing is I don't even notice the smell anymore.

When we're little, we're taught that everyone is a beautiful, individual snowflake. Unique and special. The truth is, every thought I have, every thought I've ever had and will have, is also recycled. Regurgitated, like bile. It is statistically impossible to have an original thought and the statistics are rising, insurmountable, like floodwaters. When we speak to each other, it's like we're reading the same script, over and over, but no director ever yells cut; we just do take after take hoping that something will be fit to print so we can move on. But we don't.

Everything is a business. Especially things that shouldn't be businesses, like law enforcement and religion and childbirth and death.

And love. Love is the worst. It doesn't exist, it's something They invented to sell Hallmark cards and divorces. What you think of as love is the equivalent of running a mile or eating a bar of chocolate or shooting up: a flood of endorphins (reuptake inhibited) with increased bloodflow to boot. Everything you think about love is fake: nothing more than a recited advertisement, a jingle, a poem they made you memorize in high school, a line from a movie you saw that reminded you of your own life.

And that's what we do, isn't it? We project. We're the star of the show. The main character. The lead singer. Every song is sung about us, like we're the last muse left. Every movie reminds us of our own meaningful story, but honestly, the story isn't about us at all. I'm just an extra, just a background character with two seconds of screen time and no lines, and so are you.

SKETCHBOOK HELL: "SMILE"

2008-08-10T18:21:00.000-07:00

GIRLS I'VE KNOWN, PART 3: "HAND-DRAWN HEARTS AND PAPER PLANES"

2008-08-08T01:23:00.000-07:00

This started all the way back at La Crescenta Apartments, located in the seedy multi-ethnic neighborhood of Lemon and Terrace, a neighborhood where two rival gangs (The Cholos and The Baby Whales) regularly tagged the dumpsters and block walls and telephone poles in order to be noticed. I lived alone in a poorly designed one-bedroom and routinely tried to communicate with my Mandarin upstairs-neighbors regarding the leaking pipes. Failure of communication was definitely a recurring theme, and this story is a prime example.

I was coming home from somewhere. It was late at night and I was alone and riding my bicycle, and upon arriving home, I found a mouse on my doorstep. Sitting there. Waiting. The mouse was handmade with ears made out of felt and drawn-on whiskers, and it's little silver body was hollow and empty but decorated inside with a hand-drawn heart.

Hidden beneath the mouse was a plastic shell. The kind you get for a quarter from those vending machines, the kind with sticky hands and cheap toys inside. I sat down on my doorstep and pulled the shell open, and inside was a silver ring with a red plastic stone. Costume jewelry. But wrapped around the ring was a long, thin strip of paper that read, "MARRY ME MARRY ME MARRY ME" over and over.

I kept it.

A few weeks later, she stopped by my work. I knew she was the deliverer of the mouse, no question about it. You know how whenever there's a crime in Gotham City that involves duality, the number two, or coins, everyone just knows it's the work of Two-Face? Well, that's how it was. A handmade mouse and a costume ring? Basically, her calling card.

At that point, girls did not notice me. Period. End of story. That's all she wrote. My apparent invisibility to the opposite sex was like gravity: one of those forces that seemed to govern everyday life, inescapable, keeping my feet stuck firmly to the ground. But then the mouse arrived, and some sort of ceiling broke and I was floating, floating, never coming down again.

But I digress. As I was saying, she stopped by my work, and she casually brought up the ring in conversation. "Oh, you mean this?" I said, and pulled it out of my pocket. I'd been holding onto it like some kind of charm; something to be taken out when no one was around, to be looked at and puzzled over and amused by.

Much later on, after the fact, when this ring conversation was discussed again, she said, "Brian, I never ever ever get embarrassed, but that ring thing...it embarrassed me."

When I showed her the ring, she got very quiet and very red and her embarrassment was palpable, contagious, and I caught it. Conversation died on the vine. She quickly left. I felt like an idiot for weeks, months, years. End of Act One.

Act Two began a year or so later. We randomly ran into each other on campus. I don't remember what we talked about, normal things, run-of-the-mill things, and ring-related topics were wisely avoided. All of the meaningful things seemed to exist in the spaces between the words, the pauses between the sentences. All of the meaningful things went unsaid.

We wandered. Eventually, we ended up at the top floor of Life Sciences tower, which I'm told is the tallest building on campus. We stood on the observation deck, leaning over the railing and looking down on people passing below.

And then we started making paper airplanes. I tore pages out of my notebook, passed some to her, kept some for myself. She made thin knives of planes, planes that cut and stabbed through the air and shot like missiles. I delicately folded designs remembered from childhood, planes with weighted noses and flaps and fins, capable of twisting and turning and looping through the air. Gliding forever if you threw them right.

We stood on the balcony and a rain of origami aircraft fell. Aimed at students, at buildings, at trees and landmarks picked because of their impressive distance. Eventually a marker appeared, and we were drawing designs on the planes: curling flames, dragon scales, unblinking eyes. And without thinking, I wrote something on one of the sheets of paper.

"MARRY ME. MARRY ME. MARRY ME."

I looked at it for a few moments while the ink dried. Smiling wistfully, nostalgically, the way you smile when you're thinking of a memory that isn't really yours or doesn't really belong to you, when you're thinking of a happy ending you saw in a movie or read in a book, something that seems to belong to you, but doesn't.

Instead of giving the paper to her, instead of quickly filling in the empty pauses with all the things I wished I'd said, I quickly folded the paper into a plane and threw it.

I watched it glide through the air. It caught an updraft, a rising air current, and it sailed and sailed for what seemed like forever, like it would just keep rising until it was floating with the moon and the stars. But everything falls.

SUMMER MUZIK: "FEED THE ANIMALS"

2008-07-31T00:14:00.000-07:00

Listening to Girl Talk's latest album, Feed the Animals, is like being a guest at the best house party ever.

Everyone is in attendance: Huey Lewis is listening to an amusing anecdote told by Karen O from Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and he's laughing and nodding, but it's fairly obvious that he's just being polite. Rod Stewart is in the middle of a keg-stand in the corner while Toni Basil and Busta Rhymes lift his feet. Tom Petty is doing a line of coke off of Rihanna's ass, and Daft Punk is sampling the onion dip. Of Montreal, Madonna, Kraftwerk, and Fergie are all playing Scattergories, and somehow, Fergie is winning. Roy Orbison is really embarrassed because he's spilled his Diet Coke on one of the couch cushions, and he's already tried to turn it over to hide the stain but there's another stain on the other side of the cushion (this stain caused by Salt and/or Pepa), so he doesn't know what to do. Michael Jackson is getting crunk, Nirvana is beating INXS is beer pong, Prince is teaching R. Kelly a magic trick, and you're there to see it all.

Seriously. That's what Feed the Animals is like.

I hesitate to call the songs "mashups". Mashups are lazy and stupid and come across like bad jokes (I put together "Toxic" and "Lose Yourself"!! Isn't that crazy?) However, Girl Talk's creations are anything but lazy; they're meticulously, almost painfully, constructed. The juxtapositions are clever and unexpected, the song choices are surprising.

It definitely seems to be an improvement over Night Ripper, which was excellent, and seemed to be "the go-to party album" for like, six or seven months. That's what's great about Girl Talk: literally, there's something for everybody. "Oh, you don't like this song? Well, wait seven seconds, and something new will pop in."

The speed of attack is my only problem, though. I wish some of the more amusing sections had a bit more time to play out. Specifically, the "No Diggity"/"Flashing Lights"/"15 Step" combo on "Still Here", because that part is wonderful and makes me want to listen to Blackstreet and Radiohead all day long. At the same fucking time.

Speaking of Radiohead, Girl Talk (along with just about everyone else) pulled a page from the In Rainbows playbook, so you can download the album here and pay whatever you want (i.e. "nothing").

GIRLS I'VE KNOWN, PART 2: "THE ITCH"

2008-07-27T23:35:00.001-07:00

About a week and a half ago, I went to see The Dark Knight.

I'm sure you've already discovered firsthand, but the film is excellent. Brilliant. Dense. Revelatory. Basically the film deserves every positive adjective currently in circulation, as well as adjectives not yet created (megalary, intraescent, morphity).

I saw it with my brother on opening night. Tickets were selling out faster than those proverbial hotcakes, so in order to ensure Batman-viewage, a complicated scheme was hatched: a scheme that, according to our carefully constructed plan, would involve me arriving an hour early, buying two tickets, leaving one ticket at the box office (for David to snag upon arrival), and saving the best seats available until he arrived, fresh from work, at which point Batman-viewage would commence and everything would be right with the world.

Everything was going according to plan. We were t-minus forty-five minutes to showtime. I was nestled firmly in my seat, icy beverage in hand, feeling happy and content and carefree for the first time in months, and that's when my ex-girlfriend walked into the theatre with some other guy.

A quick note on fate. What were the odds? Of my ex-girlfriend (whom I have not seen nor spoken to nor otherwise acknowledged since the breakup) walking into the theatre? My theatre? Consider how many screens were showing this movie that very night. Consider the fact that, due to unreasonable ticket sales and immanent sellouts, a second screen was converted and purloined to show the same movie at exactly the same time; that, due to this second, identical theatre, I could have chosen to see The Dark Knight in theatre 10 or theatre 16, my destination ultimately decided by nothing more than a whim, a mental coin toss, and I randomly ended up in 16 where she arrived ten minutes later. The probability involved: staggering.

She walked in with him and I did a quick double-take. She was wearing that yellow t-shirt, the one she wore when we were together. Her hair looked curly. Like I said before, she was with some guy, a guy with shoulder-length blonde hair and a blank, stony expression. I quickly turned away, not wanting to be caught looking, deciding instead to study the Exit sign with avid interest. Somehow, she continued to exist when I was no longer looking at her, lingering in the corner of my eye: a blurry yellow brushstroke existing in the periphery of the painting. My painting.

I should expand upon the circumstances of the break-up. Fill you in. Catch you up. But for the purposes of our story, you just need to know this: things between us ended reasonably amiably.

(The fact that "reasonably amiably" is italicized should probably give you the right idea). I should also tell you that yes, I was miserable for sometime after, and yes, I did "rebound" (oh, how I loathe that word), but since then, my misery has been replaced by apathy and abivalance. Or so I'd thought.

Also, if you're an active reader, you've probably noticed that thus far, I've failed to mention her name. This is purposeful. This is probably why Alex refuses to refer to her by her first name, only using her last name instead: to name is to acknowledge, to acknowledge is to recognize, to recognize is to empower, and I refuse to do so. Anyway, the point is this: I could be talking about anyone, or I could be talking about no one, but honestly, I'm most definately talking about a someone.

Out of the corner of my eye I carefully watched her walk across the theatre, up the stairs, ultimately settling on a seat directly behind me. Strategically, this was a brilliant move: it completely shut out my desire to see but not be seen. Suddenly I wondered if she'd noticed me already, if she was looking at me, if I was wearing the right clothes and the right shoes and if my hair was artfully messy or disheveled and unimpressive.

Are you beginning to appreciate the desperation of the situation? I couldn't get up, or I'd lose our seats. I couldn't turn around and look, because she'd notice me noticing her. Frantically I checked my watch and realized the movie wasn't going to start for forty-one minutes, and panic set in. I felt like Indiana Jones at the conclusion of Raiders: tied to a post as the Germans opened the Ark, wanting, needing, to look inside, but close your eyes, Marion, close your eyes, because looking inside would melt your face off.

So I was considering my overall appearance, and that's when I started worrying about the boil. See, I had this sunburn-related boil on the back of my neck, this blemish, this imperfection, this unsightly thing, and I quickly became certain that, not only had she already noticed it, but that she was staring directly at it. It began to itch, maddeningly, and I felt like poking and prodding it and scratching it and draining it to relieve the pressure.

Liz Miller once said that the only revenge is living well: conspicuously living well in the face of breakup-tragedy, creating a weaponized form of jealously that can maliciously be aimed and fired at will. Was I really living well? I wondered. I was waiting to see a movie, alone, worrying about my hair and my boil and what she would think. Here comes the part that I'm not especially proud of.

I turned to the couple sitting next to me, total strangers, and initiated a conversation. God bless them, they were very receptive, and seemed genuinely invested. We spoke of the book I was reading in the theatre (Demonology, Rick Moody). We spoke of film adaptations of comic-books, of Hellboy, of the genius of Mignola's art. They told me an involved story regarding their peculiar Irish friend who despises peanut butter, who will leave the room if peanut butter is mentioned. They told me, at length, of the new holiday they'd created and the particular celebrations involved (merciless truth, adventure, consumption of alcohol). He was wearing a vest and she possessed a complex hairstyle reminiscent of whirlpools, of vortexes, of black holes. They were young and intelligent and attractive, and, for the time being (if you were watching our conversation from a few rows behind) it would appear that they were my friends.

Kind of pathetic, right?

Somehow, the forty-one minutes shrank to thirty, and then to fifteen, and then to five, and in the last minute, just before the previews began, David appeared. The lights went down and the movie began, and for two and a half hours, I thought about clowns and vigilantes, but then the lights came back up and the credits rolled and I was back to square one.

Patrons began to file out of the theatre, like cattle. David seemed content to loiter, to bask in the film's awesomeness, to marinate in it, but I quickly rushed him out into the lobby without looking back. What's the rush? he said, but it was too complicated and pitiful to try to explain, so I didn't.

He couldn't stop talking about the movie. We stood outside the theatre, and I started chain-smoking, scanning the exiting crowd for a yellow shirt, frantically scratching the boil on my neck. All he wanted to talk about was Heath's brooding intensity, but I was too busy brooding intensely. He noticed my detachment, my silence, my enhanced consumption of cigarettes, and he lost interest. See you at home, he said, and walked away dejectedly.

There I stood. Watching, needing to see her. Wondering if her and Shoulder-Length Blonde would be holding hands, or possibly kissing. I lingered in self-created clouds of smoke like some kind of Stygian horror.

What the fuck am I doing? I thought.

What is it that makes us feel this way? I say "us" because I know you know what I'm talking about, I know you've experienced that nameless feeling when confronted with someone you used to love, or used to date, or used to sleep with. What is it that makes us voyeuristically linger on their facebook profiles, on myspace blogs, on their electronic presence, haunting them in direct proportion to the amount we allow ourselves to be haunted? What makes us return to nostalgic restaurants, to previous meeting places, to lurk in movie theatre parking lots?

For me, it was not jealousy. It was not regret, nor was it lust, nor love. It was devoid of longing. It was as if I did not want to stick my hand in the fire, but simply needed to know how much it would burn.

Perhaps I miss the person I was back then. Perhaps I prefer the previous, outdated version of myself to the current model. But, I am not a masochist. I didn't need to keep burning myself, to stare directly into my personified insecurity.

I flicked the cigarette away. I stopped scratching the boil, deciding instead to stop aggravating it, to let it slowly disappear on its own.

I quickly got into my car, and headed home. Talking to David about the Joker suddenly seemed vital, and I'd been a fool to pass it up, so, that's what I did, and I didn't look back.

CHOCOLATE, AND FUN!

2008-07-22T20:27:00.000-07:00

I just found a real invitation to a real party that my mom is planning to go. I'll recreate it for you here, verbatim.

WARNING: Reading this will make you pray for an early death.

"IT'S A CHOCOLATE AFFAIR"- LADIES NIGHT OUT!

Come enjoy an evening of chocolate delights and friends! Chocolates, desserts and beverages will be provided! I'll be featuring a Digital Photo Project you can do YOURSELF! Bring a digital image on a CD or camera (and computer cord) or email it to me beforehand. I'll show you how easy it is to create a beautiful card, page or book- great gifts too!
Come for the CHOCOLATE!
Come for the FUN!
Come for the time out of the house!

Jesus.

This is such a sad commentary on the lives of middle-aged women. It also provides insight into how they view themselves, and others like them. Here are a few preconceived notions (or "prejudices", if you will) that have been strongly reinforced by this horrible, horrible invitation.

-What do middle-aged women love? CHOCOLATE, and FUN!

-What is the only thing these women enjoy more than CHOCOLATE, and FUN!? Time away from their loveless, stagnant marriages!

-Middle-aged women know absolutely nothing about computers! ("digital image", "computer cord")

-Quitting your job and losing your pension and 401K in order to start a scrapbooking business might not be the best life-plan and could jeopardize future stability!

I've was unable to reproduce the clip-art image of the slice of chocolate cake that was included. You'll have to use your imagination, but trust me, it looks scrumptious.

I probably shouldn't be allowed to interact with real people. Like, ever. Time to go listen to Elliott Smith and walk around the city until I'm too tired to stand up anymore!

SKETCHBOOK HELL: "THE HAND"

2008-07-20T20:25:00.000-07:00

DREAMS I'VE HAD, PART 5

2008-07-16T15:37:00.000-07:00

The dream began, and I found myself cat-sitting for an elderly eccentric millionaire while he was away. I did not question this at all.

The Millionaire had presumably left on some sort of fittingly eccentric vacation, perhaps to the moon, or to Anne Frank's old house. He possessed around sixty cats, and they were left free to wander around his enormous mansion while he was away. Many of them wore clothes.

Before he'd left, he'd completely reconfigured his mansion to be more entertaining for his dozens of humanized cats: tables had been overturned, or covered with blankets, effectively turning them into forts; laser pens hung from the ceiling, casting dozens of red laserpoints for kittens to chase; every hour, on the hour, a mouse was released from a complicated machine (complete with brass cogs and steam whistles), and the chase began anew.

It was my job to care for the cats as if they were babies. Coddle them. Sing them lullabies. Perform puppet shows. Initially aloof and distant, as most cats tend to be, they quickly warmed to my presence and followed me around the mansion in a neat single-file line.

Things were going well.

One day, I decided to let the cats watch a video. I found an old cassette tape in The Millionaire's junk drawer. It was unlabeled. I fed it into the VCR of The Millionaire's curiously small television, and pressed play.

It was a grainy old movie that I'd never seen before, and it appeared to star Jodie Foster. A younger Jodie Foster, before the movie Contact but after The Silence of the Lambs, and in the scene that began to play she (Foster) was driving a dented Ford Bronco, OJ style, at very high speed through a densely wooded forest. Once again, I did not question this in the least. The cats sat behind me, politely watching along.

The camera panned left, zoomed and focused, and it became apparent that Foster was chasing someone: running at high speed, dodging and weaving between tree trunks as the Foster-driven bronco crashed and thundered through the woods, edging closer and closer. The camera zoomed in, and in close up, I realized the runner was my friend Dylan.

I turned, and addressed one of the cats, the one wearing the pinstripe suit. "Why didn't Dylan tell me she was in a movie with Jodie Foster?" I asked. In response, the cat mewed three times in rapid succession.

Onscreen, the chase continued. Foster produced a huge handgun and began to blast it. Entire trees exploded outward in a shower of splinters and burnt wood. Dylan ran faster, hurdling over fallen logs, ducking low beneath branches, sprinting as Foster's Bronco began to close the distance between them. I leaned forward, tensely, ignoring the cat's pleas for attention and treats.

Foster bellowed. Dylan swung, hurdling over a ravine. The Bronco surged forward. It's front wheels left the ground. Just as the chase reached the critical point, the moment in which escape for Dylan seemed impossible and a look of victory gleamed from Jodie Foster's crazy eyes, just as I couldn't stand the tension for a second longer...the dream ended.

NOTES FROM THE UNDERGROUND

2008-07-14T18:26:00.000-07:00

Recently many of my ideas have been short, and would appear incongruous and padded if presented in the normal, verbose fashion that I seem to be partial to (I like words, goddamn it). I've decided to round up these abbreviated thoughts and subjects and present them to you here, all at once, like a written mosaic of the past few days of my life.

1. Recently I came into the possession of an airtight popcorn jar with a live scorpion trapped inside. Do not ask how. I have been informed that in its current position (devoid of air, food, water, and entertaining magazines), the scorpion will live for perhaps a week. This has inspired me to find a nefarious use for the scorpion as soon as possible. If you have an evil scheme that could involve a live scorpion, let me know. Here are a few possible ideas presented to me by friends and co-workers:

-Find another similarly dangerous arachnid, place it in the jar, and watch the two of them battle for supremacy. (Suggested by David; this idea seems a bit mundane.)

-Place the live scorpion inside of the mailbox of an ex-girlfriend; find a safe vantage point; wait for her to check her mail. (Suggested by Rob; not only is this idea too evil, but it also really provides a concrete example of how much Rob's divorce has influenced his view of women.)

-Attach the scorpion to the ceiling, via string. Watch it swing like a foreboding venomous pendulum. Wait for someone to walk within range of it's stingy wrath. (Suggested by Ryan; this idea is so evil, so random, it might be just what the doctor ordered.)

2. I've just started to work with a new co-worker named Ryan, and he's the most entertaining person alive. He's in his mid-fifties and he's flamboyantly gay (but old-school gay, though; you can definitely tell that before he came out, he grappled with preconceived ideas of sexual identity, and suffered through two torturous heterosexual marriages as a result.) However, after years in his cocoon, he's emerged as a proud homosexual butterfly, and is incredibly interesting and fun to talk to as a result. I don't think I would have enjoyed talking to closeted Ryan nearly as much.

Previously, Ryan worked a series of jobs in Hollywood that provided him close contact with lots of famous people (extra, personal assistant, set-dresser). This, along with his strong personality and capacity for mimicry, makes him an astonishing raconteur. I listened to him, in awe, for two hours as he told me various anecdotes of his life in Hollywood: the time one of Sylvester Stallone's bouncers tried to get him to do coke in the bathroom at the wrap party for Driven (a movie about race-cars and race-car drivers); the time he had to compensate/shoo away hookers from the bed of the director of Cliffhanger (which, coincidentally, also stars Sylvester Stallone).

3. There's this girl. More on that later, perhaps.

4. At the place where I work there is a parking lot, and at the back of the parking lot there are abandoned vehicles, and behind all of the rusty cars and trucks there is a trailer. The trailer is twisted and hunchbacked and sits on flat, sagging tires and its windows are covered with sheets of splintered plywood that faded, bleached like bones, years ago. The door of the trailer has been twisted out of its hinges, its lock jimmied open long ago by someone looking for a place to sleep, and today, on a whim, I went inside.

The floor was littered with junk. Chrome fenders, bent like broken fingers and leaned against the wall. Tall, unsteady towers of milk-crates that made exploration of the trailer difficult. However, near the rear of the trailer, hung above a pile of stained mattresses, there was a mirror, and on the mirror someone had written

IN THIS WORLD LOVE IS HARD TO COME BY

IF YOU ARE LUCKY ENOUGH TO FIND IT KEEP IT

BECAUSE IT IS WORTH IT IN THE END.

OBVIOUS SIGNS THAT, WHILE MY PARENTS ARE AWAY ON AN EXTENDED VACATION, MY BROTHER AND I ARE IN CHARGE OF WATCHING THEIR HOUSE

2008-07-08T03:18:00.000-07:00

-There's a loaded handgun on the dining-room table. Y'know, just in case.

-Empty beverage containers, everywhere: empty Dos Equis bottles, empty Blue Moon bottles, near-empty Vodka bottles, empty Coke cans, and empty cans of Amp Energy Drink.

-Not only are the dogs slightly malnourished, but they've also been fought against one another; for sport, for amusement, and for betting purposes. My money usually rides on the bigger dog.

-Everything we've cooked (or attempted to cook) usually contains two or three of the following ingredients: cheese, garlic, bacon.

-The song "X Gon Give It To Ya" has been playing on an endless loop, over and over again, for the last four or five hours. It adds a certain ambiance to the dogfights.

"WE'RE GOING TO BE ROOMMATES FOREVER"

2008-07-06T00:41:00.000-07:00

Daniel,

I’m writing this in response to the angry note you slipped under my door this morning entitled “MOVE OUT OF OUR APARTMENT TONIGHT OR I’M CALLING THE POLICE”, and frankly, I’m more than a bit surprised: I cannot, for the life of me, think of why you’d want to put our roommate relationship (or “roomationship”) to an end.

After all, you and I have been best friends for thirteen years, eleven months, and twelve days. Remember our first serendipitous meeting? We were in fifth grade, and you purposefully threw the river rock that shattered my clavicle. Instead of crying like a baby and hating you for it, though, I realized that throwing a ten-pound rock at me was just your special way of asking to be my friend. My clavicle still hurts when it rains, Daniel, but I don't blame you. I understand.

Are you kicking me out because of my severe allergy to peanuts? I can't help it if I'm allergic to certain members of the Legume family, and frankly, I think a little sympathy is in order. I can't even fly on commercial airlines. The microscopic peanut dust floating in the recycled air would make my trachea swell up like a balloon.

Please just tell me why you don't want me as a roommate anymore.

Is it because I'm an albino?

Or is it because I walked in on you and Beth having intercourse? Honestly, that was not my fault: I was simply investigating suspicious noises. Okay, so maybe I mistook the sounds of your coitus for a tussle with some sort of burglar, and maybe I did knock down your locked door. Perhaps I did "freak out" (your words, not mine). I’ll admit I did overreact by hitting Beth in the mouth with the fire extinguisher. But, I did pay for you splintered doorframe, Daniel, and I also paid for Beth's reconstructive dental surgery, even though we both know I could have performed the surgery more effectively (and less expensively) myself.

Are you kicking me out because of my so-called "obsession" with white tigers? (Once again, your words, not mine). It's not an obsession; it’s simply a fascination. Whenever I'm feeling shunned because my skin lacks pigment, I look up at my tigers, and I feel like they understand me (which certainly is more than I can say about you). I realize that my collection of plush tigers is a bit “out of control” at the moment, that dozens of them are spilling out of my doorway and into the hall, and I know you and Beth regularly trip over them in the middle of the night, but I never said I wouldn’t be able to make sacrifices.

Is it because of the whole urination thing?

Because I sleep alone in a children’s bunk bed?

Is it because I regularly take your high school yearbooks into the bathroom with me?

Or is it because I accidentally killed two of your dogs with poison on two separate occasions?

Whatever it is, I promise never to do it again, and if, by some chance, I do repeat the offending behavior once or twice, I can assure you that they will be isolated incidents and will not happen on a regular basis. But if I’m going to fix it, I have to know what’s wrong. Work with me, Daniel...not against me.

I want us to be roomates forever.

SUMMER MUZIK: "THA CARTER III"

2008-07-02T20:08:00.000-07:00

A while back, I wrote about my rabid anticipation for Tha Carter III, Lil' Wayne's new album, but did not get a chance to write about the album itself.

It's really fucking good, man. Here's my song-by-song breakdown:

"3 Peat"- Solid opening. Better than the first tracks on both Tha Carter and Tha Carter II. It shows how much Weezy's flow has improved since Tha Carter: he plays with rhyme schemes more, chops and fucks with with the meter, the cadence, and the timing. Also, excellent shout-out to Adam Sandler's Click.

"Mr. Carter" (feat. Jay-Z) -Just...awesome. The beat is sick; it sounds like the soundtrack to the triumphant final scene of an epic movie. Wayne's verses almost seem dadaist, existing in left field, shouting out Macho Man Randy Savage and Beetlejuice, bragging about getting shot, executing complicated wordplay and lots and lots of metaphors. Jay-Z's verse is great, one of his better recent verses, but Wayne delivers the best four bars:

"Got summer hatin' on me cause I'm hotter than the sun,
got Spring hating on me cause I ain't never sprung,
winter hatin' on me cause I'm colder than ya'll,
and I will never, I will never, I will never fall."

"A Milli"- Fucking ridiculous. If you listen to one track off the whole album, make it this one. Once again, the beat is sick, and the bass was loud enough to make the rear-view mirrors of my car vibrate like the glass of water in Jurassic Park. I guess originally the album was supposed to feature a bunch of skit-like remixes of this song featuring different artists. I'm glad that idea got scrapped; I'm pretty sure it would diminish the impact of the beat if the album featured it again and again. However, many, many remixes of this song already exist: Jay-Z's remix is good, so is the one from Fabolous. The best, however, is the remix from Wayne himself.

"Got Money" - Kinda expected to hate this song (probably because I find T-Pain creepy in an R. Kelly sorta way), but I was pleasantly surprised. However, after the one-two punch of Mr. Carter/A Milli, it's a bit underwhelming. Wayne echoing the hook from "Umbrella", though, is excellent.

"Comfortable"- Hey, it's BabyFace! Unsealed from his time capsule, straight from 1996! And surprisingly, he and Wayne work pretty well together on this track. It's definitely a pretty standard Babyface beat and hook, but with a twist: yes, women are wonderful and necessary in the life of a man, but fuck...watch out, because Wayne's ready to kick you out on your ass and replace you at the drop of a hat .

"Dr. Carter"- Lyrically, the best track on the album. Weezy reigns it in and produces a genuine concept song, a narrative that contrasts nicely with some of his less focused (but still great) stream of consciousness verses. The Swiss Beatz production is quite nice, and works well with the subject of the song. The section about biting and re-reciting that Kanye line? Funny.

"Phone Home"- Eh. Skippable. I mean, we've heard the whole "Weezy is an alien" thing before, and the production sounds like sound effects from a futuristic amusement park ride. Once again, the fact that this track comes after "Dr. Carter" really emphasizes it's mediocrity.

"Tie My Hands"- Weezy gets serious. "The only thing that can save us now," Robin Thicke sings, "is sensitivity. And compassion." Somehow, he does this with a straight face. This is a pretty good song, though. Fairly subdued. Seemingly heartfelt. A nice change of pace. In terms of socially conscious raps, it's good, but it's certainly no "Georgia Bush".

"Mrs. Officer"- And then, as if Wayne has to prove to us that he's not too sensitive, comes a song about fucking a female police officer. And it's hilarious. Erotic fiction from Lil Wayne. About fucking a cop. Lots of double entendres and some amusing wordplay. Also, reading a transcript of the hook is pretty funny: "Wee Ooh Wee Ooh Wee Wee Ooh Wee Ooh Wee (Yea)".

"Let The Beat Build"- I glossed over this track the first couple listens, but it's become one of my favorites. The way Weezy changes the tempo of his flow several times throughout the song is pretty fucking impressive, and the Kanye beat is great. It builds. Get it?

"Shoot Me Down"- During this track, Wayne talks about how fucking hard he is, how he's "gotta 3-80 on my waist and rambo at home", but simultaneously comments about how he's drinking hot tea while recording the song. "This tea is at a real good temperature right now. So am I." God, I hope a line of Wayne-endorsed herbal teas is on the way. Oh yeah, and this song is good. Maybe not as good as hot tea, though.

"Lollipop"- Wayne likes getting head. The song is arguably his first honest-to-god pop song, and it fares pretty well, even though I've heard it on the radio six billion times. But yeah, I'd argue that the remix is a lot better: slightly faster, with a surprisingly good verse by Kanye, and Wayne's verse about safe sex is great wordplay. And, hilarious.

"La La"- Dude, I fucking hate this song. Seriously. The xylophone beat? The chanting children's voices? I'm sorry, but it's pretty cringe inducing. I usually skip this, as soon as possible. It's such a shame, because "La La La" (a totally unrelated song) was supposed to be on the album, but was scrapped because it was leaked early. And that's just devastating, because "La La La" is an amazing song, and "La La" is a piece of shit. I'm listening to it now, while I write this, and it's just unpleasant.

"Playing With Fire"- Is it just me, or does this really sound like an O.D.B. flow? It sounds like a b-side from Nigga Please, especially during the verse about M.L.K. The song, overall, is alright...I feel like it could have been replaced with "I Feel Like Dying" (another amazing song mysteriously absent from the album, presumably because of the goddamn leak).

"You Ain't Got Nuthin'"- Best guest-verses on the album, and some of the best lines, too. FABOLOUS: "I pop up like Xzibit...not to put no fuckin' fish tanks in your Civics." Ha! JUELZ: "When we slop you like seconds, obey me like peasents or get opened up like presents." WEEZY: "Man, you better keep payin' me cause you don't want my problems, I be wildin' like Capital One...what is in your wallet?"

"DontGetIt"- A fitting ending. The verses are impressive, with lots of great individual lines, and I enjoy listening to Wayne lighting up a blunt at the beginning of his long rant, but fuck, man, the rant goes on for like, ten minutes. And it amusingly makes little sense. And ends with him critisizing Al motherfuckin' Sharpton. And then, the album is over.

Overall, the album is great. Perhaps a bit uneven, though. I'm fucking glad there weren't any skits, but man, I'm a bit puzzled by the song selections. Like I said, "La La La" should have been present, along with "Zoo", "Something You Forgot", "I Feel Like Dying", and "Did It Before".

What do you think of the album? Favorite song? Favorite line? Least favorite song?

Phew. This is now officially "out of my system". I'll refrain from writing more about Lil Wayne. For a couple of days.

No homo.

POST JUMP HANGOVER: THE JACKSON/JACKSON DICHOTOMY

2008-07-01T22:07:00.000-07:00

I HAVE MANY conflicting inner-monologues, and they all seem to manifest as the voices of African-American celebrities.

The strongest, most-lasting result of the whole "getting jumped and beaten" thing seems to be an increased discomfort caused by close proximity to strangers. Basically, if someone I do not know gets within punching distance, I get paranoid. And anxious. And defensive. In the future, surprise parties should probably be avoided.

Case in point: the other night I was standing in front of a QuickTrip, minding my own business while texting, and an older Navajo man in a wheelchair started to roll towards me. "Shit," I thought. "That'll teach me to stand next to a handicap ramp."

I briefly attempted to avoid eye contact, to focus on the texting, but Navajo-Wheelchair-Guy was really trying to get my attention.

"Hey, brother!" he yelled. "What's your name?" And that's when the inner monologuing began; in response to Navajo-Wheelchair-Guy (and the potential, imagined violence that he signified) two voices spoke up, quickly, instantaneously, foils to one another.

The first voice: loud. Reactionary. Paranoid. Still angry about getting jumped. Constantly yelling, incapable of low volumes, constantly stressing the nouns of every sentence. This inner-monologue sounds a lot like Samuel L. Jackson in every single movie he's ever been in.

The second voice: demure. Quiet. Very trusting. Pretty fucking naive. Wanting, needing, to be liked. Listening to this voice, this monologue, probably got me jumped in the first place. Also, this voice sounds like Randy Jackson, he of American Idol fame.

"Hey, brother!" Navajo-Wheelchair-Guy yelled. "What's your name?"

"Don't tell this guy your name, motherfucker!" the first voice screamed. "Knowledge is power, and this motherfucker is plottin' on you! Shields up, bitch! Run!"

"Aw c'mon, dawg," the second voice replied. "This dude's in a wheelchair. He's middle-aged. He's got chafing on his hands, wheelchair chafing. Just tell this dude your name...he probably needs help. You should totally help him, dawg."

"Umm...my name is...Mark," I lied. My fingers curled up into a fist, and I kept my eyes on his hands.

"Good move, motherfucker! Good move, lyin' about your name! This asshole is hiding knives in his wheelchair! He ain't even crippled, he's faking it! He's gonna lure you in close, and then he's gonna cut out your fucking eyes!"

"Aww, c'mon, dawg. C'mon. Dawg, c'mon. The dude's crippled."

"Well hey, Mark, good to meetcha," Possibly-Non-Crippled-Wheelchair-Navajo-Guy said. "Say, Mark, think you could give me some help getting out of my chair?"

"What?"

"Just come on over here, and lift my arm up, and help me get down to the ground. It'll just take a second," he replied.

"I TOLD YOU, MOTHERFUCKER! Didn't you learn anything from Hayden Square? Do not let him get close to you! He'll put knives in your motherfuckin' eyes! Run, bitch, run! Yes they deserve to die and I hope they burn in hell!"

"Aw dawg. You gotta help him. He's in a wheelchair, dawg. How will you be able to sleep? How will you be able to live with yourself?"

Hesitantly, I stepped forward. I slipped my hand under his outstretched arm, while the other hand stayed curled into a tight fist, ready to strike at the first sign of aggression. My footing: steady. My posture: alert. I slowly lowered him to the ground, and stepped away.

No attack came. No hidden knives popped out of the inner workings of his wheelchair. Turns out he wasn't faking it, was actually handicapped, and just wanted to sit on the ground for a while.

But damn. I was so ready.

JUMPED

2008-06-28T20:47:00.000-07:00

Early Wednesday morning Alex and I got jumped by four guys while walking to our cars in downtown Tempe. Here's what happened:

After an extremely satisfying meal at Hooters, followed by some extended philosophical conversation, Alex and I were making our way back to our respective vehicles, ready to call it a night. We'd parked in the visitor lot just to the west of Hayden Square, and in order to get there, we traveled down Fifth Street. At this time, it was just before 1:30 am.

On our way to the cars, we passed Suite 301. I looked at the club-goers waiting outside, secluded behind velvet ropes, and amongst them I saw four black dudes waiting while talking to one another. "A Milli" was playing inside. "Oh, this song is awesome," I said to Alex.

We reached the parking lot. We stood by Alex's Saturn, summarizing the topics covered during the evening, saying goodbyes. Alex's head turned, acknowledging something behind me, and as I turned, I saw the four black guys who'd been waiting outside Suite 301.

"Hey, do you guys have change for a five?" the guy in front said.

"No, man, I don't carry cash around," Alex said hesitantly.

"No, I don't think-" I began. I was interrupted, however, by a sudden fist to the jaw. One of the four (who was standing in the left field of my peripheral vision) hit me in the jaw hard enough to daze me, to spin me around and drop me to the ground. I believe he was wearing a ring because that initial punch to the jaw opened up a long cut along my jawline that ultimately required ten stitches to close.

Later on, Alex would go on to tell me that from the minute he saw them, he knew something was about to go down. Here's the sad thing: when I saw them striding towards us purposefully, four horsemen in loose jeans and sideways ballcaps, I didn't suspect a thing. In fact, I thought these four guys actually needed change for a five.

I fell to the ground, and as they continued to pummel me, I closed my eyes and attempted to protect my face and chest as effectively as possible. The fact that my eyes were closed (as well as the many, many punches received to the head) makes me a rather unreliable narrator in regards to the remainder of the story, but I remember bits and pieces:

I remember hearing Alex distinctly say, "what the fuck?" I also remember saying something, too, but after the hit to the jaw my quip wasn't even close to being understandable.

From what Alex told me later, two of them continued to beat me while I was down, and two of them started to attack him (Alex). This seems consistent with what I experienced. I could feel one of them punching the right side of my body (arm, back, chest) while the other (the guy with the ring) continued to hit me in the head. He punched me in the neck, in the ear, and on top of my head, but thankfully I managed to protect my face. My beautiful, beautiful face.

During all of this, I did not pass out, but did totally lose track of time. It seemed to go on for a while. Then, it suddenly stopped. I pushed myself off the pavement in time to see three or four of the attackers chasing Alex through the parking structure. Oh shit, I thought. Oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit, oh fuck, this isn't real, I thought. I ran and hid behind an electrical box, and then, fearing that the electrical box wasn't sufficient covering, I crawled into a bush behind the electrical box. I was in bad shape.

I could feel blood dripping. Cautiously, I moved my hand up to my face, trying to diagnose my wounds. As I put my hand on my throat, seeking the source of the bleeding, one of my fingers slid into the ragged hole in the skin below my jawline. I thought my throat was cut. I also figured my ear canal was dripping blood. The end? I wondered.

From inside of my bush, I sent Alex a frantic text message: Where are you?! His response was surprisingly cool: In front of Trails. Alright, at least he's able to text, I thought. I quickly called my brother and informed him of the situation; he pledged to drive down to Hayden Square, post haste.

A brief digression: When my brother found out Alex and I had been attacked, he assembled "the crew". By "the crew", I mean, he called some of his less-than-savory friends of friends, including a dude called Lance, who is about as unsavory as they come. Lance is one of those guys who feels more comfortable in jail than he does in the real world; he's also famous for ending a fight by pulling two AK-47's out of his minivan and firing them in the air while screaming in order to frighten the opposition. Anyway, when my brother informed me that he'd be "assembling the crew", I immediately feared for everyone who could possibly be misconstrued as one of our attackers (i.e. "black people").

I slowly walked back into the parking lot, afraid that one of the four would reappear and finish what they started, but by the time I got back a policeman was already on the scene. I spoke to him at great length. In the grand tradition of the Tempe police, the officer was arrogant, patronizing, and a total waste of my time.

Then the paramedics bandaged me up. They informed me that the style of bandage used on my head was called "the Civil War wrap". Apparently, they had not needed to use it in quite some time. "It'll go well with my Civil War beard," I quipped.

I finally got to see Alex, and David arrived shortly after. Soon, the three of us arrived at the hospital. While the doctor was stitching me up, I remarked that I "finally know how the hem of a dress feels." I inquired whether the thread he was using to stitch up my face was flesh-colored; I then requested to be sewn up with turquoise-colored thread instead.

The final injury count was as follows: Alex received a broken nose and a slight concussion for his troubles, and I received multiple lacerations to the scalp and the large cut on my chin. Also, bruises. But that goes without saying.

It wasn't a mugging. They didn't take anything except my pride and my sense of security.

Since it happened I've felt very odd. Days have passed with an odd sort of unreality. Sure, things have seemed more vivid now that I realize it all could have been taken away, but in a way, it has. It's like I'm inhabiting a new world now; a place where people don't think twice about breaking bones and skin, and each day is measured successful on the criteria of whether you lived through it or not. I dunno, man. I dunno.

We got lucky. Really lucky. One of them could have easily stabbed me or stomped my head into the pavement. I don't even want to think of what would have happened if one of them would have pulled a gun on us. There's a lesson to be learned, folks: this kind of shit can happen anywhere, anytime; I mean, Mill Fucking Avenue is the last place I'd expect to be jumped. On a Wednesday, no less.

Minimize risk. Don't walk around at night alone. Stick to populated, well lit areas, and try to walk with large groups of people if possible. Be safe. And goddamn, if someone asks you to break a five, run. Just run.

This is the shirt I was wearing at the time. I'm saving it, bloodstains and all, as a souvenir:

MONDAY IS AN ENERGY-DRAINING DAY, SO IT SHALL BE THE DAY THAT I LAZILY POST AMUSING VIDEOS FOR YOU TO WATCH (INSTEAD OF WRITING)

2008-06-23T23:43:00.000-07:00

"BRIAN REPORTS THE NEWS"

2008-06-22T23:19:00.000-07:00

The following are news headlines found on CNN's homepage. All of them, except one, made me laugh. Read on and become a more informed, intelligent person.

Can extreme life survive on Mars?
New Mountain Dew commercial aims to find out.

Autistic man found alive after week in woods.
"Survival of the Fittest" thrown out the window.

Toilet-paper wedding gowns honored.
"Not cool," says man stuck in bathroom.

Kids fed 'silly pills', made to do sex shows.
FDA issues recall of silly pills in response.

Four feared drowned in party-boat sinking.
Party (boat) foul.

Should I vaccinate my baby?
Yes. Do it yourself. With your eyes closed. After drinking three maragaritas.

Finally, the lone news story that did not make me laugh:

Comedian George Carlin Dies at 71.
Probably the funniest stand-up comedian, ever.
Thank you for making me laugh.
You will be missed.

IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS

2008-06-20T23:11:00.000-07:00

I've been close to absolute madness twice during the course of my life. The first close call happened in the wave pool at Big Surf thirteen years ago; the second, less than an hour ago, inside the internet.

A brief prologue. When I say "madness", I am not mincing words. One of my ex-girlfriends used to constantly proclaim that she was "crazy", but this was not true; she, like many people I've known, liked to imagine that she was crazy. She did this to distance herself from the affections of others and to provide justification for certain amounts of inexcusable behavior. This is more common than you'd imagine.

This is not what I mean. I'm not staking a claim of madness to distance myself from others, nor to make myself appear special or unique, nor to provide justification for eccentric behavior. Fuck, I don't need to justify anything. I'm only saying that, quite literally, I feel that I've been very close to full-on madness: compulsions, hallucinations, nonsensical incoherent thoughts...you get the picture.

Anyway, back to the story.

When I was ten, I went to Big Surf for the first time with my family, and immediately fell in love with the wave pool. If you've had the pleasure of visiting the establishment, you know that the wave pool is where it's at: it's enormous (easily the size of a football field), the waves are of a significant size (perhaps six to ten feet in height, and significant enough to catch and ride to the "shore"), plus, surf-themed music is constantly playing (mostly "Wipeout").

Sure, kids have died in the Big Surf wave pool, but that was the furthest thing from my mind. In fact, most rational thoughts had taken a leave of absence from my brainbone because during the course of my marathon seven hour dip in pool, I'd become very, very dehydrated. I don't mean the "oh man, it's warm today, I could sure use a Sierra Mist" kind of dehydration. I refer to the kind of dehydration that sailors face when stranded on a marooned ship; when, after suffering from chapped lips and severe, peeling sunburns, they begin to see hallucinations of golden angels beneath the surface of the water.

Around this time, a product called "Spider-Man SpaghettiO's" existed. It was just like regular SpaghettiO's, except the little pasta pieces were spider-themed. This product was endorsed by a commercial that I now barely remember. I recall that it was set in the SpaghettiO's factory (naturally), and several children were gathered around a huge vat of Spider-Man SpaghettiO's, singing its praises. Suddenly, the real-live Spider-Man shows up and swings over the huge vat, but an errant web-sling causes a bit of his web to fall into the pasta. One of the kids looks into the camera with a look of dismay, and concernedly yells the following haunting phrase: "Webbing?! In the vat?!"

As I was floating on my limp raft in the dirty water of the wave pool, my fevered, dehydrated brain seized upon this commercial like a vice. It seemed to run in a loop through my head, over and over, and eventually settled on that haunting phrase: "Webbing?! In the vat?!", which repeated over and over and over again in my mind. An endless loop. Occasionally I would say it out loud, and fail to see how strange this situation was becoming. I was sunburned and peeling, floating in a wave pool, incessantly chanting a line from a SpaghettiO's commercial in my head. For hours.

And that was the first time I legitimately felt like I was going crazy.

The second time, like I said, happened less than and hour ago. I was browsing myspace (ugh), and playing that game where you first click on a friend's profile, and then a friend of a friend, then a friend of a friend of a friend, seeing where the digression leads. Anyway, I'd just clicked on the profile picture of a stranger, a somewhat attractive girl, and found that her profile was comprised of hundreds of pictures of Ricky Martin.

Ricky Martin, smiling on the red carpet for the paparazzi. Ricky Martin, singing in front of hundreds of screaming fans. Ricky Martin, staring directly at me with eyes the color of battleship steel. Ricky Martin, shirtless and undoubtedly pondering something. Ricky Martin, the look on his face suggesting that even his still photograph is sentient and capable of independent though.

As I vacantly stared at this, my brain formed questions that metastasized into other questions. Why is this woman fixated on Ricky Martin? Isn't Ricky Martin dead? If not, what is Ricky Martin doing right now? My internal monologue quickly became less stable. Is Ricky Martin aware of my existence? If so, is it possible that he's looking at a Brian Street-themed myspace profile while I'm looking at this profile created in his image? Is it possible that Ricky Martin and I are two halves of the same person? If we met, would we merge? Would we cease to exist? Would our lives pop like soap bubbles?

And on and on and on. Ricky Martin, Ricky Martin, Ricky Martin. Webbing in the vat, webbing in the vat. I felt my brain melt, and leak out of my ears. Snakes began to consume their own tails. Oil and water mixed effortlessly. Everything I'd learned in life suddenly became unlearned. Two plus two unquestionably equaled five. Mobius Strips circled behind the eyes of Ricky Martin, and I was afraid.

I immediately pulled the computer's power cord out of the wall and walked outside.

Needless to say, it's been a strange week.

"A (MORE) MODEST PROPOSAL"

2008-06-18T19:53:00.000-07:00

If I ever run for office, I will build my entire campaign around one simple idea: I believe that during the course of your life, you should be able to legally kill one person. This will be called "a freebie".

There will be rules and limitations, of course. You can't kill anyone under the age of fifteen; if you do, you're disqualified, and will proceed straight to jail. Also, you can't kill with complicated chemical or machine-based weapons (including guns and explosives); however, simple handmade weapons (like clubs, spears, and cudgels) are totally acceptable. Weapons based upon simple machines (wedges, pulleys) are also encouraged. Killing someone with bare hands would be highly esteemed, and totally something to brag to friends about.

After committing your freebie murder, you'll wait at the scene of the crime for the police to arrive, and once they do you'll present them with your driver's license and tell them that you're "cashing in your freebie". If everything checks out, the police will then punch a hole in your ID (just like they punch a hole in your Subway Club card when you buy a meatball sub), and you'll be free to leave. However, if you've violated any of the previously established rules or if you've already had a hole punched in your ID, the police will call you a doofus, hit you in the jaw with a nightstick, and take you to the clink.

If you fail to kill the intended target with your freebie, you don't get a second chance. You will not subsequently be charged with assault, but you will be the laughing stock of the neighborhood. Also, you'll constantly live in fear of being attacked by your old target in what will be known as a "Retribution Freebie".

This "Freebie Law" would solve so many problems. It would ease the strain on our natural resources caused by overpopulation. It would create more jobs, lower taxes, and stimulate the economy by boosting sales in kevlar and weapon-building materials. It would also "thin the herd", weeding out those who pollute the shallow end of the gene pool.

You'd have to be careful, though. You'd have to choose exactly the right person to use your freebie on, otherwise, you'd spend the rest of your life regretting the decision. "Why the hell did I kill Jeff?" you'd wonder. "I mean, Jeff was a pretty cool guy...he taught me how to play Guitar Hero, he watched my cats when I was on vacation, and he always brought beer over. Sure, Jeff breathed through his mouth, but was that really a good enough reason to beat him to death with that lead pipe?"

You'd have to choose the perfect target. Someone who really deserves it. Someone who's hated by many. I've given it a lot of thought, and I believe I've found the perfect candidate. This guy:

I've already thought it out. Planned it. Imagined all the details and variables. So, dear readers, here's a summary of my involvement in the futuredeath of Carson Daly:

The date is May 11th, 2009.

A gaunt, red-eyed Carson Daly walks into an L.A. bar called "Neon"; an establishment that, much like Daly himself, was popular in the mid-nineties but has since declined into poverty. Daly walks to one of the barstools, sighs, and sits down. He is the only customer.

He orders whiskey, "lots of it", and as the bartender prepares his drink, Daly begins to cry. He hits the sauce heavily over the next half hour, downing five drinks, oblivious to the fact that it is only 9:30.

Over the next few hours, he continues to drink. He wanders to the jukebox, looking for songs he recognizes from his days hosting TRL, but finds only obscure indie artists that he's never heard of. This depresses him, and he puts his fist through the glass of a nearby window. "I'll pay for it," he mumbles to the bartender, but eleven dollars remain in his savings account. He survives on favors and credit, tabs and goodwill, but all goodwill eventually runs out.

He calls Dave Holmes, a VJ he used to work with at MTV in "the old days", from a pay phone at the back of the bar. Holmes is busy entertaining guests at his new beachfront home, celebrating a business deal recently completed with Pandora.com. Carson draws the conversation out, stretching seconds into minutes, and Holmes expresses his sympathy for "the Late Night thing". Daly winces, hangs up, and empties his glass.

Suddenly, Daly knows it's time.

He hears the familiar opening theme, and turns his head towards the television just in time to see the "Late Night" title come onscreen. "And here's your host, Jimmy Fallon!" the announcer screams. The crowd roars. The date is May 11th, 2009, and it marks the first episode of "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon".

For the next hour Daly sits at the bar emptying a bottle, watching Fallon enjoy the position that should have been his. The crowd loves Fallon; he's breezy, effortless, self-deprecating. A natural. Fallon enjoys a rapport with the guests that is somehow both serious and casual. Daly constantly shouts at the television during the broadcast. The bartender laughs at one of Fallon's jokes, and Daly throws a salt shaker at him.

Finally, the show ends, but Daly continues to hear the ghostly echo of Fallon's applause. Applause that should have been his. He redoubles his drinking, taking shot after shot by himself. He tries to call Tara Reid, but she doesn't answer.

Hours pass.

Daly catches the attention of the bartender. He demands a bottle of Jack Daniels, but the bartender seems hesitant. "Gimme the bottle, you prick!" he screams. "I need it! Do you have any idea who the fuck I am? I own this town! I built this down! Do you know who I am?!"

"Yes Carson, I know exactly who you are," the bartender quietly replies. The bartender then moves his hands towards his face, pulling his bartender mask off, revealing my face underneath. I drop the mask to the ground and smile.

"Gimme my drink!" Daly pouts. "Give...me...my...DRINK!"

I then reach up, and pull the rope that's connected to the complicated series of pulleys overhead. A sound of squeaking metal is heard, followed by the sound of rope unraveling, and suddenly a baby grand piano drops on Carson's head. He is crushed and killed instantly.

"I'm sorry, I can't give you a drink," I reply, the dust settling. "It's Last Call."

I nonchalantly walk to the still-functioning piano, and play the three-note melody that's become synonymous with NBC. Daly's lifeless body is pinned underneath. I then walk outside, and wait for the police to arrive.

I take his LiveStrong bracelet as a trophy.

(Oh, and if if you're reading this and you're a police officer or a FBI agent, this is fiction. It's inspired by Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal", and is intended as humorous satire not to be taken seriously. I'm not really going to kill Carson Daly (just like Swift didn't really eat human babies), so there's really no need to arrest me or anything. JK, LOLZ, THNX)

FOOT-LONG CHEESE STEAK, SIDE ORDER OF PARANOIA

2008-06-15T19:34:00.000-07:00

HAVE YOU EVER HEARD of this place called Jersey Mike's?

It's a sandwich shop/delicatessen based out of Jersey, and it just opened a series of new locations in Phoenix. I was made aware of this by my co-worker Scott, who also informed me that they were "practically giving away free meals" as a part of their grand opening promotion. Only Scott has a speech impediment, so when he says words that end with "-eal", he mispronounces the suffix as "-ill"; therefore, according to Scott, Jersey Mike's was "practically giving away free mills."

"Oh, so they've got some good deals, do they?" I responded, purposefully luring Scott into a conversational trap.

"Yeah, they've got some great dills" he replied.

So, last night when I got out of work early and was in need of some food, I decided to check out these great dills myself.

"Well hey there, welcome to Jersey Mike's!" said one of the location's employees (whom I later found out was named "Azure"). "Have you ever tried one of Jersey Mike's famous subs before, or is this your first time?" When faced with the level of positivity and enthusiasm that Azure was displaying, my first response is to become very sarcastic and cynical. This was no exception.

"This is my first time at Jersey Mike's, but I am familiar with the general concept of sandwiches," I replied. "I think I'll do just fine."

He laughed, and the sound was unnerving. "Well actually, our sandwiches here at Jersey Mike's are a little different from the competition. We use only the freshest, most crisp ingredients, with fresh-baked bread straight from our own ovens! All of our juicy meat is sliced when you order it, and our tasty side-dishes can't be beat!" Each time Azure used an adjective it sounded like he was having an orgasm. My appetite wained.

This had to be a joke. I looked deep into Azure's eyes, searching for some kind of sarcasm, some sign that he was fucking with me. I mean, this guy was acting like Jennifer Aniston's co-worker at the Applebee's knock-off in Office Space, the guy with a grin that's ten miles wide and who, despite every form of rational logic, absolutely loves his shitty, shitty job.

I looked at him, and found no trace of sarcasm. He was being totally serious.

I glanced up at the menu. Normally, on a menu in an establishment such as this, the sandwiches are listed by number. Numerically. Number One, The Turkey Sandwich. Number Two, The Cold-Cut Combo. Number Three, The Veggie Special. However, Jersey Mike's was proving itself to be anything but normal, and the menu was no exception.

The numbered menu began with the Number Three. Not One, but Three. As if Three was the first number, as if this blatant disregard for the natural order was no big deal. From Three, the menu preceded to 56, and then to 33. Numbers One and Four were the last numbers presented.

"Azure, I've got a serious question," I somehow said with a straight face. "Why are the numbers on your menu all screwy?"

He laughed again and I winced at the sound. "Oh, that! Well, that makes perfect sense. You see, 1956 is the year that Jersey Mike's was founded! We started out with four locations at first, and in six short years, we'd expanded our simple menu to include more than thirty-three sandwiches! Now does that make sense?"

I absently nodded. "No, Azure, that does not make sense at all," I thought to myself. "You did not explain this fucked-up menu at all. You merely said a series of sentences that contained lots of numbers as if this adequately explained everything."

Even more alarming? Every other employee of Jersey Mike's behaved and spoke exactly like Azure. The woman that assembled my Chipotle Cheese Steak? Her praises regarding the Chipotle Mayo made it sound like the sandwich I'd ordered was capable of curing AIDS. The cashier that rang up my purchase? She claimed that Jersey Mike's is now all she eats, morning, noon, and night, and I actually believe her.

More distressing still is that this unquestioning love of Jersey Mike's seemed to be spreading to the customers, too. The guy that stood next to me in line said that he came in for lunch, and ended up liking his sandwich so much, he came back to have another one for dinner. All of them, the customers, the employees, they acted as if these simple sandwiches were the only sources of warmth and light in the universe. Because of Jersey Mike's, it seemed, these people were wrapping their lips around six-inch sandwiches instead of wrapping their lips around the barrels of handguns.

And I was the lone dissenter.

Azure finished wrapping up my sandwich in foil. In addition to the footlong sandwich, I ordered a large drink and a bag of chips.

"That'll be one dollar" Azure said.

"One dollar? This whole meal costs one dollar?"

"Yes indeed," he said, smiling. "Actually, the meal is free as long as you make a one dollar donation to charity." He then pointed to a glass jar with a generic label reading "CHARITY" in block letters. The jar was stuffed full of dollar bills.

"How can you afford to sell all that stuff for a dollar?" I asked.

"It's for a good cause," he said, still smiling. He did not specify what cause it went toward, nor did this explain his blatant disregard for the bottom line.

Suddenly, my brainbone had an epiphany, and everything added up: the ridiculously cheap food, the relentlessly positive employees and customers, the nonsensical menu...it all pointed to one thing: Jersey Mike's is a company run by either A) a very powerful cult, such as Scientologists or Mormons, or B) aliens. The sandwiches, such as the Chipotle Cheese Steak that I'd just purchased, all contained some sort of mood-altering addictive chemical, and possibly some sort of sinister post-digestive suggestion.

My mind reeled at the possibilities. Maybe after eating a six-inch Classic Italian, I'd inexplicably start to see the wisdom behind the teachings of Joseph Smith. Maybe after consuming a giant Club on white, I'd suddenly feel compelled to send a large sum of money to the estate of L. Ron Hubbard. Maybe after finishing the Chipotle Cheese Steak, I'd suddenly begin to plan the assassination of Mexican President Felipe Calderón.

Azure handed me my sandwich. "Have a great day," he said, and suddenly he didn't seem so friendly anymore.

I went home, and stared at the sandwich for fifteen minutes as if it were a loaded gun that I'd found in my dad's closet: with a mixture of fear and respect. It's currently sitting in my refrigerator, still in it's original foil wrapper, completely untouched.

Great dills, yes. But at what cost?

PHOTOZ: "THINGS WE LIKE ABOUT BRIAN"

2008-06-13T17:43:00.000-07:00

Just found this picture today. It looks like it was taken when I was in second grade.

I like to believe that people still like me because I am "super strong and nice" and because I have "wiggly ears!" It's also grim foreshadowing to see what girls liked about me in second grade: the fact that I "talked funny" and that I "colored pretty".

Hell yeah.

CARTER III, BITCHES

2008-06-11T20:03:00.000-07:00

I HAVEN'T PURCHASED A CD IN OVER A YEAR.

Kanye's Graduation? Downloaded it. Radiohead's In Rainbows? Also downloaded (for obvious reasons). 50's Curtis? I didn't even waste my time with that shit. Hell, the last album I actually bought was Jurassic 5's Feedback, purchased around a year ago, and it turned out to be really, really disappointing (at least when compared to Power in Numbers). The cause? Greater access to free media via the internet as well as a dwindling supply of exciting, worthwhile new music.

But Tha Carter III dropped this week! And somehow I do not own it yet! I'm going to go buy it tonight, and I'm so excited, I'm using many consecutive exclamation points which is truly a barometer of my excitement because exclamation points are not something I normally use!!!

Recently, for some unknown reason, I found myself almost doubting Weezy. "Is this album going to suck?" I wondered. "It's been pushed back so many times, so much of the music has already been leaked, Wayne seems to be spreading himself so thin...the album could suck."

But then I heard two new tracks ("A Milli" and "Dr. Carter") and realized that I am an idiot for doubting, as brief as my doubts might have been. These songs are so sick. I'll be posting a song-by-song review of the album sometime this weekend, and I'll also try to embed the songs in the post. STAY TUNED.

The best part? I'm leaving to buy the whole album right now.

P.S. Best album cover ever.

COMPANY-WIDE WALK TO STOMP OUT OBESITY

2008-06-10T23:06:00.000-07:00

Since my job is rather unenjoyable and the pay is meager at best, upper-management has been introducing a series of asinine contests which are designed to prove that work is hip and fun, and totally not a form of indentured servitude! This, however, is a lie: work by it's very nature will never be fun, and said contests have only served to alienate me further.

Case in point: I've won all of the contests without trying whatsoever. By this time, my co-workers are well aware that I don't give a shit about the job: I regularly take 90-minute lunch breaks, I casually insult clients on a daily basis, I've been the cause of two accidents involving the golf carts, and on average I am the perpetrator of one mean-spirited prank a week. These facts do not make me very popular at work, and my recent hotstreak regarding these contests is just salt in my co-workers proverbial wounds.

The prize for the contests? Always a gift card. Usually a gift card to Target. Which is good, because Target sells alcohol.

But the most recent contest, oh God is it hilarious. It's called the "StayFit Challenge" (I swear I'm not making any of this up), and it's designed to promote better health in the workplace. I'm assuming this contest came about because roughly seventy-five percent of my co-workers are obese.

Here's the best part: after you agree to participate in the "StayFit Challenge" (which I quickly did), you're issued a goddamn pedometer in order to record both the number of steps and the general mileage you walk during the workday. After learning about this, I sent an email to everyone I work with encouraging them to participate so "we can all stomp out obesity together". I then quickly scotch-taped my pedometer to the back of a pendulum in a clock in the office, let it swing for an hour and a half, and then took it down and put it back on my hip like nothing ever happened.

So yeah, according to my StayFit pedometer, I walked one hundred and eighty-two miles today.

Hello, Target gift card.

"IN SEARCH OF VENTURE WASHINGTON"

2008-06-04T22:55:00.000-07:00

I first stumbled upon his myth years ago.

At the time, I was nearing the end of a rather brief tenure spent as Visiting Professor at Brymar Regional School for Boys in rural Rhode Island. My time spent at the school was the result of an unfortunate bet I'd wagered against Dr. Jonas Reese (who, at the time, served as Dean of Students at Brymar). Dr. Reese and I agreed to forgo the typical monetary compensation of such bets, and I became indebted to him. As a result of this obligation (and much to my chagrin), I was forced into a yearlong stint as Visiting Professor.

At this point in my literary career, I'd been lackadaisically traveling the lecture circuit, still riding the dwindling crest of an outdated novel I'd released three years prior. Interest in my next project had long-since began to wane. In fact, I'd jet to commit anything of erudite worth to paper.

On of my colleagues, who is also an established author, once confided to me that writer's block simply exists as an excuse for writers to drink alcohol. I'd love to believe that the majority of my time at Brymar was spent under the influence of writer's block, but most of it was merely spent under the influence of cheap spirits, much as my friend had previously surmised. In fact, I would often stumble into my lectures reeking of blackberry brandy and cannabis smoke, usually thirty to forty-five minutes late. The lectures would wander, bordering on incoherency and flim-flam. Yet this rambling drivel was usually mistaken for brilliance and insight by my naive, wide-eyed students.

A majority of my courses covered material I was by no means well versed in. One of the previous professors had left behind a folio of detailed lectures and course-plans; I immediately stole them and passed them off as my own. I was an out-of-work author masquerading as a distinguished professor, already more than halfway through my life with only a series of hack dime-novels and a chronic cough to show for it, trapped in my miserable academic situation as the result of an ill-planned Mexican cockfight.

Needless to say, my time at Brymar passed quite slowly, and I slipped into a deep depression.

Autumn hardened into a sharp Rhode Island winter. The sycamore trees bowed and withered beneath the weight of the crisp snowfall, and subsequently straightened again on the first day of spring thaw. My days were spent wading through the ever-deepening quagmire of oncoming examinations while my nights were viewed through clouds of smoke and the amber glass of whiskey bottles. My depression deepened.

Around this time I gave my one of my previously purloined assignments to my students, challenging them to write a composition investigating a regional tall-tale or legend, taking into account the recollections of several members of the general populace. Many of my thirty-two students researched and reported on the same legend, although no two of my student's recollections or research matched entirely. They all wrote of a mythical woodsman who resided deep inside Rhode Island's darkest forest. Some spoke of his enormous size and physical prowess, while others detailed his rich life and the dozens of children he was believed to have sired in all manner of townships and municipalities up and down the state of Rhode Island. Many spoke of perhaps the strangest aspect of this man: that he possessed a long, flowing beard, not made of hair as most beards tend to be, but instead comprised entirely of hundreds and hundreds of swirling honeybees attached firmly to his chin. These fables all agreed on one name for this monumental man: Henry "Venture" Washington, the legendary bee-bearded woodsman.

From what I could ascertain, he existed in the same sub-group of American mythology populated by the likes of Paul Bunyan, John Henry, and Pecos Bill; tall-tales intended to bewilder and bamboozle a naive populace by explaining away natural phenomenon, and to make them believe that miracles were commonplace and achievable.

And yet, these yarns regarding Venture Washington invigorated me, reigniting the curious academic ember buried deep within the chambers of my heart. I soon discovered a widespread knowledge regarding the subject deeply ingrained within the common people; they all seemed to possess meandering recollections of anecdotes and stories centered around the days and ways of Washington. He seemed to exist as some sort of central nexus for all manner of myth, and I became enamored with it all. Finally, I felt release from the banality of my days at Brymar.

I dove into the historic literature of Ol' Rhode Isle with gusto. Yet, maddeningly, my search proved fruitless. A great void existed within the literature where detailed accounts of Venture Washington should have been.

"Could it be? I exclaimed to myself aloud. "Could I be the first scholar to stumble upon such a rich area of folklore as this?"

My head spun with the dazzling possibility that had seemingly fallen into my lap. I immediately regarded it as a blessing; a golden one-way ticket away from stagnant, backwater Brymar and back into the rush of the academic lecture circuit. I'd be the toast of the literary world, traveling amongst the most selective cliques of disillusioned expatriated American authors. I'd be the center of a movable feast, leaving legions of imitators hungry in my wake.

Without further thought, I seized this opportunity and set off to follow the legend to it's source. I severed my limited ties to Brymar (not without shrill criticism from Dr. Reese, I might add) and set forth upon my course.

Months passed.

I traveled hither and thither within the boundaries of rural Rhode Isle, conducting informational interviews and surveys in every town and village. I lived and breathed his legend, bathed in it, soaked it in, viewing my world thought peculiarly colored lens of American folklore.

Consulting my various topographical maps, I traveled up streams and tributaries feeding into the great Pasequah River, wandering up the sylvan glens of Irving Valley. It was there I stumbled upon what I believed to be Dunham Forest, the fabled "dark forest" of a Rhode Island long ago. It seemed at the time as if I was leaving the tangible boundaries of my contour maps behind and crossing firmly into the annals of legend.

Dunham forest cast and imposing shadow over the northeastern corner of Rhode Island. Violent thunderstorms had been rumored to appear in minutes, catching the casual traveler off guard, sometimes dropping pieces of hail the size of a man's clenched fist. Incredible gales were known to arise suddenly and to mysteriously change direction without rhyme or reason.

It was within this tangled woodland that Venture Washington was said to reside. Old spinsters claimed he lived within an enormous log cabin, large enough to comfortably house hundreds of men. I'd been told that the exact location of the cabin somehow changed depending upon the phase of the moon and the location of the stars in the night sky. Lesser men had been known to seek the fabled cabin of Venture Washington, finding only madness instead.

I wandered through Dunham Forest for innumerable hours. The wind whipped across my solemn frame, threatening to tear the canvas knapsack away from my tired shoulders. Temperatures dipped and rose without warning. At times it seemed as if I could hear the haunted moans of Kansas cyclones wailing far-off beyond the horizon. Stinging nettles and Witchroot scratched deep gouges across my fragile academic wrists and forearms. Yet, I drove on, compelled by some unforeseen impetus to venture further.

It was then that the broad forest canopy seemed to draw back, parting like a velvet curtain. I was sure that I was plagued by fever or madness because before me stood the cabin, his cabin, hewn from broad oaken beams and river mud; a legend come to life. My physique trembled at the sight. Suddenly, the wooden door swung open on rusty iron hinges, revealing a legend in the flesh.

Venture Washington stood before me, returning my gaze with eyes chiseled from ethereal fire.

I swiftly fainted.

Upon awakening several hours later, I found myself within the fabled walls of Washington's cabin. You see, according to legend, Washington held a soft spot within his massive heart for weary travelers such as I. This aspect of Washington's mythology is certainly true; he took me in, taking pity on my tattered clothing and poor state of affairs. Washington gave me a soft bed of goose down to sleep upon and a meal of hot onion soup. As I ate, he spoke to me at large regarding his legend as well as his opinion of it, detailing the various inaccuracies passed down from generation to generation. Not all of the legends were true, he explained.

It is here that I pass my discoveries on to you.

First, I must address Washington's cabin. Many tales have been traded back and forth about it over decanters of brandy and pints of ale regarding its enormous size. As I mentioned previously, spinsters tell stories of this huge structure towering over the Rhode Island landscape, able to house hundreds of men.

However, this aspect of the Washington mythology is certainly false. It is a large log cabin, one can be certain of that, but at most it would only be able to house perhaps three dozen men at a time. However, once within the fabled cabin, I made a most startling discovery: the interior of Washinton's seemingly normal cabin contains no right angles. This (as anyone well-versed in either architecture or mathematics is sure to know) is a structural impossibility, and still continues to bewilder my psyche to this day.

Next, I must address Washington himself. He was a large man, but not mythically large. Cords of muscle stretched taunt beneath his bronze skin; he was certainly a man accustomed to labor and exertion. Each of his individual words struck me like a clap of thunder, and his booming laughter sounded like a great granite boulder rolling down a steep foothill at great velocity.

And yes, Washington did indeed possess a beard made entirely of bees. He confided in me that he'd read tales of the pirate Blackbeard; more specifically, his penchant of weaving lit fuses into his massive beard prior to battles. His burning, tangled beard struck fear into the hearts of others, who mistook him for a demon as a result of the flames and lingering smell of sulfur.

And so, much in the manner of Blackbeard, Venture Washington set forth to fashion a fearsome beard to terrify his many foes. But his beard was not a result of magiks or something of the sort; he merely used the principles of operant and classical conditioning to teach a hive of bees in a similar manner to which a mutt is taught to perform tricks. Before long, he'd trained an entire hive of bees to swarm into a cohesive mass, and hang from the tip of his chin; a cruel mockery of facial hair. At any time he wished, Washington could dispatch his beard of bees upon anyone he wished. Truly this was a menacing weapon, and I must admit that thinking of it at such great length has set my heart aflutter. However, aside from this single macabre aspect of his character, Washington was a kind and gentle man.

Many Rhode Islanders swap stories regarding the dozens of children he was believed to have sired; I am happy to report that this fable is wholeheartedly true. At the time of our meeting, Venture Washington had fathered twenty-four and a half children. All of them were boys, and all came from different mothers, as all of the twenty-five mothers had died in childbirth, tragically widowing Washington twenty-five times over. The reason for this, unknown; perhaps carrying the child of a man such as Washington is too much for any mortal woman to take.

I met many of the Washington boys during my brief stay at the cabin. All of them were named Roger, every single last one of them, and yet miraculously this caused no confusion. When Venture addressed one of the Rogers by name, only the desired Roger responded. It was quite the unbelievable sight to behold.

And yet I have skipped over perhaps the most enigmatic question regarding the Washington boys: how is it possible for Washington to have fathered twenty-four and a half children? What manner of boy is this "half-child"? Is he merely in utero, developing comfortably in his mother's womb?

I'm happy to report that this half-child, affectionately dubbed "Roger Jr.", exists far more in the realm of mythology than reality. The boy is quite literally half a child; the lower half, to be more specific. He's simply a pair of legs, capable of motion and rational thought, able to walk, dance, and roller-skate, communicating through a series of stomps and taps in Morse code. The mere existence of this half-child, this "Roger Jr." seems to spit in the face of every modern scientific notion. However, one cannot argue with the reality one is presented with, and I stopped doubting the existence of Roger Jr. shortly after he served me another bowl of onion soup like a walking, sentient table, spilling not a drop on the ground.

My afternoon with Venture Washington passed rather pleasantly. He and I spoke of the previous topics, as well of dozens of matters that are simply too voluminous to hope to contain in writing. But as the golden sun began to take its leave beneath the westernmost horizon, I knew it was time to bid Washington farewell. I kindly thanked him for the many bowls of soup, and began to ready myself for the long road back to Brymar and my awaiting intellectual fame.

Yet before I left, Washington stopped me and spoke one final time. "Speak to no one of what you have seen here today," he loudly exclaimed. "I only wish to live in peace, raising my boys while teaching them the way of the woods. You must never reveal what you have witnessed; if you do, your world will come crashing down before your very eyes. This is the eternal promise of Venture Washington."

I was crestfallen. The walk back to Brymar was a solemn affair. I wouldn't be able to publish my firsthand account. I wouldn't be able to repay my looming cockfight debts. I would be forced to continue teaching at Brymar. My life was ruined. As I left the fringes of Dunham forest, it seemed as if the very magic and color faded.

And yet, did I have any other recourse? No. For Venture Washington exists more as a force of nature than an ordinary man. It seems paradoxical that America's largest legend resides in its littlest state, ensconced in the triteness and triviality of everyday life. Perhaps this is what gives the legend such vivid strength; when compared to all of us, to the naive, wide-eyed American multitudes, it really isn't that difficult to be extraordinary.

It has been years since I encountered Venture Washington face-to-face, yet I cannot seem to rid it from memory. I cannot help but wonder what my life would have been like had I managed to expose Venture Washington to the world.

My time on this earth is drawing to a close, much as the amber sun sank beneath the westernmost horizon on that faithful day. As of late I have begun to feel the rekindled burn of that persistent academic ember buried deep inside, and I cannot ignore it any longer.

I've written out this entire account of my meeting with Washington, and in mere minutes I shall seal it inside my trunk. If you discover this manuscript after my eventual demise, it is my wish that any profit or academic recognition be awarded to Dr. Jonas Reese, in repayment of my debt that went unpaid all those years ago.

However, if Dr. Reese perishes as a result of a beard-sized cloud of bees, or if he drowns in a shallow bowl of hot onion soup, only you and I shall know the truth of the matter.

GARY BUSEY: GENIUS OR MADMAN? PT. 2

2008-05-29T23:49:00.000-07:00

Life is all about capitalizing on your opportunities.

You only get to do it once, so you've got to make the most of it, right? For example, if you're lucky, sometime during your life you'll be able to bust an international arms deal wide open. However, getting the drop on coke-heads and weapons dealers is a rare occasion to be savored, and doesn't happen often; you've got to make the most out of it.

And here's how:

TREJO: "Who the fuck is this?"
BUSEY: "Your worst nightmare, butthorn!"
OLD WHITE GUY: "McBain!"
BUSEY: "Yeah!"

Trying to be a comedian is futile, because I'll never be as funny as this.

THE NEW SLANG: "HOT GARBAGE"

2008-05-29T23:07:00.000-07:00

"Hot Garbage" is a term that, I believe, was coined by my friend Chuck.

During the still, dead heat of an Arizona summer, hot garbage is all around: it surrounds the loading dock on the east side of the Memorial Union, it haunts the narrow passageways behind ghetto Safeways and lingers at the back entrance of every restaurant, and it creeps up on you when you take out bloated bags of trash in the middle of an August day.

Every parking lot in Phoenix has the same goddamn dumpster, the same blue eyesore surrounded by glittering diamonds of broken safety glass. During the summer, these metal dumpsters heat up underneath the brutal afternoon sun, and they become gigantic convection ovens, literally baking the piles of garbage inside. As you walk by, you can smell the mingling odors cooking : the sickly-sweet rot hanging in the atmosphere, palpably, like wet gossamer strands of silk borne up on rising currents of air.

This is hot garbage, and it has become totally synonymous with my life in Phoenix: the idea, the vary concept of it (both hot garbage and life in phoenix) seems miserable, and something to avoid...but when I'm gone, I'll probably miss it.

THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN

2008-05-29T01:33:00.000-07:00

Tonight I searched for "Lil' Wayne", and found the video below.

What the fuck is this? I wondered aloud while watching. It's not a music video, nor is it a freestyle, nor is it an interview; rather, it's just a casual video Wayne filmed for his fans, updating them on various current events within his life and music career. It is, just like Wayne himself, fascinating. I've dissected it point-by-point below.

0:09- The video begins casually. "Hello world," Wayne states, assuming (of course) that the entire world is watching. He begins by wiping his mouth; as we can see from the open pizza box in front of him, he is "enjoying some fresh Dominoes". Fucking awesome.

0:16- Members of Wayne's entourage include: "Lil' Mac Man" (originally I misheard his name as "Lil' Pac Man", but that proved too good to be true), "Lil' T", and "Streetz". Why does Wayne insist upon surrounding himself with people who's names begin with "Lil'"? My guess? Napoleon complex.

0:43- Why is this being recorded? Even Wayne himself doesn't seem to know. "We just checked in to...umm...let y'all know what we doin'". He then informs us that his new album, Tha Carter 3, has been leaked online. Instead of being upset, however, he seems downright apologetic; as if the leak is his fault, as if he should have been guarding his music more fiercely. Wayne's bemused shrug regarding the leak seems to say, "well fuck, I guess this is my fault for making music that's so damn good."

0:54- Wayne responds to the leak by deciding to release a new mixtape called "Tha Leak", proving that he's just looking for excuses to release mixtapes. Other excuses to make mixtapes that could also serve as mixtape titles include: "My Flight Got Canceled", "It's a Tuesday Night", and "Sorry These Library Books Are Late".

1:16- "Beeyotch!"

1:22- A liter of Wayne's Hawaiian Codeine Punch makes a cameo appearance, delivered personally by an as-yet-unseen member of Wayne's entourage named "Scott". Why does Scott have to deliver drug-spiked beverages, and why does he not get a rap moniker like Lil' T and Lil' Mac Man? The world may never know.

2:00- Wayne announces his plans for yet another side project: an honest-to-god band called "Badass Grasshopper". Seriously. "Badass Grasshopper" proves that 1) Wayne should stop making career plans while high out of his fucking mind, and 2) Wayne offically went crazy like, two years ago. That being said, I would still buy the album.

2:34- Wayne spontaneously decides to make a Badass Grasshopper mixtape called "Rap, Rock, R&B", so he can "try to prepare (us)". Also, I just realized that while Wayne is talking about himself and filming himself, he's also listening to his own music, which is playing in the background.

3:08- "And umm...I'm single, ladies. Ya dig?" And suddenly, the video turns into a personal testimonial from match.com. Apparently if you're a single lady trying to get with Lil' Wayne, you must first be approved by his eight-year-old daughter. I can only try to imagine what her life is like.

3:47- "We just got the liquor deal". In addition to making music, music videos, and mixtapes, Wayne will soon start to produce his own brand of champagne. He goes on to petition his fans for possible names for his champagne, because as we've seen, Wayne isn't too good at naming things (see "Badass Grasshopper"). My proposed champagne name? "Lil' Wayne's Crazy Juice".

4:37- While smoking a blunt, Wayne reiterates that yes, in case you didn't hear him before, he is single. Or, as he puts it, "single, ready to mingle, and I got Pringles".

5:29- "Rest in peace, Bruce Lee...and Brandon Lee, man."

The video ends with random shoutouts; Lil' Wayne takes another hit off the blunt, pours himself some more Hawaiian Codeine Punch, and signs off. I'm left baffled; partly wondering if Lil' Wayne actually exists, partly wondering why I watched this video over and over and over.

Ya dig?

SKETCHBOOK HELL: "THE GATE"

2008-05-26T22:42:00.000-07:00

SKETCHBOOK HELL: "RANDOM DUDE"

2008-05-23T00:25:00.000-07:00

THE BEST RAPPER ALIVE

2008-05-19T23:42:00.000-07:00

IF YOU HAVEN'T LISTENED TO LIL' WAYNE, you haven't listened to hip-hop.

I know that seems like a bold statement, but then again, Wayne is a bold statement. Dreads tied back, eyes constantly bloodshot, his voice creaking and rasping like a rusty hinge, he seems more like a hyperactive cartoon than a living, breathing person. My brother refers to him as "the rapper that looks like the alien from Predator". This is surprisingly apt; Wayne seems more comfortable comparing himself to mythical creatures than to other rappers, referring to himself as "a martian", "a creature, monster like the Loch Ness". It's almost easier to believe that he is an alien; the last survivor of a far-away planet where everyday communication is achieved through stream-of-consciousness freestyles, and the atmosphere is comprised of blunt-smoke instead of normal, breathable air.

Lil' Wayne has the words "FEAR GOD" tattooed on his eyelids. Can you even imagine the excruciating pain such an act would entail? No, neither can I. And neither can any other MC on the planet. But as we've already established, Wayne comes from a planet all his own, and to him such an act is almost humdrum.

Hubris is a necessity in the rap game. Jay-Z established himself as "God MC" on "Takeover", and Kayne has parlayed an entire career out of talking shit, comparing himself to Jesus Christ, even going so far as to hire a personal assistant to push his oversized ego around in a wheelbarrow. Currently, these boasts go unfounded: Jay-Z is now 38, and has long since traded his wife-beaters and chains for Armani suits and diamond-studded cuff links. Kanye's empire is designed to make you forget that he's principally a producer, and not a rapper; meanwhile, he's busy making millions of dollars off of ringtones and novelty sunglasses and sped-up soul samples, laughing all the way to his solid-gold castle on the surface of the moon. With hubris like this, it's almost hard to take Lil' Wayne seriously when he refers to himself as "the best rapper alive".

But Weezy isn't fucking around. He's not a CEO, nor is he a fashion designer. He's a fucking rapper. Wayne is the street: he smokes blunt after blunt on a nightly basis, he's addicted to codeine mixed with Hawaiian Punch, he's accidentally shot himself in the chest and been shot by a jealous groupie, and he's currently facing weapons and narcotics charges in Yuma, Arizona.

For a pothead, his work ethic is staggering. Since 2003, he's released two studio albums, eleven mixtapes (!), and provided guest verses for over 130 different songs (!!!). In the time it's taken you to read this, Wayne has recorded five different songs, scrapped them, re-recorded them, and remixed them all himself.

His studio albums are great, don't get me wrong, but if you want to experience Wayne in all of his glory, go for the mixtapes. Wayne offers them for free online, which allows him to sample tracks that would otherwise be out of his reach. On the mixtapes, anything goes: he frequently steals other rapper's beats and utilizes them better himself. Freestyles abound, and you can practically hear him smiling as he drops punchline after punchline, creating fragile house-of-card rhyme schemes. Sometimes he raps with a Jamaican accent for no reason whatsoever.

Look for Dedication 2 or Da Drought 2. Listen to him rhyme over a Beatles sample on "Help". Check out the bizarre codeine-cowritten drug anthem "I Feel Like Dying". Perhaps most impressive is "Georgia...Bush", a scathing, conspiracy-filled indictment of Bush's involvement with Katrina.

But first, listen to this. It's called "Sportscenter" off Dedication 2, and it nicely summarizes everything I love about Lil' Wayne. The topic is sports, and for the first minute or so, Wayne soliloquies about the shows he watches on ESPN and how much he loves hockey. But then the beat kicks in, and Lil' Wayne is spitting 900 miles an hour. "I'm from New Orleans, nowhere near peace/Pure beast, fear-free, dear grief/ Catch up, bitch, I'm in gear three/zoom, gone, see ya, peace, drop one finger." Indeed. Oh, and the beat he's rapping over? It's the sound of a bouncing tennis ball.

So, let's raise our glasses in honor of Lil' Wayne, and his new album Tha Carter III.

To the best rapper alive.

SKETCHBOOK HELL: "BABY VINCENT"

2008-05-19T23:28:00.000-07:00

SKETCHBOOK HELL: "NOSFERATU"

2008-05-18T22:09:00.000-07:00

SOMEONE STOLE THE CONCEPT FOR THIS SNOOP DOGG VIDEO DIRECTLY FROM MY DREAMS (AND I DEMAND COMPENSATION)

2008-05-17T00:54:00.000-07:00

HOLY SHIT.

"Okay Snoop, here's what we're going to do for your new video: we're going to dress you up in a series of costumes purchased from Savers and have you play keytar while a few barely-interested women writhe in front of you, and we're going to film it all with a camcorder I found in my step-dad's basement. Also, how do you feel about riding a UFO?"

Yeah, you should really watch this.

"MY PRETENTIOUS ADOLESCENT POETRY"

2008-05-17T00:47:00.000-07:00

Who sees the breeze among the trees,
amid the emerald frond, the fragrant bloom?
Who views the thrive of the honey-bee hive
as it swings and shudders beneath the moon?

Who hears the breeze among the trees,
the Autumn hues, dark October sky,
like a wind through folded paper wings,
an ancient mummy’s sigh.

GIRLS I'VE KNOWN, PART 1: "ELOI AND MORLOCK"

2008-05-13T23:35:00.000-07:00

Like most of the physical and psychological traumas of my youth, it started in gym class. I was forced to “wrestle” with a post-pubescent ogre named Chad (I use the term “wrestle” loosely, because it implies some sort of back-and-forth competition. In the case of Chad vs. myself, however, there was little contest; imagine a giant hairless gorilla tossing around an anorexic scarecrow for amusement).

Chad had permanently sweaty hair and hands the size of baseball gloves. A jutting Cro-Magnon brow hung like a shelf above his lusterless, grey eyes, and his body was made up of cords of sinewy muscle. Despite these simian characteristics I remember thinking of Chad as a fish, lurking deep in the muddy waters of middle school, occasionally rising to the surface to swallow bugs like me in a single gulp.

After “wrestling” for a few minutes, Chad grew tired of the little opposition I provided him. He wrapped his catcher’s mitt of a hand around my right foot and abruptly squeezed. Metatarsals and phalanges snapped like brittle twigs. Dizzying explosions of light danced on the backs of my eyelids, and I yelped like a mangy, miserable dog.

I crawled across the fold-out mats on my hands and knees until I was staring at the Coach’s florescent yellow running shoes.
“May I please be excused to go to the nurse?” I asked.
“Why?” he replied, his voice drifting down from above.
“Because I’m pretty sure Chad just broke my foot.”
“No. Stay here ‘til the end of the period. Then you can go get some ice or something.”

As it turned out, my foot required a lot more than just ice. Chad broke three bones and managed to bruise three more. By the time I ended up in the nurse’s office, my foot had puffed up and darkened in color, and by the end of the day, it had been sealed away in a plaster tomb of a cast, thus ending my brief foray into the world of wrestling forever.

Chad approached me a few days later as I was hobbling across campus.
“Um, I’m sorry I broke your foot” he said, smiling the entire time.
I didn’t say a single thing. Instead, I limped away, trying to look as stoic as possible.

Perhaps I should have thanked him: since my foot had been crushed like a walnut, I was allowed to skip the remaining semester of P.E. This delighted me, until I found out what I’d be forced to do instead: I would be required to aide Mrs. Bonnell, the art teacher, and Mrs. Von Peterson, the typing teacher, for the rest of the year.

My spirits sank.

Working with Mrs. Bonnell was easy. She was the art teacher and I was one of the art kids; I’d worked with her at the Ritz-Carlton, teaching martini-drinking yuppies how to use a linoleum block printer to waste paper and paint. She kept all of my pictures and paintings locked in her office (she eventually stole them for her private collection, however). She and I were unorganized, socially-awkward, and easily distracted. We got along fine.

Getting on with Mrs. Von Peterson was a different story. I’d been forced to attempt her typing class the previous semester and nearly failed; my fingers refused to dance across the QWERTY row like I envisioned, producing failure that moved at the snail’s pace of twenty words a minute. I remember her pale, flabby body looked like it had been shaped out of dough by a nearsighted baker. She would periodically bend over in order to observe my horrible typing, and whenever she did, her pendulous breasts would swing back and forth like misshapen sacks of laundry hanging in the wind. Von Peterson was the antithesis of beauty.

Soon, my indentured servitude to Bonnell and Von Peterson began. Every day I would arrive a half hour early in order to unlock the doors and prepare for the day: filling palettes with dollops of paint, warming up rows and rows of computers, cutting lumps of clay with a sharp strand of copper wire, and making pot after pot of Folgers Coffee, all while limping on my broken foot. In my scant moments of free time I would secretively read in the back room (I believe I read most of Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe and Earth Abides by George R. Stewart, both of which fittingly deal with isolation and loneliness).

This continued, and eventually became routine. The menial busywork lessened, and I was left with more and more time spent in the back room in the company of fictional characters who were just as lonely as I was. Of course that’s when I noticed her.

From my vantage point all I could see was her hair flowing down the nape of her neck like twisting curls of ephemeral black smoke. She sat with perfect posture while her fingers pecked the keys with dizzying speed and accuracy. Her smile seemed capable of powering and entire city’s worth of streetlights. At that point in my life I hadn’t read any of the romantic poets, but seeing her for the first time was a crash course in Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Keats all in the span of fifteen seconds.

Her name was Corrine. Say it soft, I thought, and it sounds just like praying; say it loud and there’s goddamn music playing.

These were dangerous thoughts in middle school. If I were to admit to others that Corrine spontaneously made West Side Story lyrics materialize in my head, I would’ve gotten my ass handed to me on a daily basis. But here’s the wonderful truth: every homophobe, every conservative gun-toting republican, every swaggering machismo asshole, all the apelike Chads of the world…they’ve all had their Corrine and they’ve all waxed poetic about her, only to quickly recover, and smooth over this chink in their armor with an imperturbable, rough veneer of cold domestic beer and indifference.

But I digress.

I developed a crush on Corrine; a hopeless, pointless crush ultimately destined to go nowhere. I sat in the narrow back room, alternating between looking at her through the narrow spaces between the blinds, looking down at my broken leg, and sighing. In my experience, there’s a direct correlation between newly discovered interest in the opposite sex and amount of time spent sighing: as one rises, the other is sure to follow.

Eventually, I mustered up enough courage to ask Corrine out on a date. She accepted. We spent a magical evening together on a checkered picnic blanket, gazing up at the night as unnamed constellations spun above us. She looked at me and smiled, and millions of light-years away, a fiery supernova exploded. We kissed, a testament of teenage love, and in that moment, nothing else mattered.

But of course, none of the previous paragraph actually happened. That’s just a bunch of saccharine Danielle Steele bullshit I made up; a faux-happy ending of sorts. In reality, nothing happened at all. I convinced myself I didn’t stand a chance with a girl like Corrine, so I didn’t even try. If your station in life is to be a Morlock, I thought, how can you ask one of the Eloi out on a date?

Since then, a few things have changed. I’ve re-read Robinson Crusoe and Earth Abides a few times, and they don’t seem as desperately lonely as they did at the time. I no longer ascribe to the whole Eloi/Morlock mentality; beautiful women are not inherently unapproachable or above my standing. Most of the time.

My right foot still is bent in an odd way from the break, though. I suppose it always will be.

PLEASE, SPY ON ME WITH THE INTERNETS

2008-05-08T00:31:00.000-07:00

So yeah, I'm on this thing called Twitter now. See, here I am. Hello.

So far I'm "following" Robby Walker, our good friend Mat, Lil' Wayne, and Barack Obama. I'm pretty sure Barack's twitter account is managed by one of his lackeys, but I like to think that Lil' Wayne actually updates himself: "Yo this weezy Im out here in Vegas Just waking up I had a long night Ya Diiig!!!" Direct quote.

Also, I really like that Twitter uses the term "follow", acknowledging how stalkerish and voyeuristic the Internet is becoming. It's kind of disgusting.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to check out my facebook news feed, read some of my ex-girlfriend's blog, check my RSS news aggregator, and strip for Russian businessmen with my webcam and raw sex appeal. brb.

"127"

2008-05-06T23:50:00.000-07:00

Do you see him?

He’s in the parking lot now, creeping slowly. Watch how his eyes dart nervously from window to window, peering around corners. Watching for movement of any kind. Surely you would have missed him if I were not here to point him out to you; it's a dark night, and the only light comes from a streetlight across the way and the thin sliver of the moon that watches, like a squinted eye, from the sky above. Regardless, he would have been difficult to spot, for he is a man who certainly wishes not to be seen.

Watch how he hugs the base of the walls as he walks; it’s almost as if he were more of a shade or shadow than a man such as you or me. His feet are careful. Well placed. He cautiously rolls them, toe to heel, making the least amount of noise possible. It’s as if he emulates the feral cats that lurk our city’s streets: his shoulders hunched, careful to distribute weight evenly on the broad soles of his feet, each step meticulously avoiding shards of broken glass and gravel that crunch loudly underfoot.

Surely you must see him by now! Even I, with my poor eyesight, can see him.

By this point, he’s crossed the full length of the parking lot, and is slinking alongside the main pathway that leads to the center of the apartments, carefully treading on patches of green grass that yield silently underfoot.

Suddenly he stops.

His hands slide over the cool stucco walls that encircle the patio of an apartment across the way. Once his hands find a solid grip, the man pulls himself up gracefully, hoisting himself up onto the six-foot wall. He pauses for a brief moment, crouched atop the wall like a gargoyle, and at seems as if he were merely a fluid extension of the wall itself.

It seems as if he’s done this before, does it not?

And what of the innocent apartment beneath this shadowy man? The crooked brass letters fixed firmly to the door read 127, an apartment that is, without a doubt, virtually identical to the apartment in which we now reside: a similar moderately furnished bedroom; the same grimy, poorly lit bathroom complete with leaking faucets and patches of mildew that creep slowly up the walls like reaching hands; the same patio, surrounded by the same stucco wall (which, instead of serving as a means of privacy and protection for the resident of Apartment 127 as it was intended, now serves as a perch for our dark intruder).

You want to cry out, don’t you? You want to yell to this sinister character that you’ve spotted him; to scream that you’re going to call the police, no, that you’ve already called the police and that they’re going to be here any second.

No. Let us watch for a moment instead. Calling the police would serve little purpose; this is a dangerous city. Broken shards of glass call out in the streets like diamonds. Streets you don't use after the streetlamps come on, paved with dirty syringes and fragments of bone and used condoms and dried spatters of blood. Everyone's learned to sleep through gunshots that pop in the dark spaces of the night. Everyone knows someone that died here. Even the police stay away. The screams here go unheard, or ignored.

And with a slight push forward, Jeremy dropped silently onto the patio of Apartment 127.

His eyes studied the arcadia door in front of him. He peered through the dirty glass into the dark apartment, searching for any signs of movement. As he waited, he removed a cigarette from his jacket pocket, careful to light it purposefully and quietly and to hide the burning tip with the palm of his hand. The cigarette itself was a brand he was unfamiliar with: a Benson & Hedges he’d stolen from Ms. Vivian Relf (the resident of Apartment 322) three weeks prior.

Minutes passed.

Satisfied that no one was home, Jeremy advanced closer to the door. From one of his pockets he pulled a thin strip of metal, which he then proceeded to slide between the door and the doorframe just beneath the latch. His rough hands pressed upward slowly, applying more and more pressure, until he heard the quiet crack of the latch springing free of its hinge.

He slid the arcadia door open and stepped inside.

Jeremy did not consider it “breaking and entering”; to him, the phrase seemed dirty and crude.

Rather, he preferred to think of it as “house-sitting” or “visiting without an invitation”. Very rarely did he steal anything from the houses and apartments he visited…except for alcohol, cigarettes, and pornography; but these were all dangerous vices, and in Jeremy’s mind, he was doing their owners a favor by removing them.

During his visits Jeremy overturned furniture and emptied cabinets, spilling their contents onto the floor. He urinated on bedroom carpets. Once he even spray-painted someone's pet iguana.

Upon returning home, the resident would realize that their innocent home had been broken into by a common criminal, at which point the tenant usually took great care to replace locks, install bars on the windows, and generally transform their previously innocent home into an impenetrable fortress. In this way, Jeremy considered his visits a great service to the apartment’s proper residents; none of their valuables (save for alcohol, cigarettes, and pornography) had been stolen, and for the simple cost of a few new locks on the doors, a great change had been made: their home was now safe from real criminals.

Or at least this is what Jeremy told himself.

According to the stack of mail sitting next to the front door, Apartment 127 belonged to J. Thomas Weatherman, but Jeremy had never, in fact, actually seen the man entering of leaving his apartment. He’d been attracted to 127 by the simple handwritten sign on the door that read

No solicitors

Day sleeper…please do not ring bell!

A day sleeper suggested some sort of night job, which provided the perfect opportunity for Jeremy’s nighttime intrusion.

For days he'd watched 127. He observed a silver Honda Civic parked in 127’s designated space during the day, and subsequently observed the absence of that same Honda Civic at night.

And yet, he never actually saw this J. Thomas Weatherman himself. And so, Jeremy set forth, wandering throughout Weatherman’s apartment, hoping to assemble some sort of picture of the man based upon his belongings.

The first thing he noticed was the smell. Upon examining the kitchen, he found three swollen garbage bags (one of which was leaking some sort of putrid liquid onto the linoleum tile beneath). The kitchen itself was otherwise tidy, yet devoid of food, save for takeout boxes and a row of frozen pizzas lined up in the freezer.

The kitchen of a bachelor, Jeremy thought to himself.

He also noted the absence of both bottles of alcohol and packs of cigarettes, which disappointed him greatly. He continued his search.

With no small level of contempt, Jeremy noted that not only did J. Thomas Weatherman possess two copies of the bible, but also an absurdly large wooden crucifix which hung on the wall above his dining room table. He cursed under his breath, bemoaning the dumb, stupid fucking luck that had led him to break into the home of a Christian bachelor.

Jeremy removed the crucifix from the wall and dropped it into a garbage can.

And just when Jeremy was loosing interest in 127, in its stacks of yellowed paperback mystery novels and its cheap Ikea coffee table, its unlabeled videocassettes and makeshift plywood bookshelves, just when Jeremy was about to abandon the apartment of J. Thomas Weatherman, the Civic-driving God-loving bachelor, entirely, he noticed the bedroom door.

And he was curious.

As Jeremy stepped into Weatherman’s bedroom, the smell that he’d previously attributed to the kitchen garbage seemed to intensify. The air grew thick and hot. He tried flicking the light switch near the door, but the room remained shrouded in darkness, but his eyes slowly began to adjust to the gloom.

The room was sparse and somewhat disappointing. Through the darkness he was able to make out the broad outline of a bed, and then a lamp, and then the contrast of another crucifix against the stark white wall of the bedroom.

Jeremy sighed. It was like spying on a goddamn monk.

But as his eyes became more and more adjusted, Jeremy noticed something else.

Instead of the usual cheap sliding doors that Jeremy had come to expect from this sort of apartment (the type of doors that usually lead to walk-in closets) there was some very large and very dark set into the wall. Using the small flame of his Zippo lighter, Jeremy looked closer.

It was a huge door, stretching from the floor to the ceiling, and it was very much out of place. Something custom made. It was made from a dark, sturdy looking wood, with broad metal hinges stretching from side to side. The left side of the door was lined with a series of sliding deadbolts that held the door firmly in place.

The smell was even stronger now. Enough to make Jeremy cover his mouth.

And yet, he was curious.

He slid the locks back, one by one.

It seems that our shadowy trespasser had disappeared, does it not?

It’s been twenty or so minutes since he disappeared over the wall, and although I have not been watching as intently as you have been, I dare say that I have not heard or seen any manner of movement from 127 for quite some time. In this ungodly hour of the night, nothing seems to be moving at all: not a car has entered nor exited the apartment; even the road is quiet and desolate.

Except for the gray sedan that's pulling into the parking lot now.

Jeremy slid the door open, and a wave of sickly heat swam over him. The smell intensified and became a swarming cloud of gnats, swimming thickly around his head while trying to penetrate entry into his mouth, nose, and eyes.

This was not right. Every part of his body screamed for him to run: his insides churning, knotting up in his chest; his heart pounding like the taut beat of a snare drum; the thin film of grimy sweat coursing from every pore of his body.

And yet…he was still curious.

Hesitantly, he let the flickering light of the Zippo shine upon what was inside.

It was a woman. Or rather, what used to be a woman. Laid back and twisted, her body contorted on some sort of chair, ankles and wrists bound with wraps of silver wire. The walls were painted with peeling, blistering layers of her black blood; her belly, cut from top to bottom like an eviscerated fish, her insides unraveled and churning with maggots in a neat pile on the floor, hunks of bloated meat and bruised snakes of sausage; her cloudy eyes, open, staring at him; her mouth frozen and contorted into some kind of horrible silent scream and her tongue, Jesus Christ, her black, swollen tongue hung from the corner of her open jaw.

Jeremy reeled, staggering. Trembling. Trying to speak. Unfocused, a low moan rising from the back of his throat. The tracks of tears running from the corners of his eyes. He vomited.

J. Thomas Weatherman, the solitary bachelor.

The faithful, practicing Christian.

The butcher of women.

Suddenly Jeremy’s ears perked, whipping his head quickly around towards the source of the noise as his feet staggered, unsteady beneath him.

It was the sound of the front door being unlocked.

Jeremy lurched quickly around the room, panicking, his hand pressed tightly over his lips to stifle the screams that died to escape his lips. He dove beneath Weatherman’s bed, pushing his small body as far into the corner as it would go.

He could hear footsteps clicking on the linoleum kitchen floor.

Jeremy felt his own hot urine stream down his thighs, soaking the carpet.

From beneath the bed his trembling eyes watched the bedroom brighten as Weatherman opened the bedroom door.

And just as Weatherman noticed the broad wooden door that Jeremy had carelessly left open, and as Weatherman detected the warm puddle of vomit left soaking into the carpet before him, Jeremy closed his eyes and began to pray.

You heard it, did you not? The muffled scream that echoed from inside 127?

Yes. I heard it too. I've heard similar screams before.

I told you. This is a bad city, and this neighborhood is even worse: a place where calling the police is a waste of time, because none of them will come here after the streetlamps come on. It's a neighborhood where screams go unheard. Or ignored.

"THE SOUND OF ACTION"

2008-05-02T23:24:00.001-07:00

(found here. Brandon Bird is the best artist alive.)

PASTOR PAUL'S GAPING THROAT HOLE OF DESPAIR

2008-04-29T21:59:00.000-07:00

TODAY AT WORK, I had the pleasure of meeting a horrible elderly man named Paul. Paul serves the Lord as a pastor for Saguaro Ministries ("His own little oasis in the desert", as he put it). Over a matter of less than one-hundred dollars (as well as a senior discount), Pastor Paul treated me like some sort of subhuman beast of burden, thus confirming my theory that religious people are more likely than sinners, fornicators, and heathens to treat total strangers like shit.

Oh yeah, and due to years of smoking, Pastor Paul had a dime-sized hole in his throat.

And he had to stick the last digit of his pinkie finger INTO THE DIME-SIZED HOLE IN HIS FUCKING THROAT in order to verbally abuse me.

I have two things to say about this:

1. First of all, this makes me believe that there really is a God, and he's got a really vindictive, dark sense of humor towards those who misrepresent him. Awesome.

2. Second, hold the fucking phone, everybody out of the pool.
I don't want to smoke cigarettes anymore.

I realize that I've said that kind of thing before. I realize that I've tried to quit twice and failed. But goddamn, the first cigarette that I fired up after Pastor Paul left tasted just awful. Instead of tasting pleasing and smooth and like a cigarette, it tasted like ashy campfire smoke and rat poison and dime-sized throat holes.

I threw the remainder of my pack into a stormdrain and walked away.

Unlike the other attempts, I am committed this time. It's something that I want to do for the right reasons...the other attempts have failed because I've been quitting for other people, instead of myself.

The plan is this: I'm going to go the entire month of May without smoking a single cigarette. No fuck-ups, no social smoking, no caving; whenever I get an urge to buy a new pack, I'm going to think about Pastor Paul inhaling blueish smoke through his throat hole. If I make it through May (which I will, because I'm awesome) then I'm going to buy myself something extravagant with the money I've saved: perhaps a Wii, perhaps a jetpack, perhaps a new dress for Steve.

Wish me luck, lolz. And if you see me smoking, please punch me in the throat.

"THE NEW SLANG: CLIMBING MT. DANTONI"

2008-04-22T22:54:00.000-07:00

ORIGIN: "To future employers, independent voters considering me for reelection, and my mom: Mt. Dantoni was a long time ago and I've learned from my mistakes. I got help and I now give classes on how to say "no" in high pressure social situations to both inner city and rural students." -Our good friend Mat

MEANING: "Climbing Mt. Dantoni"-Something that, when written about publicly online, could seriously jeopardize one's job, financial stability, political career, personal relationships, and/or general safety from Big Brother.

EX: "When my boss read that thing I wrote about the night I climbed Mt. Dantoni, he immediately fired me, and now I'm totally fucked."

INTERESTING NOTE: Originally, "Mt. Dantoni" referred to something specific, tangible, and real (I think only Mat remembers what this is); "climbing Mt. Dantoni" instead can refer to any number of things, and therfore renders you untraceable.

"MANILA"

2008-04-21T23:41:00.000-07:00

THE OTHER DAY I met a 24 year-old woman named Manila. She was quick to tell me, however, that she was named after the city in the Philippines, not after the envelope, despite the fact that her dark skin possessed the same beige color as the latter.

"My mother, she come from Luzon" she said. "My father, Visayas. They both meet in Manila, so I am Manila." She smiled. Pleased with her mastery of the words, pleased with her wit.

These events unfolded inside of a Jack-in-the-Box yesterday afternoon.
I was ordering at the counter. Manila was the shift manager taking my order.

As Manila continued to talk about what how wonderful the Philippines are (and how much she misses her namesake), I nodded and smiled. Thoughts drifted. I just wanted to get some tacos.

Then I noticed her hands.

It wasn't like they were gross or deformed, not really, but this girl Manila had the longest fingers I've ever seen. As she talked about Manila (the city), he hands flailed and gesticulated: cutting slashes across the air to demonstrate a rough estimation of height, pointing left and right, counting things off on her fingers. The bones in her hands were long and delicate, graceful like the bones a bird. But when she moved her hands quickly, it looked like two flesh-colored spiders danced from the ends of her wrists.

These hands could coax lovely sounds out of a piano, I suddenly realized. She could perform delicate open-heart surgeries. Repair the fragile inner-workings of an antique Swiss pocketwatch. It even seemed possible that with hands like those, she could probably play the piano and fix a heart at the same time.

"Two tacos," I said.

"ZOMBIE MONTH SO FAR"

2008-04-18T23:19:00.000-07:00

A FEW WEEKS AGO, in this very blog, I spoke of my plans to make April into Zombie month, during which I pledged to watch "as many zombie movies as possible" and write about them here. At the time, I was rather optimistic:

"I've got a lot of free time...this could be a poor idea...or it could be
the best idea I've ever had, ever, in my whole life...even from this current moment until the day I die, I might never, ever, have a thought as good as this."

Or, it could be a poor idea. Turns out, I don't have as much free time as I thought, m'kay?

Also, it's kind of difficult to watch a new zombie movie every night.

I don't declare this a failure, however. I've drawn the following conclusions:

First, this makes me realize that forcing a theme into this blog (or anything I write) is a horrible idea. It makes it seem so forced. For the last few days or so, I've kind of avoided writing altogether. This thing is so much more enjoyable when topics meander all over the place. Speaking of, here are some things I'm going to write, soon. Variety aplenty:

-a short story ("Shakespeare's Bones")
-Hip-hop lyrics and online rap-battles ("The Illest MC")
-thoughts regarding the opposite sex (Girls I've Known, Dated, and Been Dumped By")
-a short essay ("Wizard Status")
-more entries covering new words and phrases ("The New Slang")

If one of the topics above is something you want to read, lemme know, partner. Or, if you have an idea for a recurring feature, I'm all ears.

I'm not going to stop writing about zombie movies, though; I'm stoked to tell you about Evil Dead 2. And Army of Darkness. Soon.

"SHAUN OF THE DEAD"

2008-04-09T00:00:00.000-07:00

We're friends, right?
We've known each other for a long time? Yes?
Then I'm sure you've seen Shaun of the Dead.

It's just one of those movies. If you haven't seen it, or if you've seen it and don't like it, we can no longer be friends. Seriously.

I'm not going to summarize the plot, because hopefully, you've seen it (our friendship is at stake! we've covered this already). I will tell you this, though: watching Shaun of the Dead again has allowed me to pick up on some of the smaller references to other zombie movies that are peppered throughout the film. When Ed growls "we're coming to get you, Barbara!" into the phone, it's a line straight from Night of the Living Dead. In the electronics store, Shaun talks about how "Ash" is sick, referencing the main character from the Evil Dead series (this line also made me really want to watch Evil Dead II again, and I will be doing so, poste haste).

If you've already seen the movie (which I'm sure you have, because we're friends), I highly recommend "Danger! 50,000 Zombies!", a tie-in to Shaun of the Dead made by Simon Pegg and Nick Frost as an episode of Frost's BBC comedy series "Danger! 50,000 Volts!". The episode is about thirty minutes long, and it's a survival guide to a zombie apocalypse. The first part of the video is below...ch-ch-check it out.

ZOMBIE MONTH, SO FAR:
1. Night of the Living Dead
2. Return of the Living Dead
3. Shaun of the Dead

UP NEXT:
Evil Dead II

THE NEW SLANG: "THE TANK"

2008-04-08T23:20:00.000-07:00

(Editor's Note: This is the first post of a new feature called "The New Slang", in which I write about new words and phrases that young people say in an attempt to capture my fleeting youth and be considered 2 cool 4 skool, lolz)

(Editor's Note: not only am I writing "features", but I'm also writing "editor's notes"? GAY.)

Recently, one of my friends (who shall not be named) casually referenced something called "the tank."

"What's that?" I innocently inquired.

"It's sort of um, like, a challenge," he replied. "See, first you fill up your gas tank totally full. And then you keep track of how many different girls you can sleep with before that tank of gas runs out. You can do different strategies, and stuff."

My mind boggled.

You see how many different girls you can sleep with before the tank of gas runs out.

My friend went on to point out the many "strategies". What if he rode a bicycle everywhere? He'd save gas, and yet the fact that he rode a bike would inherently "limit his seduction". "Could I sleep with more than one girl a night?" he wondered. "Could I possibly find an orgy?" I helpfully amended, this time with a smile.

First of all, this is probably the most eco-friendly way to degrade and use women. Ever.

Second, I hypothetically wonder how I would do. Probably poorly.

TWO OVERLAPPING CIRCLES

2008-04-08T22:08:00.000-07:00

TONIGHT my dad and I watched Cash Cab together.

The host asked a question about Radiohead. I softly whispered "OK Computer", which was the correct answer. This prompted my dad to look over in my direction.

"Do you have a copy of that CD?" he asked. "I think I'd like to listen to it."

I nodded, and the circles that comprise our respective lives briefly drew together, overlapping like a venn diagram.

My own father expressed interest in my favorite band? This is meaningful.

"RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD"

2008-04-08T20:37:00.000-07:00

After George Romero and John Russo made the excellent Night of the Living Dead, they disagreed on how a sequel should be made. After parting ways, Romero went off on his own and made Dawn of the Dead (which is excellent) while Russo wrote Return of the Living Dead (not as excellent). Tonight, I watched the latter.

The film begins with two dumbass employees of a medical supply warehouse accidentally releasing a gas called 2-4-5 Trioxin which, once airborne, reanimates dead flesh, and creates shitloads of zombies in the cemetery conveniently located across the street. These early scenes were some of my favorites: the two bumbling employees try to hide their potentially apocalyptic mistake from the boss while anatomical exhibits of dead butterflies and dissected dogs come back to life around them. These scenes play out with a light slapstick quality that I wish would have extended throughout the rest of the movie.

The story then focuses on a leather-clad group of teenagers with names like "Thrash" and "Suicide" who enjoy "partying" in the cemetery (stripping on top of gravestones, drinking, and talking about how awesome partying is). This movie was definitely made in the eighties. Also, the guy from Juwanna Mann plays one of the teenagers! Anyway, the zombie-gas released in the medical supply warehouse condenses into clouds and falls to earth as zombie-making acid rain, which produces even more zombies. Aw, shucks.

The teenagers go on to do stupid teenage things, and they get horribly eaten by zombies one-by-one. Eventually, the situation gets so fucked up that the military nukes everything, the movie ends, and I felt kind of disappointed in myself for watching it.

The film presents a sad commentary on the eighties by showing us exactly what people were scared of at the time (or at least what the film's producers thought they were scared of): sex-crazed, party-loving teenagers, acid rain, nuclear war. However, these things pale in comparison to the mind bending horror of this movie.

Here's the trailer for Return of the Living Dead. Check it out.

ZOMBIE MONTH, SO FAR:
1. Night of the Living Dead
2. Return of the Living Dead

UP NEXT:
Shaun of the Dead

"NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD"

2008-04-03T12:43:00.000-07:00

If you're going to watch dozens and dozens of zombie movies, it makes sense to start with Night of the Living Dead. It's hailed as the film that introduced the "zombie apocalypse" genre to film, and is arguably the grandfather of modern zombie movies. This seems fitting: for me, the first few minutes of the film (as well as the zombies themselves) seemed to move about as fast as someones grandpa.

However, once the story gets going, things speed up. During a large scale zombie outbreak caused by space radiation (naturally), a group of human survivors hide inside a farmhouse miles from the nearest town. The farmhouse is besieged by the undead, and after a failed attempt to escape the the nearest rescue station during constant fighting amongst their ranks, they attempt to survive through the night.

Considering the budget he had to work with and the time period it came from, the film is remarkably well done. It's extremely graphic and sensationalist for its time, but it's shot in such a way that it looks almost like old war footage, or grainy videos from the evening news.

It's impressive to realize that the film set the standard for hundreds of movies to steal from; it also introduces some of the stock characters that seem to reside in all zombie movies: "The Intelligent and Somewhat Rational Leader", "The Emotional Hothead", "The Helpless Woman", "The Guy Who's Already Bitten And Rapidly Zombifying And Must Be Killed", etc.

All in all, a bit slow, but still rather enjoyable. Check it out.

APRIL IS ZOMBIE MONTH.

2008-03-30T04:30:00.000-07:00

Greetings! I'm coming to you live from PartyHouse, deep in the heart of glamourous Mesa, Arizona. I just had a revelation, so I commandeered what I think is Audrey's computer to make note of it; if you read this, Audrey...yes, I did borrow your computer to write this. Guilty as charged. And yes...I am intoxicated, still. Throw the book at me.

Everyone has fallen asleep already, except for me. It's currently about 4:30 in the morning, and I'm awake watching horrible A.M. programming when suddenly I find a movie called Zombie Rave on Sci-Fi.

And it's zombies. Eating brains. At a rave. And it's the most glorious thing I've ever seen.

So it's prompted me to challenge myself: for the entire month of April, I'm going to watch every zombie movie I can get my hands on. Every old black-and-white low budget film, every Italian knock-off, every modern remake, every cult classic...if it involves large groups of zombies, I'm probably going to watch it. I'll write about what is good, what is bad, and share the best scenes with you through the magic of youtube. Also, I'll try to document the ways in which watching dozens of zombie movies has affects my psyche and sleep schedule. It's going to be an interesting month.

So here's what I ask of you, dear reader: which movies shall I seek out? Do you have personal favorites? Or do zombies just give you the heebie-jeebies? What are your thoughts?

I've got a lot of free time. I'm going to see so much brain-eating in the next month. This could be a poor idea...or it could be the best idea I've ever had, ever, in my whole life...even from this current moment until the day I die, I might never, ever, have a thought as good as this.

Yeah, it could be that.

Zombiez.

MY ARSENAL OF TIMEWASTERS

2008-03-26T20:15:00.000-07:00

SOME DAYS at work move as slow as sloths. Days like these, there aren't any leases to go over, there aren't any modules to complete, and customers are few and far between. Days like these, the clock is my enemy, stuttering and pausing and sometimes freezing completely.

What am I to do? Conversation with coworkers is a dicey proposition: the last time I initiated small talk with Scott, my mind became caught in a beartrap of ignorance and I almost called Mike Huckabee a "banjo-strumming douchebag" in front of an office full of gawking eavesdroppers. Since then, I've decided to "tone it down".

On days like these, it's up to me to provide myself with entertainment; to unfreeze the clock and make the tempus motherfuckin' fugit. In order to do this, I delve into my arsenal of timewasters. Here are a few examples:

-After watching my boss, Rob, clean the same counter with wet-naps eight times in a single day, I finally realized that he has OCD. I asked him about it, and he confirmed my suspicion by admitting that he was diagnosed with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder a few years ago. This has provided me with perhaps my favorite timewaster. Once every couple days, I move something inside of his immaculately organized office. Something small. For example, the other day I took his pad of multicolored post-it notes and peeled off the top layer (which was green) and repositioned it beneath the bottom layer (which was yellow). Afterwards, I sat back and anxiously waited to see how long it would take him to notice the minuscule change I'd made. After twenty minutes he noticed something was amiss; he got really anxious, and when he finally noticed his post-its were out of order, he exploded and blamed my co-worker Scott for my mischief. Mission Accomplished.

-Sometimes I like to think of all the possible nicknames I could give Scott if we were actually friends: Scotty Too Hottie, Scottie Biscotti, Beam-Me-Up Scotty, Scotty-Boom-Botty, Karate Scotty, etc. Based on the quality of these nicknames, perhaps it's better that we aren't friends.

If anyone from work ever finds this blog, I will be seriously fucked.

DREAMS I'VE HAD, PART 4

2008-03-24T20:08:00.000-07:00

The dream begins and I'm walking in a place that most definitely isn't Arizona, a place where valleys and hills come together like the interlaced hands of lovers and waist-tall grasses undulate like swaying kelp at the bottom of a great sea. The air is sweet enough to drink and colors that pulse and hum like electric brushstokes make me squint involuntarily.

I smell the water long before the river shows its face. Its width, perhaps a stones throw, and it passes me by in swirling tornado eddies with a polished surface that moves like melting glass. It gently laps the shore, kissing each of the polished stones and chilling my bare feet. The skin of the water expands and contracts; the rise and fall of a sleeping man's chest

A boat appears. It coyly parts curtains of vines, curtains of blooming flowers, drifting downriver.

But it's not a boat at all. It is, instead, something undiscovered and unnamed, a flexing architectural chimera of dozens of colliding nautical styles and stylistic flourishes, seemingly designed to sail on a madman's ocean.

It has no sail. It has no mast. Instead, a trio of paddlewheels gently slap the water and shovel the boat forward. Each of the paddlewheels is a different size, and each moves in a different direction, simultaneously. The boat is constructed of coffeecolored wood marbled with swirls of dark grain, and as I watch, the patterns of grain disband and reconfigure themselves into new, unrecognizable constellations.

The boat is massive. From the shore I'm able to recognize a crosshatching of a halfdozen different decks, stretching and diverging into raised platforms supported by wooden buttresses, flanked by various pediments and metopes depicting scenes from my childhood which have been inlaid into panels of wood by skilled artisans. Barreled rooves sit atop rows of wooden columns. Pointed spires and twisting antennas loom above; hair standing up on a giant's neck.

The boat drifts closer. Directly in front of me now. It stops, seeming to blatantly disregard the preexisting current of the water it sits upon. Something that is less of a gangplank and more of a drawbridge descends like a tongue, grinding against the polished riverstones at my feet.

I step aboard. Ready to ride the river until it empties into the sea.

The dream ends.

"CHORTLE AT JOKER'S BONER"

2008-03-16T21:25:00.000-07:00

There isn't a single part of this that isn't funny.