CHANGE JAR STATS
++ As of February 7, 2005,
the change jar was 41.3% full.
++ I last emptied the change jar
on August 11, 2004.
++ The change jar is projected
to be full on October 21, 2005.
[See change jar photo here]
AN OPEN LETTER TO THE PERSON WHO INVENTED WHITE MERLOT
Dear Person Who Invented White Merlot:
I don't know who you are. But you need to know who I am, because I am coming to get you. Do not think that you are safe, barricaded in your Napa Valley compound, with its hundreds of well-trained shock troops and heavily-armed bodyguards. Do not think that you can hide in the foothills of Sonoma County, subsisting on roadkill and elderberries, relying on your cunning and animal instincts to defend against my attack. Wherever you go, I will follow. I will find you, and I will penetrate your defenses, and then you will be made to pay. You will pay for inventing White Merlot.
Oh yes... you will pay!
Perhaps it started innocently. You looked at the success of White Zinfandel, and you thought, "I wonder if it would be possible to do the same thing with Merlot." And so you tinkered with the blackest of secrets. You fermented the noble Merlot berries without their skins, (my teeth clench and my guts roil with anguish while typing these words.) Gone was the lovely ruby red color. Gone were the tannins and the aroma of black cherries. Gone was the spiciness on the palate and the long, rich finish. What remained was a pink, wine-like substance mostly indistinguishable from Bartles & Jaymes Razzle-dazzleberry wine cooler and best served with baloney sandwiches or day-old pizza.
Have you no sense of shame or decency?
Perhaps your transgression could have been excused in the name of oenology, as a example the folly and danger that lie down dark paths. Perhaps all could have been made right by destroying all existing bottles of the vile stuff, melting down the equipment used in its manufacture, burning the research notes, executing the mad scientists who assisted in the creation of the pink blasphemy and disposing of their bodies in an unmarked grave. But no. Somewhere in the reptilian depths of your mind, you thought, "I bet Americans would like this stuff! It's crisp and cold and rooty-tooty-fruity! They could take it on picnics and drink it with hot dogs and three-bean salad!" And so you bottled and sold it.
Curse you, Person Who Invented White Merlot!
What comes next? White Shiraz? White Pinot Noir? White Cabernet Sauvignon? Where will the madness end? I will answer for you: it ends now. Kilgore Trout has had enough.
It's time for the National Football League to abandon the point-after try. Think hard: when was the last time you saw an NFL placekicker miss a PAT? Yeah, it happens; in fact, if you watched every game this season, you saw 18 missed PAT's... out of 1,128 attempts. That's a 98.4% success rate. The PAT almost never affects the outcome of the game and is the most routine, boring play in football except for when the winning quarterback takes a knee with 14 seconds left in the game.
"Okay," you are saying, "I am convinced that watching a PAT is about as suspenseful as watching James Bond get strapped into the evil genius' death machine. I personally pass the time during PAT attempts rooting around in the refrigerator and/or my nose. But doesn't it seem as though there should be something to replace it?"
You are correct. The supposed purpose of the PAT is to introduce variance in scoring: if Team A and Team B both score four touchdowns, but Team A makes 3 PATs while Team B makes 2 PATs, then Team A wins 27-26. But today's NFL placekickers are so good that the PAT has become a formality -- when a team scores a touchdown, everyone watching thinks, "Seven points." I propose that the NFL steal the only good idea the now-defunct XFL ever had and make the scoring team run or pass the ball in from the two-yard line. A successful attempt would score one point. Because teams would succeed far less often, games could be won or lost depending on a team's ability to convert the extra point. Think about it: suppose it's late in the game and your team, down 25-18, scores a touchdown to make it 25-24. Nowadays you would head for the bathroom, confident that your placekicker would nail the extra point to tie it up. But if your team has to put the ball in the end zone to tie the game, you would be aquiver with anticipation and excitement. The PAT would be exciting again!
"That sounds good," you are saying, "but what you are suggesting is the same as today's two-point try. What would we do to replace that?"
That's easy. To go for two, a team would have to run or pass the ball in from further out -- maybe the six-yard line or whatever. Wouldn't that be fun to watch?
Lord of the Rings: the Return of the King (2003)
Starring Miranda Otto, Liv Tyler, Cate Blanchett, and a bunch of guys with pro-wrestler hair.
Directed by Peter Jackson.
Kilgore rates it: 7 (out of 10)
With Return of the King, director Peter Jackson delivers a highly entertaining film that skillfully intertwines several plotlines without creating confusion and, even at 201 minutes, never seems long, (until the multiple unnecessary endings.) The centerpiece of the picture is an amazing battle sequence that dwarfs the flaccid battle scenes in The Two Towers and seamlessly integrates incredible CGI creature effects. (Hope you're taking notes, George Lucas.) The film explores themes of friendship, loyalty, honor, and courage without devolving into simplicity or sappiness.
I've never been much of an LOTR fan. I never read the books as a kid, and when I tried to read them a few years ago, I got bored halfway through The Fellowship of the Ring and never picked it up again. One fault of these films is that they can be hard for the uninitiated to understand -- I have never quite figured out what the Ring does, exactly, or why its destruction causes Sauron's death. (And don't tell me that I should have read the books before I saw the movies; it's not my responsibility as a moviegoer to do outside research so I can enjoy a film.) Lifelong LOTR fans will undoubtedly rate this movie a 9 or 10 and will emerge from the multiplex with dark stains in their crotches.
A question for people who have seen this movie -- who is the hottest female LOTR character: Miranda Otto, Liv Tyler, or Cate Blanchett? I'll take Miranda Otto, the warrior-princess. Liv and Cate are both incandescent, but that's part of the problem; they're both so ethereally beautiful that it's impossible for them to be objects of carnal desire. Miranda, by contrast, seems constructed out of actual flesh and blood, making her real and approachable if, you know, I started lifting and had a cleft chin installed.
Now is the time on Chaotic Not Random when I give a shout-out to Tim Shriver, my friend and second-biggest CNR fan on the African continent. (Even Tim admits that the biggest CNR fan in Africa is Kohkomolko in Botswana, a Barolong tribesman who found this blog accidentally while searching Google for "hot Zulu lesbian sluts.") Tim recently started a two-year stint as a Peace Corps volunteer in Morocco. Attention Morroccan ladies: Tim is single! He enjoys candlelight dinners, long walks on the beach, and long conversations conducted in Tamazeight about the nature of humanity and the revelations of the Prophet. You're welcome, Tim.
G-Dog and I went to see the new LOTR movie on Friday. While handing our tickets to the United Artists employee to be ripped, another United Artists employee handed each of us a small packet. Upon further inspection, the packet turned out to be facial tissues packaged in plastic emblazoned with an ad for USA Network's P.I. drama Monk.
Yes. Tissues. Why, you are wondering, would someone hand out tissues to advertise a mostly unknown show on a mostly unknown TV network? Is Monk so funny/sad/retarded that I will want to cry while watching it? Do people often watch Monk while performing cunnilingus or fellatio, and need tissues to wipe their faces? Or is USA so broke that it can no longer afford to advertise its programming through normal media, (billboards, radio), and must rely on handing out trinkets, like a small construction company giving out free yardsticks at the local home and garden expo?
The back of a package of Trident White spearmint-flavored sugarless gum has the following statement printed on it:
35% fewer calories than sugared gum. Calorie content for this serving size has been reduced from 8 to 5 calories.
That's right -- chewing Trident White instead of sugared gum will save you THREE CALORIES. This means that if you chew gum aggressively, (say, three times a day), chewing Trident White instead of sugared gum will save you one pound of body fat over the course of 388 days. Thanks, Trident!
Do you ever actually look at AOL's ubiquitous starter CDs? They promise "1045 HOURS FREE," with smaller print specifying that you must use your 1045 free hours within 45 days. The problem is that there are only 1080 hours in 45 days. Does AOL expect users to sign up and then use the Internet almost continuously for the next month and a half? Not even skippy watches that much porn.
This doesn't really have anything to do with Stupidity in Marketing, but does anybody know why everybody is so mean to the arty girl in Linkin Park's "Numb" video? She's pretty. Attention Pretty Girl from Linkin Park's "Numb" Video: Come to my apartment. I will be nice to you.
Session 9 (2001)
Starring Peter Mullan and David Caruso.
Directed by Brad Anderson.
Kilgore rates it: 4 (out of 10)
Session 9 is set in Danvers State Hospital, an defunct mental health facility in Massachusetts. This is the main reason I rented it -- what better possible setting for a horror movie than a 130-year-old abandoned insane asylum, with its crumbling catacombs and antiquated medical equipment?
Unfortunately, Session 9 squanders this opportunity, mostly through its shoddy writing. The story concerns a group of hazmat workers under contract to remove asbestos in preparation for the hospital's renovation. The creepy environment affects each in a different way, and when the bodies start to hit the floor, we are left to wonder who-or what?-dunit. The answer, a nonsensical disappointment with a cheap twist, has nothing to do with the hospital. Several times, the director creates extended moments of genuine suspense -- I found myself coiling in my chair, steeling myself for the scare -- only to let those moments dissipate without satisfaction. Overall, Session 9 is a wannabe horror movie and a waste of a great location.
I am constantly surprised by the number of people who would hesitate to tell another person that he has bad breath but feel perfectly comfortable expressing contempt for my lack of desire to be a father. "You'll change your mind when you meet the right person," they all say.
"I don't think so," I always say, smiling tightly.
"But you might," they persist, nodding their heads as if truth could be created by gesturing vigorously. "You might change your mind. You never know."
Yes, I might. Anybody might do anything at any given time. Yasser Arafat might convert to Judaism. President Bush might undergo sex-reassignment surgery. Ben Affleck might make a movie that doesn't suck. You never know.
Other people try to convince me that, unbeknownst to me, I actually do love children and want to raise scads of them. "Children are wonderful," they say. "Children are a reflection of the love shared between two people. Children are [insert slushy proverb copied from Precious Moments figurine]."
My father used to do this same sort of thing when my mother served macaroni and cheese for supper. I would refuse to eat it because I hate macaroni and cheese. My father would try to convince me that, in reality, I found macaroni and cheese to be a tasty and satisfying dish. He would do this through the use of Aristotelian logic. "You like macaroni, don't you?" he would say. "And you like cheese. So..."
You fill in the rest. But this doesn't work. People either like things or they don't -- logic has nothing to do with it. I don't know why I don't like children, and I don't care. It's a personal preference, not a fault. I personally can't even conceive what it would be like bear the responsibility for raising a family. It's like trying to imagine a fourth dimension -- I just can't wrap my mind around the concept, and anyway when I try I get an upset stomach and have to lay down for a while.
Add to all this the undisputed fact that raising children requires an incredible sacrifice of money, time, and energy. It seems obvious to me that the only people who should be having children are those who are sure they want them.
Look, everyone: You don't want me to have children. I'd be a lousy father. Any kids I raised would grow up to be drug addicts and car thieves. And why do you care, anyway? It's no skin off your ass. It's not like I'm trying to convince you not to have children. Christ, it doesn't matter to me -- have as many as you want, (and can afford, and are willing to pay attention to.)
Solaris (2002)
Starring George Clooney and Natasha McElhone.
Directed by Steven Soderbergh.
Kilgore rates it: 6 (out of 10)
DrRevenend had this to say about my rating for Solaris:
How the fuck could you give Solaris a 6 out of 10? What the fuck is wrong with you? That movie sucked so large the english [sic] language doesn't contain words to describe it. No wonder you haven't had sex in almost a year. You don't a fucking clue as to what you're doing.
I think DrRevenend might be on to something here. Ever since I saw Solaris, I have been going to Denver's hottest bars and clubs and using this pickup line: "What did you think of Solaris? I gave it a 6." No wonder I haven't had sex in almost a year, indeed.
The thing is that most people seem to agree with DrRevenend. Solaris bombed horribly at the box office, grossing less than $15 million against a budget of $47 million. But I'm not sure why. The acting is wince-worthy in parts, with George Clooney playing George Clooney and Natasha McElhone playing George Clooney's Hot Dead Wife, but Jeremy Davies turns in an excellent supporting performance, and overall the acting, direction, and writing aren't any worse than the average Hollywood movie, which I would have rated a 5.
I bumped this film's rating a point because I thought it addressed interesting ideas. (Also because Natasha McElhone really is beautiful. Probably you are thinking that I shouldn't rate movies based on the bone structures of the leading actors. Probably you have also had sex within the past eleven months.) The movie is set on a space station orbiting a kind of intelligent star that can "create" people based on the memories of their loved ones. The star uses George Clooney's memory of his Hot Dead Wife to recreate her aboard the space station. But is it really his Hot Dead Wife? Is it even human? Does it matter? The film confronts ideas about identity and asks if we are who we think we are, or who other people think we are, or if the self exists objectively and independent of perception. I'm not saying that Solaris addresses these ideas in a complete or satisfying manner, because it doesn't. But it takes on issues far weightier than nearly anything else Hollywood puts out -- Mona Lisa Smiles, anyone? -- and for that I'll give it the extra point.
So: not a movie I would really recommend, but neither does it suck "so large the english [sic] language doesn't contain words to describe it." Christ, DrRevenend, not even Wild Wild West was that bad.
Ladies and gentlemen, I present for your consideration the Aurora Central High School football team of Aurora, Colorado.
The Trojans finished the 2003 season with an 0-10 record. They got outscored 550-24 and were shut out six times. Their leading rusher, Greg Florence, gained 175 yards -- for the entire season! -- on 112 carries, for an average of 1.6 yards per carry. In ten games, the team rolled up just 56 yards of passing offense, fumbled 27 times, and never converted a third down.
Just how bad were the Trojans? On September 4, they got shellacked by Fort Lupton 41-0. This was the only game Fort Lupton won all year -- they posted a 1-9 record while getting outscored 351-39 in games not involving Aurora Central. (Fort Lupton, by the way, is a class 3A team. Aurora Central is a class 5A team.)
But.
On August 29, Aurora Central traveled to All City Stadium to play the Lincoln Lancers in the first game of the year. In the first quarter, the Trojans' Vincent Holloway scooped up a fumble and ran it in for a touchdown. Score: Trojans 6, Lancers 0.
Let's pretend for a moment that you are the Aurora Central football coach. You have seen your guys practice and scrimmage, and you know that they are no good. You know that this is going to be a long, punishing season full of humiliating losses and whopping margins of defeat. You never wanted to be a football coach. In fact, you were only planning on teaching until you could get some paintings sold and move to New York. But then Marsha got pregnant -- by accident, supposedly -- and when the baby came you had to take this coaching job for a few extra bucks to make ends meet. You've started drinking in the morning, a little, and you've also been unable to perform your marital duties lately because you've been dreading this first game so much. But now the football gods have dropped a 6-0 lead in your lap. What are you going to do, Coach? What are you going to do?
Here is what you do. You say, "Fuck it, boys. We're going for two."
And that is what the Trojans did. Greg Florence ran in the two-point conversion, and suddenly the Trojans led 8-0. Aurora Central lost the game 34-8, and never held a lead again for the remainder of the season, but who cares? They went for two.
Bad Santa (2003)
Starring Billy Bob Thornton and Tony Cox. Directed by Terry Zwigoff.
Kilgore rates it: 7 (out of 10)
The bad news is that Bad Santa is built on the hackneyed comedy formula of dressing someone up in a fake beard and a red hat and then having him curse or fart or give someone the finger. Automatic laffs through juxtaposition of supposed innocence versus revealed vulgarity!
The good news is that nobody plays a bad Santa like Billy Bob Thornton. His character Willie takes jobs as a department store Santa with his midget partner Marcus, (Tony Cox), in order to gain access to the stores' security systems and rob their safes. Unfortunately for him, Willie actually has to play Santa for a while, and he plumbs new depths of Kris Kringle obscenity by showing up to work drunk, stealing cars, and sodomizing a plus-size woman in a department store dressing room. The scenes of Willie behaving badly in his filthy Santa outfit are very funny and provide most of the comedy in this movie. The rest comes from smaller parts played by John Ritter and Bernie Mac, who can exude bad attitude even while eating an orange.
The plot veers close to a cliched Hollywood redemption at the end, but mostly manages to steer clear. I would like to have given this movie a higher rating, but it gives none of the immortal moments that make great comedy movies like Office Space or Tommy Boy. Still a worthy effort.
The federal government today raised the national terrorism threat level to orange, the second-highest rating. In response, I have been wearing a condom all day and will continue to do so until the rating is lowered to yellow. I suggest you do the same.
Doubtless you have some questions about how to prepare for a possible terrorist attack:
What if I don't have any condoms? You should wrap your penis in several layers of duct tape.
What if I am a woman? If you are unattractive and/or overweight, don't worry! Your unique biochemistry provides you with natural protection against terrorist attacks. However, if you are attractive, and especially if you have a large nose and small breasts, you are in terrible danger.
Terrible danger!? What should I do? You must come to my apartment immediately. I will shield you with special terrorism-proof bedcovers and administer an injection of Dr. Trout's Anti-Terrorism Elixir.
What if I don't like injections? Fortunately, Dr. Trout's Anti-Terrorism Elixir can also be taken orally.
Okay, I got some condoms... ouch! How do I get this duct tape off? Just yank it off, like a band-aid. Don't be a pussy, man.
Carnival of Souls (1962)
Starring Candace Hilligoss. Directed by Herk Harvey.
Kilgore rates it: 4 (out of 10)
Carnival of Souls is a cult classic. Cult classic is a code phrase meaning "bad movie that nobody watched when it first came out, and nobody really watches it now, (because it's a bad movie, remember?), except for a handful of pathetic people who desperately seek something, anything to latch onto to make their barren, empty, involutarily celibate lives seem livable for two hours or so, and for some reason these people always corner you at parties and trap you in unspeakably boring conversations about things that no person with a life worth living could ever possibly care about, for example: the cult classic Carnival of Souls."
Carnival of Souls is a low-budget horror film about a woman who gets haunted by dead people at random intervals, and might be dead herself, or maybe not, or something. It's hard to pinpoint exactly what's going on, because the plot is so muddy and convoluted. The movie's pace slows to a crawl at times, making it seem interminable even though it's only 78 minutes long, and the acting is spotty and awkward at best. On the plus side, Candace Hilligoss -- the lead actress -- is a very beautiful woman, and the organ music score is hauntingly effective. Also, some of the scenes were genuinely creepy, especially the shots of the ballroom-dancing zombies.
E and I had been dating for 68 days when she dropped the K-bomb.
Sixty-eight days is a long time for a woman to tolerate my presence. Hell, 68 minutes is pretty good at this point in my life. I am serious. If I go on a date and put together 68 consecutive minutes without blurting out something embarrassing or offensive, or without my dinner companion dropping subtle hints like, "I want to leave right now and I never want to talk to you ever again and I'm going to sit in the back seat and if you try to kiss me I will Mace you," I feel like as jittery and nervous as a pitcher taking the mound in the ninth inning of a perfect game.
Don't screw this up, I say to myself. Almost there. You have got it. Just... don't... mess... up. And then:
"So, Angela, would you call that a scar or a mole on your neck?"
Anyway. E tolerated my presence quite nicely for 68 days, and I returned the favor. This was not hard for me to do. E is smart, funny, quirky-in-a-good-way, compassionate, and tall. She dressed as a pregnant nun on Halloween. We engaged in acts of transatlantic travel together. She knew that Zinfandel is a red wine. And on Monday night, she dropped the K-bomb on me.
"So," she said, "if you were really serious about a woman, and she told you that she wanted to have Kids someday, what would you say?"
"Well," I answered, "I would say that that is not a possibility for me."
This was true. I do not want to have children, and I never will, and I will not thank you for trying to convince me otherwise. I don't like children. I don't know how to talk or relate to them. When there are children around, I get anxious and irritable and wish they would go away. Unlike E and Whitney Houston, I was never issued the special glasses necessary to see the special brilliance and unlimited potential of children. All I can see are short, loud people with runny noses and peanut butter in their hair.
E and I discussed these things for a while. It was the strangest breakup I have ever experienced, and not just because it was conducted in the nude. We conducted the breakup in a strangely rational and dispassionate manner, like characters in an Ayn Rand novel. This wasn't because we are cold, unemotional people, (at least, E isn't), but because of the obvious hopelessness of the situation. Having children is a binary proposition: either-or, true or false, 1 or 0. No compromise possible. We didn't want to break up, but we had to. What else was to be done?
At one point, E said, "I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry," I said. "Neither of us is doing anything wrong."
GRANDMOTHER GIVES OH, THE PLACES YOU'LL GO! TO FUTURE MINIMUM-WAGE WORKER/SMALL-TIME FELON
COMMERCE CITY, CO -- Louise Alton, 78, gave her grandson, Tyler Stevenson, a future wage slave and Class D felon, the motivational Dr. Seuss book Oh, The Places You'll Go! as a high school graduation present, sources reported Wednesday.
"I'm so proud of Tyler," said Alton, looking at a framed photo of her sullen grandson, who graduated 177th out of 190 in his class with a 1.07 grade point average. "He's such a smart boy. I just know he's going to do something big with his life."
Alton purchased Oh, The Places You'll Go! at the Westminster Mall Waldenbooks, where the book's colorful cover caught her eye from the "Gifts for Graduates" display.
"I started reading," said Alton, "and I came to a page with a drawing of air balloons and the words
You won't lag behind, because you'll have the speed.
You'll pass the whole gang and you'll soon take the lead.
Wherever you fly, you'll be best of the best.
Wherever you go, you will top all the rest.
And I thought, 'Well, that's Tyler. He just does so well at everything he tries.' And I bought that book right then and there."
Alton presented the book to Stevenson at his graduation open house, along with a fifty-dollar bill. Upon receiving the gift, Stevenson grunted and glanced briefly at the first page. He then dropped the book on a coffee table and left the open house to buy drugs with his grandmother's money. Alton spent the next hour reading selections from Oh, The Places You'll Go! to various family members.
"Look at this, Sarah [Stevenson]," said Alton to Tyler's mother, who has placed her son in detox three times since he was fourteen. "Doesn't this remind you of when Tyler used to play Little League?
Oh, the places you'll go! There is fun to be done!
There are points to be scored. There are games to be won.
And the magical things you can do with that ball
will make you the winning-est winner of all.
Fame! You'll be as famous as famous can be,
with the whole wide world watching you win on TV.
Now, can't you just see Tyler on television?" Alton asked, unaware that her grandson would be spending the next four years either unemployed or drifting between low-paying jobs at Burger King, Gas 'n' Go, Kmart, and Jiffy Lube.
When contacted for comment, a spokesman for Random House, the publisher of Oh, The Places You'll Go! said, "We are proud to distribute the work of Dr. Seuss, and we are glad that Ms. Alton decided to purchase one of his books as a gift. However, although the book states,
And will you succeed?
Yes! You will, indeed!
(98 and 3/4 percent guaranteed.)
You have to understand that Dr. Seuss really meant for these words to apply to bright young college-bound boys and girls from good families with good grades and SAT scores in the second quintile or above. He did not intend for his whimsical rhymes to be read by white trash stoners who flunked remedial math twice, can only read at a fifth grade level, and will be arrested in July 2008 on drug charges, convicted of distributing methamphetamine through the U.S. Mail, and sentenced to five years in federal prison."
Today is the joint Finance/Human Resources/Information Technology potluck. The haul:
Seven-layer dip with blue corn chips
Baked beans
Rice Krispies treats with butterscotch/peanut butter topping
A giant sub from Subway
Two competing dishes of scalloped potatoes with cheese and ham
An Entenmann's cheese danish
Plastic utensils and napkins. Someone always has to pull that shit, and if that person is you, who do you think you are fooling? Everybody notices who the person was who brought plastic utensils and napkins, the same way everyone notices who brought one bag of chips to the barbecue and then downed five cheeseburgers and a six-pack of Milwaukee Best Light. If you have a potluck coming up this holiday season, write this down: Plastic Utensils + Napkins = Lazy, Pathetic Loser. Bad karma, man. These people usually die of cancer.
2-liter bottles of Coke and Sprite. See above.
Pasta/vegetable salad
Zucchini bread with miniature chocolate chips
"Jambalaya", which appeared to be nothing but yellow Rice-A-Roni. Where's the sausage, Cajun Man?
Ham
Bagged rolls
Vegetable tray, which nobody ate, of course. Notice to vegetarians: it's cool that you're vegetarians, but quit bringing vegetable trays to the potluck, because nobody wants raw celery sticks when they could be stuffing their faces with Kilgore Trout's Amazing Swiss Cheese Chicken Casserole.
Why do people bring so much food to potlucks? Most everyone brought enough food for about six people. But if you have ten people in a potluck, and each person brings enough food for six, you now have enough food for sixty people. This means that the average potlucker will take 83.3% of his or her offering home.
The uneaten food will not be distributed evenly, of course -- the seven-layer dip disappeared in thirty seconds, while the nearly all the baked beans remain, lonely and congealing in their Pyrex serving dish. I hate it when I bring something to a potluck and nobody eats it. It's like when people pretend not to notice your new haircut or when a girl turns you down for a date; it's a public failure at a very deep and miserable level. "You thought you made a tasty, appetizing dish that would draw admiration and hearty compliments from your coworkers?" is the unspoken message. "Think again. You're nobody special. In fact, you suck."
(Kilgore Trout's Amazing Swiss Cheese Chicken Casserole: Brown 5 chicken thighs in oil, drain and place in greased crock-pot. Layer on 6 slices of Swiss cheese. Mix a can of cream of mushroom soup with 1/4 cup of milk and pour over top. Cover with 2 cups of dry stuffing mix and drizzle on 1/2 cup of melted butter. Cover and cook on Low 8-10 hours. Serves three Kilgore Trouts or six normal people.)
BAD THINGS THAT HAPPENED THIS WEEK: 1. My girlfriend and I broke up.
2. My best friend inexplicably stopped taking his bipolar disorder medication and spent the weekend in the psych ward.
3. The National Lacrosse League is on strike.
GOOD THING THAT HAPPENED THIS WEEK: 1. Wendy's is now serving Great Biggie fries for only $1.59.
You cannot believe what you just read. You are rigid and pale with shock. "Good God, man!" you are shouting, groping at your groin to keep from spontaneously urinating with excitement. "Only $1.59 for 190 grams of deep-fried goodness? Why, that's less than 7 cents per gram of fat!"
Indeed. Nowadays a trip to Wendy's sounds like a taunting match between eight-year-old boys. "Would you like to Biggie-size that?" the clerk asks, as if your ability to consume obscene quantities of greasy potatoes is directly proportional to your sexual potency. "Would you like to Great Biggie-size that? I double-dog dare you."
Those of you who unironically order Great Biggie fries might be interested in the Bacon Wave, a remarkable product that allows you to cook 14 slices of crispy bacon at a time. The Bacon Wave reminds me of commercials that used to run several years ago by Miller or some other beer maker who had increased the size of the opening in their cans. I used to watch these ads and think, If the only thing keeping you from drinking more beer is the size of the hole in the can, you have problems. Likewise: if you eat so much bacon that spending $9.95 plus $5.95 S&H on a device intended solely for cooking bacon becomes a rational purchase, you have big problems. Specifically, you have big, fat problems with jiggling man-titties and a 68% higher risk of dying from congestive heart failure.
Meredith Baxter-Birney: if you are reading this, please know that I want you. You are the hottest TV mom ever, hotter than Phylicia Rashad and Patricia Heaton put together. I have watched every episode of "Family Ties" and every one of your made-for-TV movies on the Lifetime Channel. Do you remember the episode of "Family Ties" where none of the Keatons could get the water jug on top of the water cooler? And then you came in and stuck that water jug on the cooler with such effortless grace, like a ballerina rising to the tips of her toes. I was astonished by your strength and confidence in the face of adversity.
All I desire from you, Meredith Baxter-Birney, is a simple handjob. I will supply the lubricant and post-ejaculation cleaning materials. You do not need to remove any of your clothes if you don't want to, although I would consider it a wonderful favor to your greatest fan if you could remove your blouse and unbutton your jeans so I can see the waistband of your panties. But let me hasten to assure you, Meredith Baxter-Birney, that all I really need is your angelic presence and a rapid, up-and-down movement of your dominant hand.
Before the handjob, I will serve you a hearty and nutritious supper of grape Kool-Aid and Chef Boyardee Spaghetti & Meatballs. If you decide your Spaghetti & Meatballs would taste better with twice the meatballs, Meredith Baxter-Birney, I will pick out the meatballs from my own plate and give them to you. I will also cut up boiled hot dogs and put them in your Spaghetti & Meatballs, if you wish. If you get tired in the middle of the handjob, we can take a break and I will fetch you more grape Kool-Aid while you rest and restore your strength.
Meredith Baxter-Birney, I thank you so much just for listening to my plea. There is just one thing that could make our time together any more of a beautiful, life-affirming experience, and that is if Michael Gross could be in the closet peeking at us. He wouldn't have to take off his clothes or anything weird like that, just stand in the closet with the door slightly ajar so he could peek out at you giving me a handjob. Do you still have Michael Gross' phone number? I bet he would be happy to join us. (It's not as though he's busy these days.)
I don't have much, Meredith Baxter-Birney, just my Space Invaders Swatch, my lava lamp, my 1998 Chicago Marathon finisher's medallion, and my Sharpie collection. But you can have all of these things if you make this Christmas wish come true for me.
A couple of years ago my sister gave me an Onion Page-A-Day calendar. I kept a few of the funniest articles and taped them up in my cubicle at work. Today the IT guy was fooling around with my computer when he noticed one of the articles, headlined U.S. Populace Lurches Methodically Through The Motions For Yet Another Day. A short excerpt:
The wall-eyed, slack-jawed U.S. populace, beaten down into a state of near-catatonia by the relentlessly deadening banality of their joyless, insipid lives, dutifully trudged through the motions for yet another emotionally blank day Monday, sources reported.
Against all logic, the nation's citizenry, their insides withering away with each passing moment, somehow managed to continue filling out invoices, shopping for footwear, loading dishwashers, eating Whoppers, pressing buttons, watching reality-based TV programs, vacuuming floors, engaging in conversations about petty office politics, riding buses, sitting in traffic, mailing letters, and tending to the little rubber mats people wipe their feet on as they enter the lobby areas of vast, windowless industrial complexes. How they managed to do it, no one can say.
IT Guy smiled and tapped the article. "That's great," he laughed.
"It's so cruel," I said, smiling.
"It's so true," IT Guy answered, suddenly serious. He stared at the article. "Every day you get up and go to work and go home and get up to go to work again. It's just the same thing, over and over..."
It was a poignant moment, the kind of real human interaction that doesn't happen often enough, so of course I dismissed it with a feeble joke. "Existential angst, right here at [name of my company]," I said.
"Yeah," he said, and the moment passed. He took my computer away to scrape the viruses out with an SOS pad or whatever, and I thought a little about what had just happened.
As great thinkers from Solomon to Linkin Park have observed, life can be a meaningless void of numbing repetition occasionally punctuated by brief fits of happiness and/or orgasm. You've probably thought along these same lines from time to time, especially if you are a high school sophomore who gets picked on a lot.
So what is to be done? Solomon recommends that you "fear God and keep his commandments" (Ecc. 12:13b). But God doesn't exist, probably, and even if you talk yourself into believing that he does, fearing him and scrambling to keep his commandments will make you even more miserable than you were before -- trust me on this. Linkin Park recommends that you buy their latest album, Meteora, available at all music stores and on Amazon.com. But will piling up material goods make you any happier? Consider this: if you are an average American, you are wealthier than 99% of all the people who have ever lived. And your life is shit! Do you really think getting a promotion and raise at work to bump you to the 99.1 percentile will make things any better?
Here's my idea: Do something. Take that trip to Ireland. Learn to paint. Run a marathon. Create something that wasn't there before, even if it's just crappy poetry that doesn't rhyme. Eat something you swore you'd never eat. Get a tattoo. Build a doghouse. Take aikido classes. Volunteer to help the East Timorese, whoever they are. Write a mystery novel. Learn to play cricket or lacrosse or jai-alai or Go. Do something cool and important and a little scary, the kind of thing that would make you raise your eyebrows if someone else said she did it. Why not? What the hell else do you have going on? Are you afraid you're going to miss The Bachelor? The time remaining in your life is a dwindling resource, friend. Bad television is not.
Right now, you are laughing. "Thank you, Kilgore," you are saying. "Very Chicken Soup for the Blogger's Soul, that. But tell me: why should someone as obviously bitter and unhappy as you be telling the rest of us how to be escape the grinding, swirling abyss that is human life?"
Yes. But I am struggling toward happiness. What are you struggling toward?
+posted by Lawrence @ 12/11/2003 11:36:00 PM
While Americans compete to see can dominate the roads with the most massive tank/SUV, Londoners have embraced DaimlerChrysler's Smart Car, a preposterous "car" -- really a four-wheeled scooter with a roof -- that is 8.2 feet long and seats two. Smart Cars get 58.9 miles to the gallon, an attractive feature in a country where a gallon of gas, (sorry, petrol), costs more than five dollars. Smart Cars are not legal in the U.S., and for good reason, I think; it seems the occupants would be doomed in a collision with anything larger than a hummingbird, much less an 8,600-lb. Hummer H2.
Speaking of hummingbirds, the ten-pound note features a picture of one, as well as a portrait of Charles Darwin. Let me repeat that: the ten-pound note features a portrait of Charles Darwin. Can you imagine how impossible it would be to put a person like Charles Darwin on American currency? Can you begin to comprehend the mewling by the religion-addled rednecks? Can you picture the podium-pounding and posturing by Bible Belt congressmen? Can you see W pandering to his Christian conservative base at a press conference, ordering the bombing of the Mint to prevent any portrait of the infidel from appearing on our God-fearing money?
I had gone to England with vague thoughts of picking up a football jersey, maybe Manchester United or Arsenal. Not a bad idea, except for the part where English soccer jerseys have HUGE TACKY CORPORATE LOGOS right in the center, where the team logo belongs. The team logos -- which look like coats of arms and are very cool -- have been shrunk down to small patches and banished to the upper left-hand corner of the jersey. Big, big points to the major U.S. sports leagues and their fans on this matter.
I did my part for misogyny by buying a Yorkie candy bar, which comes in a hilarious wrapper announcing: "IT'S NOT FOR GIRLS!" The "O" in "Yorkie" is actually a red circle with a stick figure of a purse-carrying woman inside and bisected by a diagonal red slash. (For some reason, the underside of the wrapper commands: "DO NOT FEED THE BIRDS!")
People who use "literally" to refer to routine events. I last heard this abomination on VH1's "I Love the 80s", on which some has-been celebrity observed, "Mark McGwire was the best. I mean, he used to literally hit the ball over the fence." ATTENTION HAS-BEEN CELEBRITY: hitting the ball over the fence is called a home run. It is not an extraordinary occurrence: major league baseball players hit 5,207 of these home runs during the 2003 season, averaging 2.14 per game. Mark McGwire, all by himself, hit 583 home runs during his 16-year career, so using the word "literally" to describe Mark McGwire hitting a home run is like you saying "I struck out at the clubs trying to capitalize on my has-been celebrity status, so I went home and literally masturbated to Internet porn."
To clarify: you should use the term "literally" only when you are concerned that your listener is in jeopardy of believing that you are describing an event figuratively, when in fact you are describing something unusual that actually happened. This often happens in conjunction with a cliche or other figure of speech. For example: if you are arguing with your boss and suddenly a large chunk of feces flies into the room and slams into an oscillating cooling device, you have the all-clear to tell your friends "... and that's when the shit literally hit the fan".
(IN-CLASS EXERCISE: think of an example using the term "screwed the pooch.")
The thing where I go to Subway and have this conversation:
Sandwich Artist: Would you like cheese on that?
Me: Yes, please.
Sandwich Artist: What kind?
Me: What kinds do you have?
Sandwich Artist: Provolone, Swiss, and American.
Me: Provolone.
But I don't want provolone cheese. Provolone cheese has no taste! What I want is American cheese. Why do I ask for provolone cheese? And I always catch the mistake immediately, so why don't I just say, "Actually, I'll take American"? Am I really that much of a pussy? Who is John Galt?
Football commentators who overuse the word "football", as in: "He really knows how to throw the football." "This is one heck of a football club." "Now that is how you catch the football." "He is a great, great football coach." Announcers for other sports never do this -- you never hear anyone say, "John Smoltz can really throw the baseball", or "Jason Kidd passes the basketball better than anyone." ATTENTION FOOTBALL COMMENTATORS: If you say that Brett Favre "really knows how to throw the ball", I promise not to be confused and think that you are referring to Brett Favre throwing lacrosse balls or bocce balls or whatever.
Weatherpersons who call snow "the white stuff". Also: weatherpersons in cold-weather states who react to the arrival of snow between the months of November and March with shock and horror. This is not as much of a problem in Colorado, where snow is a money-making natural resource, but in Iowa, whenever snow was on the way, the weatherman would say, "Well, looks like we're going to get a little bit of the white stuff," in his smarmy voice, which was the cue for the anchorpeople to make their Big Frowny Faces of Surprise and Dismay, as if Martians had just landed in the town square with anal rape on their minds. Where are you people from, Guam? This is Iowa, and it's January, you assholes!
About a year ago, I was suffering from terrible headaches and pain deep in my ear canal, as well as tinnitus and pain radiating from below my ear down the back of my neck and along my jaw. The pain was never there when I woke up, but would flare up in mid-morning and last the entire day, sometimes making it difficult to go to sleep. I put up with this for a month or so, swallowed lots of acetaminophen, and waited for the pain to go away. But it didn't. I went to the doctor when I could hear the phantom whining in my ears over the television.
"Hello!" said the doctor, a sharp-looking guy in his early thirties. "Wow! Great specs! Mind if I try them on?" He took my glasses and mugged in front of a mirror. "How do they look?" he asked.
"I don't know," I said. "You have my glasses."
I described my symptoms. He looked in my ears and exclaimed over the scar tissue marring my eardrums. (I had a lot of ear infections as a kid.) He grabbed a piece of paper and drew me a picture of my eardrum. "And here," he said, scribbling with great enthusiasm, "you have a chunk of scar tissue that looks like Portugal."
He told me that he didn't think I had a brain tumor, and that when young people have headaches the problem is nearly always stress. I told him that it was good to hear that I didn't have a brain tumor, and even better to hear that I'm still considered a young person.
He laughed. "Have you changed anything in your routine recently?"
"I started a new job a couple of months ago," I said, "and I stopped running at about that same time."
He nodded, told me that I needed to start running again for stress relief, and that was all. I paid a $20 co-pay so an M.D. could tell me the same thing I could have learned by watching a Richard Simmons videotape. I went back to running 25 miles a week and the headaches, earaches, and tinnitus disappeared almost immediately.
There's no funny wrap-up or punchline here. I just think it's strange that for me, vigorous exercise is not a healthful lifestyle choice but a necessary strategy for me to avoid chronic, debilitating pain. So when you see me running through Denver's Washington Park, remember that I probably don't want to be there. It's just that I don't have a fucking choice.
WORTHLESS PONDERING: You will notice that no live-action movie adaptation of The Cat in the Hat was made while Dr. Seuss was alive. Why would this be? Could it be that Dr. Seuss realized that a 90-minute live-action movie would necessarily lack the two elements -- his wonderful illustrations and his whimsical poetry -- that made The Cat in the Hat great? Could it be that Dr. Seuss realized that such a movie would not be The Cat in the Hat at all, but an artistically unjustifiable, shameless grab for cash?
I wish Dr. Seuss' heirs had realized the same thing.
I am eating Corn Nuts. Barbecue-flavored. They are delicious.
Corn Nuts are perfectly named. They are large kernels of corn, fried in oil, (the website calls the snack "toasted corn", but the second ingredient on the list is "partially hydrogenated soybean and/or canola oil", so you figure it out), which gives them a pleasant, nutty flavor. The good folks at Kraft then drench the corn kernels in powdered artificial and natural flavors. Mostly artificial flavors, I imagine. I don't care. Corn Nuts. Mmmmmmm...
Are they crunchy? You're good and goddam right they are, mister!
I only discovered Corn Nuts this week. The bag caught my eye at Safeway. The bright red-and-black bag features a snarling anthropomorphic ear of corn and the slogan CORN GONE WRONG. CORN GONE WRONG -- I love that slogan. I've been repeating it to myself all week while I was supposed to be balancing the general ledger. And the anthropomorphic ear of corn has tousled silk for hair and a missing kernel to make him look like he got a tooth knocked out. Sold -- one 7-ounce bag of barbecue-flavored Corn Nuts. I'm a sucker for packaging.
Marketing works. "Not on me," you are saying. "Each one of my purchases is a considered, rational decision unaffected by advertising or social pressures and based solely on multiple, carefully weighted criteria including but not limited to: price, quality, quantity, need, the impact of the purchase on my budget and my financial goals, and the position of Jupiter relative to the Big Dipper." To which I say: ha. Specifically: ha ha. I don't see you buying the bagged cereal. And is that a swoosh I see on your shoes?
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