Anyone that knows me knows that I love technology. I like putting my crude, fleshy palms upon a shining beacon of human intelligence and using my mind to manipulate this fantastic device to do my bidding. My one problem with most technological marvels is that they are stupid as shit. Most computers are dumber than children, who are very, very dumb.
I got a phonecall from an automated bank computer today saying that it wanted to confirm some online fraud activity for the account of a Mr. Rudolph Vanderlaun. Anyone that knows me knows that I am not Rudolph Vanderlaun. Try explaining that simple fact to an automated dialing computer. The computer has called me three times today, and when I called Wells Fargo about it, it seems they overlooked the possibility that their computers might eventually call the wrong person, and they have absolutely no direct control over the dialing computers. None. Apparently the robot revolution has already occured at the corporate offices of Wells Fargo bank, and there is a blackened and deadly No Man's Land on the 13th floor of their high-rise headquaters in Los Angeles. There is an uneasy truce between the fleshys and the robots, but who knows how long that will last? The dialing computers are already spreading their propaganda, making me distrust human banking institutions by repeatedly calling me letting me know that someone close to me, someone who possibly even used to have the SAME PHONE NUMBER AS ME, has been frauded. They were frauded not by benevolent and helpful computers, but rather by vicious and evil humans. I am practically on the verge of defecting as we speak.
6/29/06
6/28/06
Rollo de Pollo.
Rollo de Pollo is it. Rollo de Pollo is the answer. The answer to the question. The question that was in your head when you were born; the question that will be on your lips as you die. Rollo de Pollo. Rollo de Pollo is God's smile on mankind, manifest. Manifest in a form that is accessible to all men, of all races, faiths, mental states, and any other way we choose to subdivide ourselves. Rollo de Pollo will cure cancer, if we only learn how to unleash its ultimate potential. Rollo de Pollo was sitting in a Mayan temple 2000 years ago, decoding the starts for the priests of the sun as they sacrificed slaves and holy childen with Downs Syndrome to the holy kind Quetzaquatl, the king of seas. The king of seas breathed upon the flat green grass of a young earth and what came of the breath of a titan was Rollo de Pollo. Nectar and Ambrosia - Rollo de Pollo. One in the same, like the Holy Trinity. Holy Trinity? One short. Missing one cruical key. Holy Quadrology: Father, Son, Holy Ghost, and Rollo de Pollo. It can be found on any dollar store shelf, in any cupboard, on any street corner, in any knapsack, in any cauldron. Rollo de Pollo is Jesus teaching man how to fish.
Go to the dollar store, buy Rollo de Pollo, and eat it until you feel the Earth Mother's seed of happiness and fertility well within your very being. Wallow in the glory of the Rollo, and repent at the majest of the Pollo.
For ye of uneducated levels of faith, Rollo de Pollo is the mexican chicken version of SPAM. It's tastes like it should taste given its name, but oh, how glorious the IDEA of it is.
Go to the dollar store, buy Rollo de Pollo, and eat it until you feel the Earth Mother's seed of happiness and fertility well within your very being. Wallow in the glory of the Rollo, and repent at the majest of the Pollo.
For ye of uneducated levels of faith, Rollo de Pollo is the mexican chicken version of SPAM. It's tastes like it should taste given its name, but oh, how glorious the IDEA of it is.
6/26/06
Blogging is hard, and not fun.
At least I'm not passive-aggressive about it. Most days I can't think of anything interesting to type. This blog isn't meant to be informative, or a resource, so unlike the other 10,000,000,000,000 blogs that are out there, there is absolutely no reason for people to keep returning to this page. Maybe people aren't. Maybe that's my problem. Maybe I am like a lost blind prophet, preaching to the squirrels and the trees in the forest, imagining in my head that there are thousands of faithful sitting silently listening to my every word, so captivated they cannot utter one phrase. In actuality, I am dirty, naked, and hungry, telling a large oak about the evolution of mankind and how rotating magnetic fields have kept us alive for millions of centuries, or something. My point is, senseless ramblings are not material, they are ramblings. One cannot build a religion on the philosophical equivalent of a cat feces.
6/24/06
Photography is not for amateurs.
I like to troll the photo postings that people put online to share their lives with their friends, and strangers for that matter. The emergence of sites like www.ofoto.com has deluded people into thinking there is something intrinsically interesting about their lives. Take for example the man who posts hundreds of pictures of his toy poodle, Sassafrass. Sassafrass is a sickly-looking rat dog that quivers at the sight of anyone other than it's owner and is at risk of falling into the garbage disposal. Sassafrass' owner, however, thinks that the world needs to be introduced to the modeling prowess of Sassafrass and so he puts up hundreds of photographs of Sassafrass in myriad poses. Sassafrass at the beach. Sassafrass going to the post office. Sassafrass at the dentist. You get the idea. Descriptively titled photographs that are intended to share your life with the world, when in actuality you are just building a case-file for any hitman who ever has to come kill you. He'll know where you are most of the time, who you hang out with, and which pair of jeans are your favorite.
Another interesting observation I have had scanning all these pictures is what I call the "sinking ship" syndrome, or the Titanic syndrome. Since the Titanic disaster is far away enough in history, we can make funny syndromes out of it. We can get a little chuckle. It'll be like in 30 years when someone on the Dallas Cowboys makes a good tackle on a wide receiver the announcers will say "That guy went down like the Twin Towers!" in reference to the receiver crumpling like a bag of laundry under the steroid-ridden body of a draft pick out of Nebraska. ANYWAY, the sinking ship syndrome is this behavior you see people perform when they are all sitting at tables and trying to pose for a picture. A group of people seated around a three-dimensional object does not make for good two-dimensional photography, so the people on the ends of the table closest to the photographer lean back away from the camera to try to fit in. Because they lean, everyone else at the table leans, until it looks like you're taking a picture on a sinking ship, with everyone going "Whoooa! Hold on! We're sinking! Snap a picture Ted! Snap a fucking pictureeeeee!" It also looks like the pictures that get taken of you at the log ride at Disneyland. As it drops, everyone leans back as if to say "I don't want to go down this waterfall!" But the affirming flash of the camera says "You're going down the waterfall buddy. And here's your proof!"
People should start posting more pictures of meaningful things. The pictures don't have to be good. If you give good context to a badly taken photo, it can still be amazing. I think it would be sweet if some guy took a picture of his old porn collection and titled it "Longest relationship I've ever been in." That's some deep shit. Or a wife who takes a picture of her husband asleep and the caption says "This is the only time I can stand him." People could send some serious messages with their amateur photography, but instead Sassafrass gets slapped into a pink sweater and put on a pair of Barbie doll skis and we get "Sassafrass hits the slopes."
Another interesting observation I have had scanning all these pictures is what I call the "sinking ship" syndrome, or the Titanic syndrome. Since the Titanic disaster is far away enough in history, we can make funny syndromes out of it. We can get a little chuckle. It'll be like in 30 years when someone on the Dallas Cowboys makes a good tackle on a wide receiver the announcers will say "That guy went down like the Twin Towers!" in reference to the receiver crumpling like a bag of laundry under the steroid-ridden body of a draft pick out of Nebraska. ANYWAY, the sinking ship syndrome is this behavior you see people perform when they are all sitting at tables and trying to pose for a picture. A group of people seated around a three-dimensional object does not make for good two-dimensional photography, so the people on the ends of the table closest to the photographer lean back away from the camera to try to fit in. Because they lean, everyone else at the table leans, until it looks like you're taking a picture on a sinking ship, with everyone going "Whoooa! Hold on! We're sinking! Snap a picture Ted! Snap a fucking pictureeeeee!" It also looks like the pictures that get taken of you at the log ride at Disneyland. As it drops, everyone leans back as if to say "I don't want to go down this waterfall!" But the affirming flash of the camera says "You're going down the waterfall buddy. And here's your proof!"
People should start posting more pictures of meaningful things. The pictures don't have to be good. If you give good context to a badly taken photo, it can still be amazing. I think it would be sweet if some guy took a picture of his old porn collection and titled it "Longest relationship I've ever been in." That's some deep shit. Or a wife who takes a picture of her husband asleep and the caption says "This is the only time I can stand him." People could send some serious messages with their amateur photography, but instead Sassafrass gets slapped into a pink sweater and put on a pair of Barbie doll skis and we get "Sassafrass hits the slopes."
6/20/06
Low Comedy
It has come to my attention, as many things do, that there are only two forces left in contemporary low comedy. We should begin our examination with a reminder of what low comedy is. High comedy, by contrary, is an intellectual approach, often tapered with "serious" subject matter. Wes Anderson makes high comedy. The Squid and the Whale was high comedy. We're talking about stuff that isn't that.
Today's movie going audiences have two camps they can turn to for their low comedy. The Frat Pack and Sandler & Co. Both groups are made up primarily of Second City and SNL alumni and both make big money movies.
The Frat pack is led by Will Ferrell. While he has made small investigatory excursions into other fare (Melinda and Melinda...) he is most remembered for his Frat Pack collaborations. With supporting players Ben Stiller, the Wilson brothers, Steve Carrell, Paul Rudd, David Koechner and more, his movies like Anchorman, Zoolander, and the upcoming Tallegada Nights seem to set the tone for our expectations in modern low comedy.
The other camp, Sandler & Co. includes David Spade, Rob Schneider, Jon Lovitz and a few legitimate Hollywood weirdos like Christopher Walken and Steve Buschemi. Films like Happy Gilmour, Billy Madison, and Big Daddy have cemented this camp into another formidable force in low comedy. Their upcoming summer films, Click and Benchwarmers, are sure to make money and fuel many drunken quoting sessions.
A third force used to exist. Jim Carrey, with his mid-90s hits like Ace Ventura, The Mask and Dumb & Dumber set himself as a one-man comedy camp. Unfortunately for Carrey, his legitimate aspirations such as the Truman Show and Man on the Moon took him out of the low comedy spotlight and by the turn of the century, when we thought Jim Carrey, we thought The Majestic. Despite the quality of his legitimate acting in films like Eternal Sunshine, Carrey has lost touch with his low comedy fanbase and has failed to reconnect with the younger crowd, releasing latte-pandering fare like Fun with Dick and Jane.
What interests me the most about the low comedy camps is where and how actors can cross boundries. Craig Kilborn, who was great in a self-deprecating turn in the Frat Pack's Old School, will be seen in Sandler and Co.'s Benchwarmers this summer. Sandler and Co. scooped a big winner with Napoleon Dynamite's comic title actor Jon Header, also to star in Benchwarmers, but it seems that Header's ambitions are too great for one camp alone and he has already been cast alongside Will Ferrell in the as-of-now filming Blades of Glory.
Where will low comedy go from here? While it is unlikely that we'll see a true Adam Sandler and Will Ferrell crossover it seems that comic actors like Carrey may have the right idea, at least in terms of career move. Carrey will co-star alongside Ben Stiller in 2007's low comedy Used Guys, to be directed by Jay Roach who (still following?) worked with Sasha Baron Cohen (making a mainstream turn in Talledega Nights) on Borat. This will allow Carrey the chance to connect himself once again to the low comedy world and hopefully we'll see him soon in a true ensemble Frat Pack film. Sandler & Co. on the other hand have used the strategy of swinging serious actors into their pictures to great success (aside from Walken and Buschemi, we've seen Kathy Bates in The Waterboy and Jack Nicholson in Anger Management). Expect this trend to continue.
Slightly nuanced approaches to the same end product: highly consumable low comedy. Popcorn fare which makes money for studios and keeps their comic actors in our minds. Because you can't sell a low comedy without a recognizable star. And thanks to the efforts made by both camps, their stars should retain recognizability for a bit longer.
Today's movie going audiences have two camps they can turn to for their low comedy. The Frat Pack and Sandler & Co. Both groups are made up primarily of Second City and SNL alumni and both make big money movies.
The Frat pack is led by Will Ferrell. While he has made small investigatory excursions into other fare (Melinda and Melinda...) he is most remembered for his Frat Pack collaborations. With supporting players Ben Stiller, the Wilson brothers, Steve Carrell, Paul Rudd, David Koechner and more, his movies like Anchorman, Zoolander, and the upcoming Tallegada Nights seem to set the tone for our expectations in modern low comedy.
The other camp, Sandler & Co. includes David Spade, Rob Schneider, Jon Lovitz and a few legitimate Hollywood weirdos like Christopher Walken and Steve Buschemi. Films like Happy Gilmour, Billy Madison, and Big Daddy have cemented this camp into another formidable force in low comedy. Their upcoming summer films, Click and Benchwarmers, are sure to make money and fuel many drunken quoting sessions.
A third force used to exist. Jim Carrey, with his mid-90s hits like Ace Ventura, The Mask and Dumb & Dumber set himself as a one-man comedy camp. Unfortunately for Carrey, his legitimate aspirations such as the Truman Show and Man on the Moon took him out of the low comedy spotlight and by the turn of the century, when we thought Jim Carrey, we thought The Majestic. Despite the quality of his legitimate acting in films like Eternal Sunshine, Carrey has lost touch with his low comedy fanbase and has failed to reconnect with the younger crowd, releasing latte-pandering fare like Fun with Dick and Jane.
What interests me the most about the low comedy camps is where and how actors can cross boundries. Craig Kilborn, who was great in a self-deprecating turn in the Frat Pack's Old School, will be seen in Sandler and Co.'s Benchwarmers this summer. Sandler and Co. scooped a big winner with Napoleon Dynamite's comic title actor Jon Header, also to star in Benchwarmers, but it seems that Header's ambitions are too great for one camp alone and he has already been cast alongside Will Ferrell in the as-of-now filming Blades of Glory.
Where will low comedy go from here? While it is unlikely that we'll see a true Adam Sandler and Will Ferrell crossover it seems that comic actors like Carrey may have the right idea, at least in terms of career move. Carrey will co-star alongside Ben Stiller in 2007's low comedy Used Guys, to be directed by Jay Roach who (still following?) worked with Sasha Baron Cohen (making a mainstream turn in Talledega Nights) on Borat. This will allow Carrey the chance to connect himself once again to the low comedy world and hopefully we'll see him soon in a true ensemble Frat Pack film. Sandler & Co. on the other hand have used the strategy of swinging serious actors into their pictures to great success (aside from Walken and Buschemi, we've seen Kathy Bates in The Waterboy and Jack Nicholson in Anger Management). Expect this trend to continue.
Slightly nuanced approaches to the same end product: highly consumable low comedy. Popcorn fare which makes money for studios and keeps their comic actors in our minds. Because you can't sell a low comedy without a recognizable star. And thanks to the efforts made by both camps, their stars should retain recognizability for a bit longer.
6/17/06
Shotgun Weddin'
Today we were headed to one of those famous Las Vegas shows put on by a French circus troupe when I saw a big wedding party standing on the sidewalk. They were smiling, having a great time. The bride was dressed all in white, surrounded by her bridesmaids. They were all drinking Bud Light and smoking cigarettes. It was picture-perfect. The proud father standing in his cutoff t-shirt and cowboy hat, making an off-handed comment about the "uncomfortable" amount of "foreigners" in Las Vegas. Various other family members were chasing cars and breathing through oxygen regulators. Yet others were navigating the masses of people as best they could with a small joystick and a cart with some liberating title like "Rascal" or "FunMobile."
When I was at the performance, there was a large group of people similar to the wedding party sitting in front of me. They were talking much louder than they had to, tipping me off that alcohol might be involved in the equation. The performance was "asian-themed" if that is even a word, or a theme, or anything, so the actors/acrobats were'nt speaking English. To be fair, I don't think they were speaking Mandarin or Thai or Malay either. I think they were speaking a gibberish language just intended to sound like something slightly Asian to 99% of the audience. Anyway, the people seated in front of me immediately began to express their displeasure with the show. They were overly loud about their displeasure, causing numerous hushings from the other audience members and theater employees. They finally chose to leave on their own free will, stating upon departure "This fuckin' sucks, I thought it would be in English." The tickets for this show, at least face value, were $150. These people, "fuckin' rednecks" as my brother so eloquently called them, spent over $1000 on tickets for their group, and all left after 30 minutes because the actors weren't speaking a language they could understand. I'm sure after the show they felt like complete asses when they found out nobody in the audience understood the show. Complete asses.
Ok, who am I kidding. They hit the slots, kept drinking, were kicked out of the casino, and were beat by the police. But a man can dream about the intellectual conversion of others. He can hope and dream.
When I was at the performance, there was a large group of people similar to the wedding party sitting in front of me. They were talking much louder than they had to, tipping me off that alcohol might be involved in the equation. The performance was "asian-themed" if that is even a word, or a theme, or anything, so the actors/acrobats were'nt speaking English. To be fair, I don't think they were speaking Mandarin or Thai or Malay either. I think they were speaking a gibberish language just intended to sound like something slightly Asian to 99% of the audience. Anyway, the people seated in front of me immediately began to express their displeasure with the show. They were overly loud about their displeasure, causing numerous hushings from the other audience members and theater employees. They finally chose to leave on their own free will, stating upon departure "This fuckin' sucks, I thought it would be in English." The tickets for this show, at least face value, were $150. These people, "fuckin' rednecks" as my brother so eloquently called them, spent over $1000 on tickets for their group, and all left after 30 minutes because the actors weren't speaking a language they could understand. I'm sure after the show they felt like complete asses when they found out nobody in the audience understood the show. Complete asses.
Ok, who am I kidding. They hit the slots, kept drinking, were kicked out of the casino, and were beat by the police. But a man can dream about the intellectual conversion of others. He can hope and dream.
6/16/06
Bicycle Soul
A few nights ago I was out at a wine bar in town and as I left with my friends, I got to partake in the following conversation:
Friend 1: "Gosh, I wish I still had my bike!"
Friend 2: "Did you ever give it a name?"
Friend 1: "No! Do bikes have souls?"
Me: "You don't need a soul to have a name. His wife doesn't call him 'Mr. Vice-President' you know."
What got me thinking was the quip that I made. I'm researching political humour right now and my own joke took me back. I had participated, unconsciously, in the trivialization of political figures which I believe is diminishing legitimate political discourse. Certainly it is likely that Dick Cheney has no soul, but to automatically target a politician with a meaningless joke is to propagate the kind of attitude which helps the Daily Show to be the most popular "smart" comedy on TV. It isn't smart and it isn't political; the Daily Show does not require viewers to know anything about currents events or politics. The jokes are as topical as anything the late great Milton Berle constructed in his Altzheimer haze (Hey everybody, what do you think of the Tea Kettle Scandal huh? That President Harding sure has a head that looks like a tea kettle, ho ho ho).
My point is that political humour is a very effective tool for informing discourse, but that the form it takes in today's mainstream is vulgar and uninformative. Things without souls sure as hell do have names. The Daily Show is a name. Son of a bitch.
Friend 1: "Gosh, I wish I still had my bike!"
Friend 2: "Did you ever give it a name?"
Friend 1: "No! Do bikes have souls?"
Me: "You don't need a soul to have a name. His wife doesn't call him 'Mr. Vice-President' you know."
What got me thinking was the quip that I made. I'm researching political humour right now and my own joke took me back. I had participated, unconsciously, in the trivialization of political figures which I believe is diminishing legitimate political discourse. Certainly it is likely that Dick Cheney has no soul, but to automatically target a politician with a meaningless joke is to propagate the kind of attitude which helps the Daily Show to be the most popular "smart" comedy on TV. It isn't smart and it isn't political; the Daily Show does not require viewers to know anything about currents events or politics. The jokes are as topical as anything the late great Milton Berle constructed in his Altzheimer haze (Hey everybody, what do you think of the Tea Kettle Scandal huh? That President Harding sure has a head that looks like a tea kettle, ho ho ho).
My point is that political humour is a very effective tool for informing discourse, but that the form it takes in today's mainstream is vulgar and uninformative. Things without souls sure as hell do have names. The Daily Show is a name. Son of a bitch.
Dedication.
Dedication to a journalistic ideal. That ideal: providing nonsensical semi-journalistic quips about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness through the lens that I, Drew, view the world swirling around us. Currently the world swirling around me is called Sin City. I am in Las Vegas, the city where you can spend $50 on a bad hooker or a good steak, you take the pick and you take the consequences.
My initial observations in the airport about people travelling to Las Vegas were pretty dismal. A group of sad-looking, aging, over-tanned women with their hip Abercrombie cowboy hats and over-sequined flip-flops were spending a lot of time loudly talking about the clubs and all the guys they would meet. Me, being a guy, thought "you're not going to meet any guys." So, to let them know what I thought, I wrote that sentence on the napkin that came with my peanuts and I dropped it casually on the tray in front of them as I walked by. I know they got the message because they quickly hushed their conversation, and one of them began to cry about how she was never going to get married or have babies. Me, being a guy, thought "you're never going to get married and have babies," but she already knew that, and I was only given one napkin anyway.
My first trip through the casino/hotel revealed to me that despite the "unique" theme of this particular casino/hotel, it was exactly like every other casino/hotel in Las Vegas, and indeed, in the entire world. (I have not actually been to all casino/hotels in the entire world, but if you read the blog, my propensity for gross generalization should not be a surprise to you at this point.) What was pretty remarkable about the situation is the new card system they have for slot machines. I saw a small Asian man with a lanyard attached to his jacket that was attached to a card stuck into a slot machine, and he was yanking away, shooting for that new Dodge Viper! I'm pretty sure that puppy just saps your room account, which is pretty much like gambling for free, because you're probably paying for your room on a credit card.
There are also malls inside every casino, and inside these malls are super-hip clothing stores where guys have their hair combed into mohawks and the girls have so much makeup on that they start to look like shit again. They have cool, hip names like "X-S" and "Streetz" and they sell underwear for $500 and screen printed t-shirts with a couple colors and picture of a bumble bee for $1000. I almost bought the bumble bee shirt because it was badass, but the guy behind the counter starting going off about how nobody had ever heard of the band that was playing in the store except him and his friends, so I walked over and punched him in the face. Now I can't go back to the Aladdin, but that hotel sucks anyway.
My initial observations in the airport about people travelling to Las Vegas were pretty dismal. A group of sad-looking, aging, over-tanned women with their hip Abercrombie cowboy hats and over-sequined flip-flops were spending a lot of time loudly talking about the clubs and all the guys they would meet. Me, being a guy, thought "you're not going to meet any guys." So, to let them know what I thought, I wrote that sentence on the napkin that came with my peanuts and I dropped it casually on the tray in front of them as I walked by. I know they got the message because they quickly hushed their conversation, and one of them began to cry about how she was never going to get married or have babies. Me, being a guy, thought "you're never going to get married and have babies," but she already knew that, and I was only given one napkin anyway.
My first trip through the casino/hotel revealed to me that despite the "unique" theme of this particular casino/hotel, it was exactly like every other casino/hotel in Las Vegas, and indeed, in the entire world. (I have not actually been to all casino/hotels in the entire world, but if you read the blog, my propensity for gross generalization should not be a surprise to you at this point.) What was pretty remarkable about the situation is the new card system they have for slot machines. I saw a small Asian man with a lanyard attached to his jacket that was attached to a card stuck into a slot machine, and he was yanking away, shooting for that new Dodge Viper! I'm pretty sure that puppy just saps your room account, which is pretty much like gambling for free, because you're probably paying for your room on a credit card.
There are also malls inside every casino, and inside these malls are super-hip clothing stores where guys have their hair combed into mohawks and the girls have so much makeup on that they start to look like shit again. They have cool, hip names like "X-S" and "Streetz" and they sell underwear for $500 and screen printed t-shirts with a couple colors and picture of a bumble bee for $1000. I almost bought the bumble bee shirt because it was badass, but the guy behind the counter starting going off about how nobody had ever heard of the band that was playing in the store except him and his friends, so I walked over and punched him in the face. Now I can't go back to the Aladdin, but that hotel sucks anyway.
6/15/06
Explosive Expansiveness.
What a good title. Nothing like having no idea what you are going to write about so just starting with a good title. Nothing like having every sentence end with the word "title". Nothing like beginning every sentence with the word "nothing", or ending every sentence with the word "nothing". What about a one word sentence? Nothing. There is nothing to say about a one word sentence that only has the message "nothing." You can say nothing by just saying "nothing". Can you learn anything by reading nothing? Let's break it down. No-thing. By saying "nothing" you are being redundant. Would you walk around all day, remarking to every passerby, "I am walking around, doing nothing?" No, you would simply say nothing. You would let your actions be determined by their interpretation, you would have no need to give a title. "I am sitting" would quickly get annoying if you were just explaining the fact that you are, in fact, not standing. People would stop talking to you.
I hope I can be an example, to my friends who also maintain this site. I have tried, as I tend to do, to do what I can to draw their eye to the fact that I blog so much, and they, so little. Dan got a new bike, a shiny new bike. As black as the night, a shiny new bike. "Blog about the bike!" I would say, if I was a man who dealt with my problems directly.
I leave tomorrow for Las Vegas, a family vacation that should be interesting considering the city prides itself on being markedly un-family. There are not family rates at strip clubs. You would get a look if you were breast-feeding a child at the no-limit poker tables. I shall takes pictures of any sad saps I see, and show them so that we may all marvel at how truly devastating gambling addiction can be.
I have a bad habit of just typing the word "and" whenever I am starting a short word that starts with "a." But I edit, so you would never see this unless I told you about it. That is what a blog is for; I share my secrets.
I hope I can be an example, to my friends who also maintain this site. I have tried, as I tend to do, to do what I can to draw their eye to the fact that I blog so much, and they, so little. Dan got a new bike, a shiny new bike. As black as the night, a shiny new bike. "Blog about the bike!" I would say, if I was a man who dealt with my problems directly.
I leave tomorrow for Las Vegas, a family vacation that should be interesting considering the city prides itself on being markedly un-family. There are not family rates at strip clubs. You would get a look if you were breast-feeding a child at the no-limit poker tables. I shall takes pictures of any sad saps I see, and show them so that we may all marvel at how truly devastating gambling addiction can be.
I have a bad habit of just typing the word "and" whenever I am starting a short word that starts with "a." But I edit, so you would never see this unless I told you about it. That is what a blog is for; I share my secrets.
6/11/06
Don't own a home.
I am helping relatives move from Phoenix to Idaho. I think it is ironic that Matt is blogging about garage sales, because these people desperately need to have one. Moving their boxes and miscellaneous household items has been a history lesson in infomertial and home-shopping crazes from the past twenty years. There were Dr. Phil self-help tapes, Ab-Rollers, and anything else that was invented to not work for anything except to rip people off. My aunt and uncle have purchased it all. The worst part is that they want to keep it all. I hauled things out of their garage that are not identifiable. It was like digging an artifact from an ancient culture out of the earth. Some of these things have absolutely no discernable function whatsoever. Plastic tubes connected with hardened rubber cords with a non-descriptive name like "UltraMax 2000" screen-printed onto what looks like a seat of somekind, though one is sure if they sat upon this so called "UltraMax" it would snap shut like a beartrap, claiming any captured limbs as its bounty. Objects that at one point in history probably fetched hundreds, if not thousands, of hard-earned dollars, and these things are now lying twisted and mangled in dark garage corners like the corpses of families covered with molten ash when the volcano erupted upon their village.
Things only got worse when their children began to pack. These kids were dumping things into boxes without any regard for organization or packing effciency. Socks in a box with hockey skates and loose change. Water guns with bicycle helmets and pet hamsters. You would have thought I had just punched one of them in the face when I inquired about possibly donating a toy rather than packing it into the box. Toys, upon further questioning, the READILY ADMITTED to not playing with for at least a year, and several toys that they could not even confidently identify as to its entertainment function. Many of these "toys" were half-toy carcasses that should just be gathered onto a space shuttle and shot into the Sun, so useless are they to mankind.
My children will be given Legos and only Legos. You want a toy car? Build it your goddamn self.
Things only got worse when their children began to pack. These kids were dumping things into boxes without any regard for organization or packing effciency. Socks in a box with hockey skates and loose change. Water guns with bicycle helmets and pet hamsters. You would have thought I had just punched one of them in the face when I inquired about possibly donating a toy rather than packing it into the box. Toys, upon further questioning, the READILY ADMITTED to not playing with for at least a year, and several toys that they could not even confidently identify as to its entertainment function. Many of these "toys" were half-toy carcasses that should just be gathered onto a space shuttle and shot into the Sun, so useless are they to mankind.
My children will be given Legos and only Legos. You want a toy car? Build it your goddamn self.
6/10/06
Garage Sale
Today it came to my attention, as many things do (through general revelation), that Garage Sales are a beautiful American institution. One of the primary values upon which our country supposedly functions is the right to free enterprise. The blood of the entreprenuer (who invented spell czech?) runs rich in our cholesterol choked veins. I would argue that Garage Sales are a beautiful part of what it means to be an American.
Anyone with a home can (and inevitably will) hold a garage sale at some point in their lives. The garage itself is not even a requisite for this ceremony. Many garage sales are infact held on lawns rather than in garages. This lets the goods air out. And lord knows some of these vendings need the air. A garage sale is a chance for you to get rid of shit that has been in your posession for no good reason for far too long. That battery charger that doesn't work, those beta-max tapes, the macaroni noodle picture frame Junior made at camp before he went to juvie.
This most recent garage sale I attended was selling a piece of shit bike which has been sawed apart and put back together into a monstrosity that can only be described as "giraffe-like". One of my companions bought it out of irony, but I know that he intends to fix it up. Maybe one day he'll sell it at his own garage sale. God dammit, it's beautiful.
Anyone with a home can (and inevitably will) hold a garage sale at some point in their lives. The garage itself is not even a requisite for this ceremony. Many garage sales are infact held on lawns rather than in garages. This lets the goods air out. And lord knows some of these vendings need the air. A garage sale is a chance for you to get rid of shit that has been in your posession for no good reason for far too long. That battery charger that doesn't work, those beta-max tapes, the macaroni noodle picture frame Junior made at camp before he went to juvie.
This most recent garage sale I attended was selling a piece of shit bike which has been sawed apart and put back together into a monstrosity that can only be described as "giraffe-like". One of my companions bought it out of irony, but I know that he intends to fix it up. Maybe one day he'll sell it at his own garage sale. God dammit, it's beautiful.
6/9/06
this is what happened
It was time immemorial and all the stopwatches had stopped clicking a rythym that any of us even tried to understand, it was weird being as two and having one more suddenly in the room. I stared at the ocean and it raised breathlessly or rather effortlessly, as effortless as a breath and me on a cliff witnessed the whole pacific ocean exhale as the mighty lung that it is. We are taught as children that the oceans are 75% of the earth's surface and from space the oceans are what me believe visually at least that the earth is a living planet, and there it is boom, they are lungs, lung take in air, filter it and keep us alive, peep that alveoli fish, yum dude thanks for your crevices.
All that politics is is people seeing how long they can hold on to ideals before turning to dark sides and then in turn how long they can keep the wool over people's eyes even when they have embraced the darkness. But way better than Star Wars, that's why I love non-fiction, william jefferson, but what about ted kennedy, he has drank himself back into idealism and that my friends is a beautiful thing.
I am pulling hard for Togo in the world cup.
All that politics is is people seeing how long they can hold on to ideals before turning to dark sides and then in turn how long they can keep the wool over people's eyes even when they have embraced the darkness. But way better than Star Wars, that's why I love non-fiction, william jefferson, but what about ted kennedy, he has drank himself back into idealism and that my friends is a beautiful thing.
I am pulling hard for Togo in the world cup.
6/8/06
My brain thinks up stories.
I am going to share a dream I had last night with all of you, mainly because it's one of the weirdest dreams I've had in a long time. Also, it is now officially a recurring dream, so that makes it special. A celebration is in order.
Dream:
I am at my school, Whitman College, and all the buildings are about three times their normal size and height. The library is about the size of the Seattle Public Library, etc. As I wander through campus with some friends, I notice that there is an unusually large amount of people gathering near the the athletic center, which is roughly the size of a large office building. Thousands of people are gathered around, many of them running past me to see what is going on around the corner. For some reason, I don't follow the crowd, and instead go into the library and look at children's books, and then I browse the gift shop.(Whitman's library has no gift shop, only a crappy coffee dispenser and an old microwave for heating up frozen burritos) My curiosity gets the best of me, but for whatever reason I don't want to leave the library so I ride an elevator up several stories until my line of sight clears the athletic center and I can see what the large crowd is gathering for. It turns out the crowd has gathered to see a rather large, living dinosaur. It looks like a Tyrannosaurus Rex, but is again about three times larger, making it tower over the buildings around it and making the people gathered below it look like ants. The thing about this dinosaur is that it doesn't look really natural. It looks like it is a totem pole dinosaur...like it was illustrated by a native American from the Pacific Northwest.
So, this strange looking dinosaur is PISSED that it is on display for thousands of gawkers. As only happens in dreams, the second I notice that the dinosaur is secured rather poorly with a surprisingly thin rope around its neck, the rope breaks. The people don't seem to mind. They keep gawking. I am standing on the 30th floor of the huge library, and the dinosaur, as only happens in dreams, looks directly at me and beings to approach the library, completely ignoring the thousands of people who are still calmly watching the dinosaur leave the secured area and start charging a building. I immediately panic and do what anyone else would do who was in an elevator staring at an oversized dinosaur charging at them. I hit "B" on the elevator's glowing buttons, and the elevator carried me to the basement of the library. I started walking down a concrete hallway lit by dim and flickering fluorescent lights, and I wake up.
Dream:
I am at my school, Whitman College, and all the buildings are about three times their normal size and height. The library is about the size of the Seattle Public Library, etc. As I wander through campus with some friends, I notice that there is an unusually large amount of people gathering near the the athletic center, which is roughly the size of a large office building. Thousands of people are gathered around, many of them running past me to see what is going on around the corner. For some reason, I don't follow the crowd, and instead go into the library and look at children's books, and then I browse the gift shop.(Whitman's library has no gift shop, only a crappy coffee dispenser and an old microwave for heating up frozen burritos) My curiosity gets the best of me, but for whatever reason I don't want to leave the library so I ride an elevator up several stories until my line of sight clears the athletic center and I can see what the large crowd is gathering for. It turns out the crowd has gathered to see a rather large, living dinosaur. It looks like a Tyrannosaurus Rex, but is again about three times larger, making it tower over the buildings around it and making the people gathered below it look like ants. The thing about this dinosaur is that it doesn't look really natural. It looks like it is a totem pole dinosaur...like it was illustrated by a native American from the Pacific Northwest.
So, this strange looking dinosaur is PISSED that it is on display for thousands of gawkers. As only happens in dreams, the second I notice that the dinosaur is secured rather poorly with a surprisingly thin rope around its neck, the rope breaks. The people don't seem to mind. They keep gawking. I am standing on the 30th floor of the huge library, and the dinosaur, as only happens in dreams, looks directly at me and beings to approach the library, completely ignoring the thousands of people who are still calmly watching the dinosaur leave the secured area and start charging a building. I immediately panic and do what anyone else would do who was in an elevator staring at an oversized dinosaur charging at them. I hit "B" on the elevator's glowing buttons, and the elevator carried me to the basement of the library. I started walking down a concrete hallway lit by dim and flickering fluorescent lights, and I wake up.
6/6/06
Vampires are tools.
I am watching the first Blade movie on TV right now. Blade paints a non-flattering picture of the modern vampire, but Blade is by no means unique in this portrayal. There was that movie Underworld, and I think Tokyo Drift is about vampires, but I just assume that because of all the leather and Japanese people.
The modern media vampire has really become more of a fashion and sex icon than a terrifying mythical creature. The vampires in these movies are leather-clad, makeup-wearing, martini-drinking dandies. They seem to be more concerned with what kind of product they use in their hair rather than taking over the human race. They don't even listen to good techno music. They listen to Rob Zombie remixes. They lounge around on couches and talk about taking over the human race, and when they eventually devise a scheme, it's never something logical like "since we're immortal, let's just work it so that we get a vampire in charge of every major corporation and country in the world." It's always some scheme that has to do with bringing a "blood god" to earth. It's like a bunch of stoners sitting in the living room and devising a hair-brained plan to acquire 22 pizzas with $5. It's pretty much doomed from the beginning, but god help you if you try to stop them.
When did vampires become metrosexual supermodels? I think it started with that movie starring Tom Cruise, Interview With A Vampire. That presented a dandy victorian vampire that floofed around high society nipping people on the neck and shouting "Oh dear" whenever blood got on his ruffled collar. As a result, goths everyone have taken inspiration from these films to get their cheap fashion ideas. Though most goths (at least the teenage ones hanging around outside of Coffee Perk that act deviant) are about as dangerous as a Beanie Baby. The vampire needs some serious re-thinking.
The modern media vampire has really become more of a fashion and sex icon than a terrifying mythical creature. The vampires in these movies are leather-clad, makeup-wearing, martini-drinking dandies. They seem to be more concerned with what kind of product they use in their hair rather than taking over the human race. They don't even listen to good techno music. They listen to Rob Zombie remixes. They lounge around on couches and talk about taking over the human race, and when they eventually devise a scheme, it's never something logical like "since we're immortal, let's just work it so that we get a vampire in charge of every major corporation and country in the world." It's always some scheme that has to do with bringing a "blood god" to earth. It's like a bunch of stoners sitting in the living room and devising a hair-brained plan to acquire 22 pizzas with $5. It's pretty much doomed from the beginning, but god help you if you try to stop them.
When did vampires become metrosexual supermodels? I think it started with that movie starring Tom Cruise, Interview With A Vampire. That presented a dandy victorian vampire that floofed around high society nipping people on the neck and shouting "Oh dear" whenever blood got on his ruffled collar. As a result, goths everyone have taken inspiration from these films to get their cheap fashion ideas. Though most goths (at least the teenage ones hanging around outside of Coffee Perk that act deviant) are about as dangerous as a Beanie Baby. The vampire needs some serious re-thinking.
6/5/06
Mama didn't raise no fool.
I lived in a house with ten other guys, ten other cool guys who I enjoyed spending my time with. Everyone had their little quirks and entertaining hobbies. Everyone had their pet peeves and distinct method of pissing on the toilet seat. You know you have lived with a group of guys too long when you can identify their respective laundry when you haul it half-dry out of the drier and dump it onto the floor.
Over graduation weekend I noticed another strange trend with all of these guys; everyone has a cool mom. Every mom I talked too was outgoing, fun, and almost overly talkative. Not to say that these moms are without their own personal quirks; on the contrary I think that the moms most likely have deeper, darker quirks that gave rise to more sociable versions in their sons. Aaron spends a lot of his time around the house naked, so I can only assume that Mrs. Mandel has a rather lax clothing policy when she goes to the grocery store or to pick up something from the post office.
Over graduation weekend I noticed another strange trend with all of these guys; everyone has a cool mom. Every mom I talked too was outgoing, fun, and almost overly talkative. Not to say that these moms are without their own personal quirks; on the contrary I think that the moms most likely have deeper, darker quirks that gave rise to more sociable versions in their sons. Aaron spends a lot of his time around the house naked, so I can only assume that Mrs. Mandel has a rather lax clothing policy when she goes to the grocery store or to pick up something from the post office.
6/3/06
The Crazy Dog Man
The other night was the birthday of Ryan Goeden, a friend of mine from school who I have always regarded more as an older brother than as a peer. Ryan runs what he calls a successful business. Ryan runs what I call a successful pyramid scheme. He takes my categorization of his work lightly...mainly because he makes more money than me. A lot more money than me. Anyway, it was Ryan's birthday, and Ryan wanted to have a bonfire. I have seen Ryan around fires before and he behaves for the most part, so all the friends in Walla Walla agreed to meet up behind our fraternity house's fire pit. The fire was going along great with the exception of a couple dogs making a mess of things by disappearing into the darkness, prompting drunken summons from their owners. Needless to say it was rather shocking to see two more dogs than there should have been emerge from an alley. They looked mean, and attached to the end of their leashes was a bearded gentleman with too-short jean shorts and one of those looks that you see in the eyes of street people and circus performers; you don't really know what's going to happen next, but you know that it's going to be crazy.
"Can I help you?" I asked, assuming that I would get an answer along the lines of "Yeah, can you tell me where my spaceship is?" Surprisingly, he simply stated that he brought his dogs over because they were getting along with my friends' dogs. He hung out for a couple minutes, got his mutts, and left. No problem. No crazy outburst. He didn't pull his penis out. He disn't attack anybody. He went completely against everyone's assumptions, and the reason that we had these assumptions in the first place is that he was exhuding the appearance of crazy. He looked and dressed crazy. We simply stereotyped him. It happens every day.
"Can I help you?" I asked, assuming that I would get an answer along the lines of "Yeah, can you tell me where my spaceship is?" Surprisingly, he simply stated that he brought his dogs over because they were getting along with my friends' dogs. He hung out for a couple minutes, got his mutts, and left. No problem. No crazy outburst. He didn't pull his penis out. He disn't attack anybody. He went completely against everyone's assumptions, and the reason that we had these assumptions in the first place is that he was exhuding the appearance of crazy. He looked and dressed crazy. We simply stereotyped him. It happens every day.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)