Friday, April 29, 2011

Do We Blame the Shit or the Digestive Tract?

"Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." - Chinese Proverb

What a noble, selfless thing it is to provide another person with facts, knowledge, the ability to think and care for himself, and the freedom to eventually pass the knowledge and care onto others. So what happens if you teach a man that the world is flat when you know it is round? What if you teach him Creationism instead of showing him proof of Evolution? What if you teach him to be racist, misogynistic, and homophobic?

You teach him not to think for himself. You've produced an idiot that will believe whatever you say even if what you're saying today is contradictory to the shit you said yesterday. He's too dumb to understand Facts that prove you wrong. And when he has kids he can teach them to be dumber than a bowl of cotton, he being the cotton. It's the GOP, Republicunt, Tea Bagging Agenda: Keep the people as stupid as possible so they will keep voting for the dirty, thieving whores who keep them poor and uncared for.

I can go off on how annoyed I've been listening to the insulting Birther Bullshit, but what makes me really mad - Street Rat Crazy Mad - are the masses of people who bought into it despite the Birth Certificate presented long ago - the people too thick to understand Proof.

Those are the people I hear clapping at Donald Trump's Las Vegas speech from last night. They are the ones who believe in Sarah Palin even after they've heard her speak. They are the ones who voted the Idiot Emperor into the Oval Office in 2004. You want to talk about an illegitimate presidency, let's talk about 2000. It's easy to dislike Paul Ryan and Scott Walker's politics, but it's the people who will vote for them again that scare me. Those who make more than $250,000 and have no soul will want to keep them in office, but those who make less and are unwilling to see that voting for these schmucks means voting to pay more taxes so the rich can get more tax breaks? They are a thumb in the eye. A Not-Done-Evolving-Yet Thumb in the eye.

I'll be honest - part of me hopes that Trump runs for President. It would be the funniest. Election. Ever. But there are so many stupid, stupid people out there, I'm a little worried he would accidentally win or just steal it like Bush did in 2000. It seems that the most successful GOP, Republicunt, Tea Bagging contenders are the ones that wave The Crazy Insane Flag real high. They attract Stupid faster than a Hick on a Slim Jim.

Where are all these ignorant schmucks coming from? This is America. Children are sent to school, and lots of them have parents or someone caring for them when they are NOT in school. How do so many of them manage to avoid learning? How has nearly half of our population gone through the system and come out thicker than a bucket of shit?

Here is a friend's status on Facebook yesterday:
"A kid in my class just used the word "Illinoise" in reference to the state, not the Sufjan Stevens album. #sadface"

I once knew a cop in Chicago whose regular beat was one of the high schools. One day he and his partner arrested two girls for beating a third with a Masterlock on a chain. As the girls sat in handcuffs the officers discussed an article one had read in the newspapers about a woman who called Ticketmaster to purchase tickets for some event. When asked for her billing address, she told the Box Office she lived in New Mexico. The Service Rep said, "Sorry, Ma'am. We don't sell tickets outside the US." She repeated that she lived in NEW Mexico, but the kid still insisted that they do not sell tickets outside the US. She asked for his manager, and after explaining her issue, the manager, too, explained their Foreign Policy. And while the two officers chuckled at the IQ of Ticketmaster representatives, they overheard one of the girls turn to her friend and say, "New Mexico, Old Mexico - What's the difference?"

Sad face indeed. Scared, Sad Face.

Your Racist Friend 



You are the result of 4 billion years of evolutionary success.
Fucking act like it.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

My New Favorite Song Comes with a Freaky Video.

Never heard this one before, but tonight it's my Bedtime Song. Even the video is the kind of movie I'd watch right before going to sleep.

Vast - Pretty When You Cry


When I treat you bad
it always makes you wanna stay.

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished.

As I was cleaning out the cat box a few hours ago, I was thinking how pleasant it's been to to chuckle at the GOP's antics this month instead of becoming enraged. The reaction I had from November 2010 to February 2011 was one of Fear and Loathing. Now it's one of Cautious Comfort and Delight-in-their-Failures Joy. I'm a little giddy at the thought that Maybe the town hall meetings I attended, the petitions I signed, and the emails I sent to state reps helped place the noose around that chubby GOP neck, but there's pure bliss in watching them tighten it themselves, and I can't wait till they step off the chair. I could piss myself, and it would have nothing to do with MS!

So, by all means, 112th United States Congress, continue wasting your time with issues that have nothing to do with creating jobs and bills that you know damn well will be vetoed because of how outrageously damaging they are to women, children, senior citizens, and anyone who doesn't make over $250,000/year. That platform you built your last campaign on was so shoddily built it's caving in on itself. Your lies about Planned Parenthood have led to a glorious backlash, your Union Busting attempts stepped over the line so well that, at least for now, you've ruined yours or anyone's chance of making it happen, and your ridiculous bill to rob the poor to overfeed the bloated and jowly rich is being met with the proper response. And you still haven't created a single new job.

Even The Universe is stepping in with a wicked sense of humor by letting The Trump continue to lead in the polls, and although that doesn't mean he will be the Republican Presidential Candidate amongst the mixed bag of nuts who seem to want their hat the ring, it's still a good indicator of just how well the party is doing. Silly Birthers, proof is for people who understand what proof is! Keep fighting that good fight...

And then I watched The Daily Show. Really, Cliff Stearns?



REALLY?


An attack on 9/11 Responders. The same people who put their own lives at stake to save ours. This is their Thank You. This is your response to the injuries and illnesses they suffered that day. I'd be enjoying the step you seem to be taking off that chair if I weren't so god damned fucking mad. Women, Children, Seniors, anyone who isn't rich, and 9 fucking 11 Responders. Welcome to your New Low, the 9th Circle of Hell. Treachery and Treason, I believe. And don't think I didn't notice "Democrat" Henry Waxman in there. He's one of Them, and he can choke on it too.

How these scumbags can live with themselves is beyond me.

My Gratitude goes out to every 9/11 Responder for his and her heroic deed, my Sorrow goes out to each of their families who lost a loved one, and my Best Wishes are with each one who is surviving and battling an illness contracted that day. May you finally get the proper care you need, and deserve, and are owed. America can never repay its debt to you, but it should try - every fucking day - as hard as it fucking can.

You're a real Cunt, Cliff Stearns. May this deed bring you what you are owed into either end of your digestive tract. You, and everyone you love.

America is Waiting


You are the result of 4 billion years of evolutionary success. 
Fucking act like it.

Monday, April 25, 2011

She's Tabitha, and She's Taking Over.

"Just When I Thought That I Had Seen it All, My Eyes Popped Out, My Dick Got Hard, and I Dropped My Jaw." - Red Hot Chili Peppers

I thought I'd seen it all, till this video. Embedding is blocked so if the link is not working, please go to Youtube.com and look up "3 Year old crying over Justin Bieber."

The surprise I get from this is not the little girl's obsession. It's how young she is. And her wicked sense of humor at minute 4:13. Granted, my first celebrity crush was for Davy Jones when I was only 5, but it wasn't powerful enough to make me cry let alone SOB. For the first four minutes, this girl is inconsolable.

I may not understand What It Is about Justin Bieber, but I still understand. Jason Bateman's nakedness in the movie trailer for The Change-Up reminds me I once wanted to marry him. A love so strong and so true it could only be broken by watching Back to the Future and wanting to marry Michael J. Fox. People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones, and my house is 100% unadulterated glass. I cannot make fun of any girl aching for someone she does not know.

It's a phase I think most girls go through. I know men will admit to having owned THE Farah Faucett poster. Not the same. When I think of Elvis and The Beatles I think of their music and immediately think of the screaming girls. When I think of New Kids on the Block, The Backstreet Boys and the Jonas Brothers, I can only think of the screaming girls because I don't know their music. Perhaps young femme are asked to be more repressed with their sexuality than boys of the same age, so the easiest way to express it is by obsessing over a Teen Idol and decorating her walls with his posters. He will smile at her no matter how bad her hair looks that day. It's a subject close to my heart because I had it BAD, but I have yet to find a name for it so I'm naming it myself, and I'm naming it Tabitha.

I was your average, weird little kid like all little kids when Tabitha Took Over. I was innocently watching Eight is Enough when Ralph Macchio's character was introduced, and my fragile little mind snapped, and I was forced to hand Tabitha my keys. Ralph, Ralph, Ralph, Ralph, Ralph. Till I saw Tristan Rogers on General Hospital. Tristan, Tristan Tristan. Just a blip on my radar till Rocky Horror's Tim Curry shined bright like a light over at the Frankenstein place. But then MTV came to Manhattan Cable, and I got a look at Cheap Trick's lead singer Robin Zander who I replaced five months later with Duran Duran's keyboardist Nick Rhodes, easily the most prominent of my teen idol crushes. It was Duran Duran that wallpapered my bedroom, it was Duran Duran I saw live five times in two months, three times in front row, once in third, and once in tenth, and it was Duran Duran I stood in line for in 1983 at a Tower Records signing. Line is hardly the best term for the mob of girls pushing their way forward hoping to get in before the band was whisked away. Being so very close up front, I learned that the force of that many people pushing forward affects those up front more than those in back who actually were just standing in a line. I was so stunned by the pressure surrounding my body I lifted both feet off the ground at one point just to see what would happen. It was a stupid thing to do, yet I never fell to the ground. That much pressure. The band was escorted out some back exit and when the police let us know the band was really gone, we had to wait for layers of girls to leave before we could go. I will NEVER forget what I saw. There were three cars parked at the curb of the store and they were crushed. Girls had been standing on them hoping to get a glance over our heads and into the store, and they flattened them. FLATTENED. I shit you not. But I digress.

Footloose's Kevin Bacon ended the Nick Rhodes era, followed immediately by the crush on Jason Bateman which ended, or rather, was replaced by Back to the Future's Michael J. Fox which just faded away. Tabitha and I went through her Final Recommendations, she was happy to see that I'd done my Duty as a Teenage Girl, and she mercifully handed me back my keys.

In 2004 I saw The Libertines in Chicago. Being a shorty, I asked my buddy if we could get there early so I could be close to the stage. We were right up at the front except for the four very young girls who were lined side by side protecting their 10 foot span of Front Stage Property in front of John Hassall. When one went to the bathroom, the other three spread out to protect her spot till she came back. My buddy shot me confused looks and them dirty glances. I told him it was OK, that I was the same way when I saw Duran Duran live. The girls turned around to look at me.

"You saw Duran Duran?"
"Yeah, a few times."
"Did they sing Come Undone?" I told you they were young.
"No, this was during their Seven and the Ragged Tiger Tour." That's about twenty years earlier.

These girls who had been banning me from a spot of stage I had no plan to steal from them suddenly worshipped me. I was their hero. Till I told them that John Taylor threw his towel to me and my friend AJ, but she caught it. Now AJ was their hero.

You can ask any woman whose posters and magazine collages dominated her bedroom walls in her teenage years, and there is always an immediate answer. I know only one woman who has denied any teenage obsession, and if she's telling me the truth, I pity her. She's missed out on something. A cognitive step, a rite of passage, a Wild Fucking Ride. One that costs less than cocaine but more than marijuana and causes fewer deaths than drunk driving but perhaps slightly more than roller coasters.

Tabatha is a timeless phenomena. And a Hard Ass Bitch of one at that.

She warned me to keep up the good work because you never know, she might come back. We'll see what happens after the Change-Up ...

I Think I Love You ☯

You must chill. 
I have hidden your keys.

Sunday, April 24, 2011

I Have to Wait Three Months to See Naked Jason Bateman Clutching His Nut Sack and a Mirror to Get a Better Look at His Taint.

A high school friend alerted me to a new Jason Bateman movie by sending me a link to the trailer. We were huge fans of his TV show It's Your Move and still quote from it as often as we quote Arrested Development. Sadly, it's all just a big tease because The Change-Up isn't released until this August. Its premise of two buddies envying each other's lives and then switching bodies in some magical moment isn't original, but Jimmy Crack Corn, and I don't care; the trailer made me laugh. Not that it matters. Jason Bateman was one of my teen idol crushes in the eighties, and his career's resurrection has reminded me of his charm. And how enjoyable it would be to see his bare white ass. Perhaps this is not the best reason to choose to watch a movie, but fuck it. Can you really blame me? Exhibits 1 and 2.

Forty-two years old and happily married but still a little pissy I have to wait three months. I may as well be fifteen again. After twenty-seven years I still wouldn't throw you out of bed for eating crackers, Jason Matthew Michael Bateman Burton Bluth. Perhaps that should be a secret. What the hell. You are the Internet. You can keep a secret...

It's Tough to Have a Crush on You


The mere fact
 that you call 'making love' 'pop pop' 
tells me that you're not ready.

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Who's Your Babysitter?

I have this anal compulsion to organize my music chronologically. Not by the date it was released, but by the date of impact. David Bowie released Space Oddity in July 1969, but when I listen to it I don't recall the summer of '69 or the first moon landing, I recall early spring of 1984 when I finally discovered Changesonebowie. I'm in high school, my bedroom walls are covered in Duran Duran posters, and I am sitting on the floor with the album cover in my lap while the vinyl LP plays on my stereo. I'm also wondering how the hell my very best friend AJ could possibly dislike it. And that song leads me to recall not just the other songs on that album, but the other songs and bands I was listening to those days, the people I was friends with, what I was wearing, what I was doing, blah blah blah. All that from a song - it's like a time capsule. It's brilliant. So for the purpose of time travel, I listen to my music as chronologically as I can. Those of you who stumbled upon this from Blip.Fm may have clicked the link just to see who The Dork is. Perhaps now your question has been answered.

Today I pressed Play on the iPod and the first song, Michael Jackson's Thriller, brought me memories of December '83, the night the video premiered on MTV. I'm pretty sure AJ was camping out for Duran Duran tickets that night, something my mother never would have let me do, so she did the dirty work for us that evening while I ended up babysitting for one of the two families I regularly sat for. Soon John Lennon's posthumously released Nobody Told Me began to play and it took me to the following month when it had its own MTV premiere, and I happened to be sitting for the same family. That memory led to a few thoughts of those two boys who loved Dr. Who, Fraggle Rock, and were just really lovely kids. After harassing myself for not remembering their names, the memory branched off again, and I eventually landed on the other family I sat for - the one with the 2 girls. This is where my time traveling Delorean crashes into The Night I Vowed I'd Never Babysit Again. Oh yes, I had such a babysitter's night. The kind of night that could have turned into Urban Legend if it weren't for the fact that the destiny which rules my life has a strange and fucked up sense of humor.

I got along with this family. I not only sat for the girls, but I had a part time job at the father's dental practice. That man gave me a much needed set of braces for the price of the hardware alone. One hundred bucks for braces. If it weren't for him, I'd have teeth growing out of my eyes. I need to find him on the internet and thank the fuck out of him. My family certainly could not have afforded it otherwise.

On the night in question, the girls and I were in the playroom, which happened to be in the basement, when the parents said their goodbyes and left for the concert they were seeing that evening. An hour later, we moved upstairs for dinner. Up one short flight of steps was the TV room with the Easy to Break Sliding Glass Door that you couldn't see out of when it got dark outside. It led to the Very Dark Yard that didn't have lights. A Homicidal Killer with a Sharp, Bloody Axe could stand at that glass sliding door and stare right at his victim inside innocently watching Friday Night Videos, and she would never be able to see him staring at her because a glance at the glass would only reveal her own reflection. She would never know he was there until the glass broke, and by that time it would be too late.

Up another short flight of stairs was the main floor with everything but the bedrooms which were another flight up. Kitchen, living room, entryway, and front door. But tonight, it wasn't just a front door. It was an Open Front Door. A Halfway Open Fucking Door. What parents leave their two little girls home with a babysitter down two flights of stairs and don't close the front door? No parents do, that's who. At least no New Yorkers do. None that have the common sense to hire a babysitter. So why was the door open on a Dark, Dark Night? Because, clearly, a Homicidal Killer had let himself in, that's why. And he left the door open just to let me know that it was already time to start worrying. Which I did.

Not wanting to alarm the little ones, I heated up their kosher dinner while trying to Take Care of It. I didn't want to call the police from another room, because then the killer would have easy access to hack the poor things while I was gone. I also didn't want them to hear me asking the police to come or why, so I picked up the phone to call my mother and ask her, in Spanish, to call the police for me. Except the line was dead. Dead. Like in the movies Dead. I tapped the thingy where the receiver rests a few times, and finally on the third tap, I got a dial tone. I shit you not. I made the call to Mom, fed the kids, put them to bed, and sat on the stairs that led to the bedrooms while clutching the baseball bat I found in the coat closet, and waited for either the police to show or The Killer to strike. A policeman showed up first. He very kindly checked every corner of the house, found no killer, and suggested that the parents neglected to shut the door all the way causing it to blow open with a little gust of wind.

I think any teen who has ever babysat has experienced that fear of What If. Up till now, if you were one of the lucky ones, there has been some adult in your life protecting you, and now, just for a few hours, you are learning to be the adult, and you are learning to protect someone else, at night, and it is scary. Especially if you like horror movies and you've seen When a Stranger Calls.

The officer's Clean Bill of No Killers in the House left me with an overwhelming sensation of relief and safety. It's the same high you're left with when the doctor tells you your tests came back negative. For the first and last time as a babysitter, I awaited the parents' return with No Fear and a cocky attitude of invincibility. I sat in the TV room watching Friday Night Videos, casually flipping the bird at the sliding glass door. If there was a crazy killer out there tonight, I had already defeated him. Just having the police come by left a force field that blocked the killer's ability to break the glass. Fuck you, Killer. I Win!

That's when the lights in the living room up those stairs turned off.

It wasn't a blown fuse. All the lights would have gone out and the TV would have turned off. The TV was still on, and the entryway light was still on. I could see it from the couch. Just up those few stairs, 2 lights had shut off, and I did not do it.

"DEE!?... RAE!?... Are you out of bed?" I wouldn't have yelled, but I thought they might not hear me from the spot on the couch I was now fused to, paralyzed with fear. No response. Killers don't respond. They wait for you to inspect, and then they tear your face off.

I finally got myself up the stairs and stared at the living room where the two lamps that should still be on were now off. That's when I realized for the first time that the couch they bookended was now pushed away from the wall. The Killer was clearly hiding behind the couch. He knew that if he turned off those lights, I would come upstairs to inspect. His axe was ready for my face.

I grabbed the baseball bat again and retreated to the girls' bedroom. I could tell you I was doing the honorable thing by checking that they were still alive before confronting The Killer, but honestly I was just postponing the confrontation. I don't mind confrontations as long as the other person isn't carrying an axe. After confirming that they were alive and not just swapped with The Killer's own demented spawn I made my way back down the steps. I could phone the cops again, but I knew if I lifted the receiver, the line would be dead, and this time, no clicking would bring it back to life. That's when he'd come out from behind the couch and tear off my face. I walked slowly to the couch, baseball bat raised high above my head, ready to strike down and get one good hit before we became the Evening News. On the count of three I jumped into the open spot by the couch's end and struck down at The Killer. I will never forget what he looked like.

He looked just like a light timer you plug into an outlet so that a specific set of lights will turn on and off tricking Would Be Robbers and Killers into thinking you're home. Roughly 2"x4", white round face with black numbers, a dial... Seems the Mr. and Mrs. decided to install it that day, forgetting to tell me about it, or that they were testing it out tonight. They also forgot to push the couch back to the wall and didn't close the front door.

When they came home the mother ran into the house having sensed all night long that something was wrong. There were no cell phones then. "What's wrong? I know something's wrong!" Then she saw my face. My very pissed off face. And she started to laugh and laugh and laugh. "We forgot to tell you about the timer on the lights, didn't we?"

I have always had an attitude, but I wouldn't have dared be disrespectful. I had balls, but they hadn't fully dropped yet. I told them about the front door, they said they left it open because it was still light out when they left. I said the phone was fucked up, they said it was a coincidence. I told them I called the police, they thanked me for being cautious, but I could still see their smirks. And in my first true epiphany about who I really was up to that point in my life, I looked at them and said into their smiling faces, "You know you left your Precious Cargo with a kid who follows Duran Duran around the tri-state area, right?" And for just a moment, I believe I saw a little bit of What If fear in their own faces. As adults, I imagine they were able to quickly brush it off with a What Are We Gonna Do, Never Live Our Lives?, and I do hope it was that easy for them. But I made my point. And I still think it was pretty insightful for someone who still wasn't old enough to drive.

All that from a song. Thriller, no less.



They're quite aware of what they're going through...

Sunday, April 17, 2011