Can We Get Civil Here?!

A couple of things have come to my attention over the last couple of weeks, in the midst of President Obama's nomination of Solicitor General Elena Kagan to an open post in the highest court of the land.  That's right... the supreme one.

Now I have heard a lot of bickering back and fourth.  People say that she doesn't have a track record that is well enough defined for the approval committe to make a decision about her.  People say that she is a lesbian (because there was a photo of her playing softball at some point, which leads me to wonder what people would say if the photos of me performing on broadway would be? Eek! I'm not gay.  Pinky swear!)  People say that she is a "progressive" and an "activist" and would judge as such.  During her approval hearings she claimed not to know what "progressive" even meant.

Which lead me to the truth.  I thought: "oh, this poor lady.  Here I was thinking that she was just another of Obama's Chicago cronies, when in fact, she is a woman with severe mental and vividly apparent physical handicaps."

Because claiming not to know what they meant when they asked her about her "progressive" leanings could only indicate mental defect and little else.

I applaud Obama for nominating someone who is so severely handicapped.  Let this be a lesson to any American who is a little "slower" or who can't clearly and succinctly identify themselves as either being, or NOT being, "progressive", that you CAN do anything you set your mind to.  This is an America where dreams CAN come true and where they DO come true.

Obama and Biden give Kagan the 

encouragement she so dearly needs.

I was even more convinced when I heard her explaining that her political viewpoints were not even pertinent information regarding the issue at hand, because the job of a judge is to interpret the letter of the law.  She's so CUTE!  That senator Sessions is such a bully for asking her those questions, foolishly thinking that "interpretation of the law" might be something that, by it's very nature, is somewhat subjective, and has historically proven to be so with nearly any Supreme Court Justice you can name.

What a DICK that guy was.  Oh well, I was still behind our disabled friend all the way.  Then I recalled something.  Something TERRIBLE....

Have you ever seen the "Goonies"?  It was a silly movie from the 80's (pretty much everything from the 80's was silly), and it centered around the story of some kids who meet some big freak of nature called "Sloth" (pictured below).

Remembering Sloth, I suddenly remember why Kagan looked so damn familiar to me.  Immediately I was outraged.

It would appear as though the producers of the movie the "Goonies" somehow mastered time travel and came here to 2010 in order to find someone to make fun of in their movie.  Then, having found Kagan, ever vulnerable, they went BACK to the 80's in order to directly mock her with the "Sloth" character from the movie.  Those BASTARDS!  How could they be so cruel?!?  I mean, the resemblance is DEFINITELY there, but they clearly took a lot of time to really exaggerate Kagan's homely features on their movie character.  This is just cruel.  If you don't buy this, the following picture might help:

(The Woman LOVES Baby Ruth)

Obama should set up a special research group (as long as we're just throwing government money out the window left and right) to develop time travel so that we can go back to the 80's and teach the makers of the Goonies a hard lesson about what it means to be KIND to people that are DIFFERENT from you.

While we are there, there's about three dozen popular music acts that we need to assassinate.

Again, though, three cheers for Kagan for getting as far as she has in life.  Maybe someday she will have developed enough to have the balls to identify simply and clearly as what she is, and instead of hiding them, to be PROUD of and UP FRONT about her political views and of her track record, no matter what they may be.  But, how can we expect someone as slow as her to learn that when no one else in DC has it even close either?

But please, dear reader, tell me if I am wrong.  Can you see the resemblance between Sloth and Kagan?  Maybe if she stood up and shouted "HEY YOU GUUUUUYS" during her first day on the bench, that would solidify it...?

Absolute Terror

Do you believe in ghosts and aliens?  Or terrible insane people who stalk outside of houses and try to lure you out to kill you (or worse)?

I have a story to recount.

Recently my lady-friend and I were staying the night at my mother's house.  I don't remember why we were staying there in Greeley, but we were.  My aunt was in town from Florida and she was sleeping downstairs.  Jera was to sleep on the couch.  I was sleeping on the floor.  Well, I was about to sleep, when some scary scary shit went down. (See Diagram Below)

As you can see from this rudimentary (or "shitty", if you will) drawing, Jera and I were laying almost directly next to each other.  My mother was in her room in bed, not even within earshot of us.  As I was settling in by squirming and wiggling around endlessly in some bizarre floor dance bringing me closer and closer to comfort, I was talking to Jera.  I told her I loved her and I said "good night" and laid there in the dark for a couple of minutes.  It had been a long day and I was ready for sleep.

Then I heard a masculine voice whisper from somewhere close, distinctly, "hey, can you hear me?"

The voice didn't sound like Jera's, but she was the only one there, so I figured that it had been her.  But immediately after I heard the voice, Jera asked me "what? What did you say?" 

She had almost been asleep but had, very clearly, heard what I had heard as well.  My blood ran cold.  I sat straight up and put my finger to my mouth to quiet her.

"Stop talking... I didn't say ANYTHING..." I whispered to her.  My eyes darted around my immediate area to see if anyone was in the living room with us.  The voice had sounded as though it had came from the windows labeled "A" on the diagram.  I could see Jera was freaked out that I hadn't been the one who said what we had both heard.

"I think there's someone outside..." I whispered.

"Oh god, what the fuck was that?" Jera said.

We sat quietly for another moment, peering out the window at our feet, waiting to hear another sound.  Another whisper.  Some sign of movement.  Anything.  I was already convinced though.  There was someone outside and they had whispered to me: "hey, can you hear me."

We were starting to calm down finally, and I thought that maybe we hadn't heard anything at all, when suddenly again came the whisper: "hey, can you hear me?"

"What the hell is that!?" Jera said.

"There's someone outside," I said, horrified.  I got up and walked to the back door and turned on the porch lights to illuminate the area outside around label "A" in the diagram.  I peeked my head outside and didn't see anyone.  I was shaking a little bit, and was entering a state of adrenaline induced confusion.  I don't like confrontation, and I don't like fucking indigent people who have blown their brains out with crack and inhalants coming around acting crazy when I am trying to sleep.  I was certain that there was some kind of dangerous nut outside.

I walked to the windows at point "B" and looked out into the back yard.  The dog was quiet.  I thought that odd, because if there was someone there, the dog would find it impossible to be quiet.  Max is not at all a good guard dog... but he is loud.

I saw no one outside, nor did Jera.  I decided to go to point "D" and look outside the window of my parent's office room.  On the way back to that room, at point "B", with Jera close at my heels, we heard it again.

"Hey, can you hear me?"

What the fuck?  We were freakin' out.  I looked out the window at "D" and tried to peak out the bathroom window, a small window above the shower across from my mother's bedroom.  My mother was still asleep, despite all of the lights being turned on now.  (Jera reminded me repeatedly, and reminds me each time we talk about this, that I was an idiot for turning the lights on.  I disagree though.  If the person outside psychologically tormenting us had ANY sanity, he would be able to clearly see that there were at least two able adults inside and that they were aware he was there. I thought that that would likely deter him from doing whatever he was going to do.)

Oh, I forgot to mention that at this point I was walking around with a steak knife in my hand.  I had grabbed the steak knife straight away and was ready to stab the next rapist or burglar I saw.  But by this point, we heard the voice again, the same words, and I had to wake my mom up. 

"There's someone outside." I told her.  She stirred and then got out of bed when she saw that the lights were on and that Jera was following me.

"What?" she asked.

"There's someone outside.  We heard someone talking outside."

Mom got up and Jera relayed to her what was happening.  Mom then told us that she had heard a weird voice earlier in the middle of the day while doing some filing.  She had thought for sure that the voice had been calling my aunt Mary.  Mary is a bit on the paranoid side when it comes to ghosts or anything creepy, frankly, and my mom had not pushed the issue for fear of upsetting aunt Mary.  We all went into the kitchen and heard the voice again.  "Hey, can you hear me?"

Now I am never the guy to think that there might be something paranormal happening.  I am not the kind of guy who goes for anything like that.  But at this point, after my mom had recounted the earlier event, I will admit that it crossed my mind.  If this makes me and idiot... I guess I'm an idiot.  

After hearing the voice again, I decided that it would be a good idea to get my father's gun.  I retrieved the gun and checked to see that it was loaded.  (See Artist's Rendition Below)  I kept the safety on, and really just thought that the gun would scare any insane rapists away, not that I would shoot anyone.  Jera had told me during the course of our frantic searching about that she had heard of people leaving tape recorders outside of people's homes in order to lure them out for murder and rape and terrible things.  This had spooked me even more, and my mom as well I think.  The gun was a precautionary measure.

"Should we call the cops?" I wondered allowed after we heard the voice again.

We grabbed a flashlight and searched the basement directly under where we were hearing the voice now.  It seemed certainly to be coming from the section in and around label "B" on the diagram.  I tried to go outside with the gun but my mother stopped me and forced me to put the gun down.  I thought this to be a bad move, as we might meet our demise soon.  We were all shaky and a bit panicked though, so I guess I understand her logic.

Finally, after we were totally certain that no one was about outside (having looked with the flashlight), I settled on the only rational conclusion: my father.

My father was in a hospital in Denver with complications of the abdomen, but I suddenly felt like he had something to do with this.  It had to be some kind of recording device or something.  Some kind of prank.  

We searched all over and listened very very quietly to try to identify the exact location where the voice was coming from.  I looked under the table to see if there was something taped to it.  Mom looked through the little cabinet the phone sits on (between "B" and "E").  We looked everywhere.  I noticed that there was a standard padded manilla envelope style shipping package on the counter over the stove and wondered if that could be it.  But that didn't make sense.  The package was addressed to my father from one of his co-workers.  

The panic was starting to subside, and I no longer felt like we were going to have to have any gun battles (part of me was dissapointed by that), but we still had to find whatever it was because it would certainly keep Jera and me up all night if we couldn't.  

Finally, my mom decided to open the package sitting on the counter.  She opened it and, lo-and-behold, there sat a few little prank items, including a little black speaker about the size and shape of a stack of four quarters.  We looked at it, and it said: "hey, can you hear me?" in a really sinister fuckin' voice.

Dad.  That bastard!  Had he planned this?  How could he have?  I had been the one to take him to the hospital a couple of days earlier, and I hadn't seen him try any shenanigans then.  He couldn't have planned it.  

I pushed the button on the device and it switched through to some other creepy noises.  One sounded like a little girls laughing in the distance.  One sounded like a door creaking open.  One sounded like a vicious animal try to claw its way through solid drywall.  They were all terrifying, but the worst one, I thought, was the "hey, can you hear me".

We took the battery out, had a good laugh, and returned the gun to its resting place.  It still took me a while to fall asleep, as my nerves were jangled and my paranoid sense was jacked through the roof.  But it was, in the end, probably the best prank ever pulled on me.  Perfectly timed and executed.

And the thing of it is, my dad didn't plan it at ALL.  They were his toys, but he had left them in Utah with his co-worker and the guy had sent them back to Greeley at dad's request.  The guy just happened to leave the battery in the noise maker when he packaged all that stuff up.  

He couldn't have done it better if he had planned the whole thing.  He almost died laughing the next day when we told him the story (literally... his abdomen was in rough shape... he shouldn't have been laughing).

It was a fear that I won't soon forget.  It was awesome to feel that kind of fear that I hadn't felt since I was a child.  Today, I fear things like the government tightening it's hand around the neck of the internet, stifling into death the last place where free speech is truly free speech, or maybe cancer.  But not ghosts or rapists or aliens.  The thrill was one in a million and I loved it.

What is the best prank ever pulled on you?  Did it make you nearly crap your pants like this one did me? 

Three of Three-Fer, or; In Review: Denialism

Third blog, here. Completing this cycle of triple blog day is my review and endorsement of the book "Denialism" by Michael Specter.

I just finished this book and I give it a rating of "really good" to "great" alternatively.  The book focuses on various areas in which modern science is under attack, and describes in great detail why these attacks are waged from false ground and why these attacks are risking (in some cases) the lives and livelihoods of people all around the world.

At first, I thought the book might end up being about the people usually responsible for hindering science: the evangelical Christian radical right.  I was surprised to find that today, the culprits in many cases are people from the radical left, and that the entire cultures built up around science denialism (for instance, the raging super-industrial econo-cultures that have been built up around "organic" foods and "alternative medicine") are frequently willing to sacrifice the health and well-being of the greater good for their own "image" or sense of false hope.

The problem though, it would seem, is that most denialists don't know that they are in fact denialists.  Most science denialists suffer more from a lack of knowledge, for instance, about the pharmaceutical industry or FDA regulations or MMR vaccinations, than they do from sheer sociopathy or idiocy.  The heartening message I took away from the book: by educating the public objectively, we can shed our new found fear of science and move into the next couple of decades poised to end world hunger, many illnesses, and other social ills that continue to plague human kind.

I would recommend this book to anyone and everyone.  If you are a lunatic who get's wet just reading the word "organic", read this book.  If you are a conspiracy theorist who thinks that the government is controlling minds with vaccines, read this book.  If science or the world around you fascinates you, read this book.


This concludes today's three blog adventure.  I got my huge jug of Frank's Red Hot, and I am off to Fort Collins.  What did you all think?  And what book shall I read next?  I will remove the image of the book from the "What I'm Reading" section on the side ASAP, cause it is already driving me crazy.  I feel like I am lying to you all even more than usual.

Tell me what it is.  Love

Two of Three-Fer, or; In Review: A Good Condiment

This is something I have been meaning to get out there for you all....  anyone familiar with the product pictured to the right?  You should be, since it is by far the best condiment ever created in the history of man kind.

Frank's Red Hot.  The best.  Let me tell you a little something about what you can put Franks on:

Pizza
Eggs
Soup
Bread
Nachos
Quesadillas
Tacos
Burritos
Saltine Crackers
Potatoes
Fuckin' Hamburgers
Dumplings
Meatloaf
Steak
Goddamn Chipotle
Qdoba
Chicken
Veggies
Pasta
Ramen
Fuckin' Anything

And the list goes on and on.  I thought as a child that honey was the nectar of the Gods, but after some thought and experience, I have realized that this condiment is in the fact the best thing ever.  Way better than honey.  I put it on fuckin' everything.  It has become quite pricey, because a huge bottle of this stuff really only lasts me about a week, but I think that it's worth it.

The ingredients are pretty much the same stuff in a lot of Louisiana style hot sauces... cayenne pepper and salt and vinegar etc.  I ran out, and am about to go to the store to get some more, so I don't have a nutrition information label to consult right now regarding this.  But presumably, everything is pretty standard stuff for a hot sauce.

It's just... so damn good.  It makes Tabasco look like... well... something disgusting.  The only other alternatives to Franks for me are Cholula and Tapatio, which are both Mexican hot sauces.  Franks is the mildest of the three, I think, and that's what I like about it I guess.  I can handle hotter food than anyone I know (if anyone wants to challenge me, please bring it on.  We'll eat Indian food and wash it down with habanero peppers and stuff and see who cries or shits first).  But Franks is not in the category of super hot.  Maybe the thing I like about it the most is the saltiness of it.  I really enjoy a good salty flavor, and Franks is very much that.

Ask anyone who has eaten many meals with me.  I eat a LOT of this stuff.  I really think that I could be a spokesperson for the brand, and it's one of the few brands for which I would actually do it.  I wouldn't consider it selling out.  I would consider it doing a public service for my fellow man.

I have even on many occasions eaten spoonfulls of Franks Red Hot, straight up.  I used to do this in the mornings to kill that "morning breath" instantly while in the kitchen getting a meal ready.  The vinegar and salt and spiciness just seem to make the gross odor go away instantly.

Now here is my problem: I like to put condiments on my nipples.  Below, you will see a picture of me with whipped cream on them.

(am I crossing a line here?)

Anyway.... I have tried to put my favorite condiment (Frank's) on my nips many a time, only to end up with a huge stain on my floor and a sadness in my heart.

I need your help.  Can someone tell me what I can do to keep a significant portion of this delicious all purpose tasty goodness on top of my Frank's thirsty chest for more than a couple of seconds at a time?  Should I put a gelling agent in the Red Hot?  Should I devise some kind of open bottom dixie cup situation, where the open cup is glued to the area surrounding my nipples? Is there something I can do to end this pain?!?!

Please, for the love of god... HELP ME!!!

Three-fer Day

Welcome to the first "Three-fer Day"

Today I will offer to the reader three posts.  Because I am in a creative mood.

The first post will be art-ish.

The second will be funny-ish.

The third will betray my nerd side-ish.

Hope you all enjoy.  Here's the first post:


Morning Evaluation

The mindscape is not illuminated

but rather colored

by the sun.  

Colored by the sun and 

illuminated with the totality of experience.

The mindscape is colored

and the criss cross connection

between heart and mind

across to mind and back to heart

and up from heart to the other mind

back and forth up and down

folds me in.

...On wonderful occasions.

but don't you hate when the body

forgets about the heart and mind? 

Or when you feel as though you are the only person

who has a thought 

(and one of those fucking feelings)

every second of every day?

What would you give for a blank mindscape?

I tried to buy one once.  

The big crooked nose

on the short crooked man

in the dark crooked corner of the market

was a billboard telling me

"burn your mind down"

I slapped those three-hundred dollar bills

onto the table before him

and he (she?) winked at me and said

"not for sale"

the kernel of the blood computer

burned cosmic white hot that night.

and the desperation of persistant thought

came over me like a plague

ran over me like a river

carried me to the shallow grave.

How Shit's Going

An update for anyone interested:

First off, the good news: my pee smelled like asparagus the other day.  I can't tell you how happy that made me.  I think I need to start eating asparagus every day.  I don't know why that entertains me so much, but it does.

The bad news: when you are on unemployment, you have way less money than you did a few months before when you were writing estimates and working the desk at a body shop.  In fact, when you are on unemployment, you are frequently wont to wonder: "Why is it that my former employer told me 'yes, go ahead and move into a more expensive place in Longmont' when you asked him 'is this a financially sound decision, when considering the stability of my employment?"  You wonder: "what the fuck made him insinuate that this was a good idea, when very clearly he was planning on closing the body shop anyway?"

Then you wonder: "how hard, REALLY, would it be to rob a liquor store?"

Then you go to the Sports Authority and they tell you that there is some kind of goddamn "waiting period" when purchasing a firearm.  So you say "ok" and go look at the ski masks and black jumpsuits for a little while.  Then you go back to the gun counter, and they inform you that the "waiting period" is a lot more than fifteen fuckin' minutes.  Then you get all pissed off 'cause you don't have the patience to wait that long, so you decide to just sit down a write a blog instead of robbing a liquor store, even though robbing the liquor store would be far more lucrative.

You argue to yourself: "at least I can't get arrested for writing the blog...."

Which pretty much brings us up to date.  On the bright side of things though, I did complete the "First Step" (of the famed "12 Steps") and I am moving on to the second step.  I am struggling, at times, but the fact remains clear that I am infinitely better off today, no matter what, than I was when I was using.

I am about ready to start another re-write on my book.  I have been working on this book for about a year now, and I am, frankly, getting tired of thinking about it.  So I am going to put a re-write on it, and then have a few impartial observers read it and get a few opinions.  Then perhaps one more re-write and then with any luck I will have the balls to start sending query letters to some agents.  One can only hope, in a matter such as this.  I am assured of my natural skill as a writer, but I am assured of little else, aside from my conviction in the thematic elements of the book.

I am in a place where I just want to have it out of the way.  Whether it ever gets published or not, I'd like it to at least be out of the way.  I mean, I can always say: "hey, I wrote a book".  Which will make it that much easier for me to embark on my next book writing adventure.

So the biggest news, of which I haven't talked much about (or perhaps I haven't talked about it at all on the blog), is that I will be returning to school this fall.  I think that providence (or whatever) has placed it's heavy hand on my life once again.  I don't think I would have had the gall to go back to school had I not lost my job.

I will be attending Front Range Community College in Longmont.  I will be taking some general classes.  They put me in the math class for students who are... well... not good at math.  But that's ok.  Since my ACT scores (which were high) were no longer applicable due to their age, the school made me take an "accuplacer test", which just assess your level of competence in reading and writing and math.  I scored perfect on the reading and writing.  Math, not so much.

Anyway, I am very excited to go to college again.  My first time in college, at CU Boulder, I was arrested three times in my first two months there, and had little choice but to abandon ship.  My second time in college (at AIMS community college in Greeley) proved difficult because I had gotten a steady line on some opium (the only time I ever found it ANYWHERE) from Denver, and it is remarkably hard to perform well in school when you drive to class, smoke a bowl of weed and opium in the parking lot, and then just sit there, never leaving your car.  There were other attempts at higher eduction that met with similar demise, but thankfully, all of those have been a long time ago.  I like to think that I have matured a little bit since then.  Going back to school to write is truly my dream.  It has been that elusive, ephemeral and paramount desire of mine for a long time, and now it is happening.

I just gotta keep this financial ship from sinking on me here until school starts.

I've been clean for somewhere on the order of 125 days and I feel good.  I've been lagging on the blogging, but that will pick back up.  The creative fruit (or ugly rotten fruit) of my mind waxes and wanes like all things.  There are few problems today, and I am grateful.

I just can't rob a liquor store.  So this blog is my liquor store robbery stand-in.

On a side note: is anyone out there interested at all in reading over a portion or all of a draft of my book? I'm looking for someone who can be objective.  Someone who doesn't know me well and has no real emotional investment in me or my writing?  The next draft should be ready here in just a couple of weeks.

Let me know by comment or e-mail.

A Mi Papá

Father:

Jera just fell asleep as I read to her Emerson's “Self-Reliance” and thought about you. A beautiful essay, and one I have read many times over. I think of you when I read it, for some reason. Perhaps it is as simple as you and him sharing a name, but whatever it is, Waldo draws my mind to Waldo.

Emerson begs me, in his essay, to rely first on what is inside of me for direction. He pleads with all men my age to say what crosses our mind's eye unequivocally, waiting for the approving nod of no other man.

“Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string.”

Self-reliance. I'm willing to bet all that our namesake didn't have half the father I have.

I do what I do today with my eyes straight ahead, nearly unflinching, looking as if I act only to the tune of that “iron string”, but anyone who knows me well knows that, though my gaze appears unflinching, I glance to my periphery with each and every step I take to see if you are nodding. No man's nod meant anything to Ralph. He could not have had a father like you. Your nod means the world to me.

I glance for it not out of self-consciousness but out of curiosity and eagerness. I glance to the teacher wondering what more I, the student, can learn.

There are times when foolishly, I stop glancing, and those have been the most painful. I want you to know that though my eyes seem fixed forward, I am looking to you more than ever, now, for your direction and your blessing. Now, when life is moving ever faster for both of us, I adore the power of your wisdom in my life.

I have known no stronger man in my life than you.

A cascade of mental snap shots comes to mind when I ponder on our journey together. I remember, of course, those times when you were weak and broken down. These times do not stand out to me. While some might think of Chuck Emerson and think of those hard times when you fell totally ill, I do not. I remember a man that was bigger than life when I was a young boy. I recall a man who made me laugh. A man who gave himself to those around him. A man who embodied love and embodied that force that is slipping faster and faster away from our world: genuine fatherhood. A man who gave direction, solicited or not. A man firm of his convictions. A man whose word was, ultimately, but gently, the last word. And for good reason.

As we have grown together over this short quarter of a century, I have learned most of what I know about most of what I know from you. You have taught me how to have faith in the face of overwhelming adversity. You have shown me how to turn a discerning eye to the world, such that right and wrong don't blend together but rather separate from one another and make themselves clear. You have taught me how to love and to be loved. How to give of myself. You taught me how a man smiles. How a man speaks with force and conviction. How a man cries.

Our lives, for better, have drawn certain parallels. Believe, dad, that if you wouldn't, I wouldn't have it any other way. You and I, even when we are in the starkest kind of disagreement, are cut of the same cloth. I just wish the cloth looked as good on me as it does on you. But if I am certain of little else, I am certain of this: when I follow in your footsteps, the cloth from which I am cut becomes more and more favorable. My burdens become lighter and lighter. And my smiles brighter and brighter.

I owe you happiness and reverence and faith, and everything that comes with those things, until the very day that I shuffle off this mortal coil. Because I know that, whether I deserve it or not, you will enduringly impart those things on me until your very end.

You will always be bigger than life to me, and I am soliciting your direction. And Ralph Emerson's father could not have possibly held a candle to Charles Emerson Jr.

Jera is sleeping soundly, having fallen away to my voice reading one of my favorite essays, and I am compelled to give you my eternal pledge: I am now, and always will be, listening to your words. I am now, and ALWAYS will be, looking for your nod.

Thank you.

Love.

Charles III

In Review: Jeff's Cartoon

So my cousin Jeffrey draws cool cartoons...

Will he ever become a professional cartoonist?

Will his cartoons ever inspire awe and laughter in the lives of a wide audience?  Well, here at In Review, they already fuckin' have.  So deal with it.

(Oh, and Jeff went to prison once... so whatever you say about his cartoon, it better not be asinine.)

Without further ado, I give you a Jeff W. original:

It's funny because it's true.

I give Jeff and his cartooning an A+++

What do you all think?

Winner, and iPhone4

Ok, folks.  We have a winner for yesterday's art naming contest.  The painting will forever be known as "Lick My Love Pump", much to Jera's probable dismay.  Merlin, you win!  But, who the hell expected any mere human to stand a chance against a freakin' wizard?!

I'm just proud that a wizard is visitting my humble blog here.  Thank you for gracing us with your presence, Merlin.  I would offer you the reward money for winning the contest, but I know that you can conjure hundred dollar bills out of thin air, and that you probably shit nuggets of pure platinum, so I'll just say "congrats".

Anyway, let's get right to the heart of this thing:

Is anyone else pumped about this?!  I know there were some technical flaws during the keynote address, and "blah blah blah" it doesn't have a 64 gig model in the first offering... but listen: video chat.  Faster processor.  Slick new casing design (which I love).  Customizable backgrounds (without having to jailbreak the mother fucker).  An LED flash for photography.  Shoot video in HD (goodbye Flip video recorders.  You had a good run.)  Multi-tasking and better Mail program.  Folders for apps.  Etc, etc.

This is going to rock my world.  I can almost guarantee it.

I just have to figure out a way to get one.  Especially since my iPhone screen is still tragically cracked.  I don't know how long this thing will last.  I guess AT&T is going to offer an early upgrade to customers on this, but it's only six months early, and I don't recall exactly when my contract with those blood thirsty psychos started, so I will have to check on that and keep you all updated.

It may end up being hard to get one, even discounting my severe lack of discretionary funds.  Pre-orders have been through the roof, from what I hear.

My father said something earlier today via text that he read that the iPhone4 launch was being pushed back due to some sort of security compromise or something... any word on this out there? I haven't had a chance to look up the latest info.  Anyone?

Anyway, I have been looking forward to this for a long time.  Even before that dingle berry accidentally left his test model of the iPhone4 at a bar in California.  I am not convinced that this wasn't a plant though, and a publicity stunt.  That would brilliant if it was.  The genius behind the Apple name right now is that they barely have to advertise on their own... the media does it for them because there is so much hype and fanaticism behind the product lineup.  I.E. this blog.

On a side note though, I will say that I can't really see myself using the video chat feature much.  It's a cute novelty, but I prefer people not to be able to see my ugly mug when I'm talking to them at a distance.  I get better reactions from people when they can't see this hideous mask of skin and cartilage that I wear every day.

On another side note, I'm not just some bitch Apple fanboy.  'Cause to be frank... I can't believe they have sold as many iPads as they have.  I just don't see the point of that device.  It's the most expensive e-reader out there.  I've tried typing on one, and it is awkward at best, and would certainly result in finger cramps.  And who would play a video game on it?!  I'll stick with the PS3, thank you.

Tonight, I'll pray for the happiness and well being of all those near and dear to me.  I'll pray that fate will grant me another day clean.  I'll pray for the serenity to accept the things that I cannot change, etc etc and then I will pray that my iPhone lasts long enough that I can replace it with an iPhone4 sometime before the iPhone5 comes out.

Who else is fuckin' PUMPED about this!?

Art Naming Contest!

Hello everyone!

Things have been hectic over the last couple weeks, so I'm sorry about the infrequency of my posts.  It has been exciting of late though.  The outcry of congrats to Jera for saving the bird was well received, and you all got to see me publicly fail at quitting smoking.  My friend says that he has tried to explain on multiple occasions to professors and people in academic libraries why he is laughing when everyone else is being quiet.  He was reading my blog on his phone, 'pparently.  He had no real way of explaining to them that there is "ugly" and then there's "Al Gore ugly..."

To which I should have responded: hey, dick, why don't you at least give them the address to the blog?! If you are enjoying it so much maybe they would too!

That's up for debate though.

Either way, it's not been contest time in some weeks, so we are going to have a "name the drawing" contest again.  Me and Jera were gifted a new "Wacom" drawing tablet (see left), and the following is her first try with it.  Pretty good for a first.  My first try was terrible.  Although a couple blog's back where I drew a picture of me getting kicked in the testicles was done with this tablet, and I felt it looked reasonable, for having been drawn by someone with no artistic talent whatsoever.

Anyway, the contest will be open for 24 hours.  If I know you, please use a pseudonym for posting your contest entry, so that we can avoid the unpleasantness we had before.  I want this to be a fair game.  Good luck to everyone.

Here is the drawing:

Jera: 1, PETA: Nothing!

Ok, PETA: this one's for you.

So the other day, while I was attending a twelve step meeting of my choice in Boulder (aka the goddamn Orwellian nightmare we never thought would ever blossom into reality), I received a frantic text from ol' girl (previous guest blogger Jera, my girlfriend), saying that she had found a baby bird.

The bird she found, in rough approximation, looked like this:

Now my girlfriend, at times, is the most kind hearted individual I know, and has had a lot of exposure to a tree-hugger mentality that permeates certain circles here in Northern Colorado.  She seemed upset via text on the phone while I sat there in the meeting, but I didn't know what to tell her.  I didn't know what to do with a baby bird.  She said it had been on our porch. (See Illustrations Below)

So, as may or may not be clear from the supplied photos, the bird landed smack dab on our porch after falling from a nest which rests directly above our porch.  She said that she had taken the cat outside to get some air on the porch when she looked down and saw the featherless bird laying on the wood, limp, and nearly dead looking aside from a heaving in it's lungs.  She said that at first, she had thought that it was a frog.

I couldn't do anything, but I felt bad for the bird and for Jera.  In a way, I was relieved that I wasn't there right at that moment.  I would have hated to have had to make a snap decision about the poor creature's life... 

That evil cat of mine DID mentally make a snap decision about the bird's life, but thankfully the cat is an indoor cat, and the bird was decidedly outdoors.  Otherwise it would have been snack time.

Jera's snap decision was to call a wildlife refuge place nearby here in Longmont, where they take in injured or orphaned wildlife.  I wouldn't have thought that a place like that would have had so much information or investment for normal citizenry when it came to an everyday hatchling bird that had gone overboard from his nest.

Jera was concerned that the bird had hurt his back or head during the fall to our wooden porch, but knew from previous experience not to touch him (or her?) with her hands because the mother bird would not like the smell.  The animal rehab people told her to get the bird into a basket or container of some kind and get it up as close to the nest as possible.  The hope is that the mother bird should hear (see/smell?) the baby, even though it's not in the nest, and come to feed it.

The wildlife service lady also told Jera that the mother should be feeding the baby every fifteen minutes. Jera wasn't sure how long the baby had been laying there in the first place, so time was an issue.  Valiantly, my girlfriend scooped the little nestling up into a little wicker-basket and put him up on the ledge of our porch.

When I got home, Jera was very worried and was looking constantly out to see if the bird was ok.  

When I saw the bird, his breathing had slowed, but he looked frail and frightened.  I couldn't discern whether or not the thing had been injured, but I figured that it probably had.  It was warm out, but not warm enough, I supposed, for the little guy to be sitting in his basket un-covered, so Jera grabbed some tissue and covered him up a little.

We tried for about fifteen minutes to find a way to place him back in his nest, which is what the wildlife people said would be optimal, but to no avail.  The bird's nest above our porch is built into the covering structure (or, the bottom of the third floor porch above) and we were totally unable to place him back from whence he came.  We decided to elevate the basket, at least, so that it would be nearer to the nest.

After another half hour, the adult birds had still not paid any attention to the orphan.  I wondered if perhaps the orphan had had a behavior problem and, rather than falling, had been KICKED out of his home by strict parents.  Either way, he was certainly unable to sustain himself in his condition.  Bald and struggling to breathe and probably hungry as all get up, he needed help.

Jera called the wildlife rescue people back and we were told the location of their office.  The bird didn't have much time, we thought, so we loaded our avian friend up into the vehicle and whisked him away.

Would he still be alive when we arrived?  It was a ten minute drive.  We were worried, and Jera being the kind soul that she is, kept him constantly in her lap, fretting over his welfare at full power.

Finally we arrived at the Greenwood Wildlife Rehabilitation Center!  

We walked inside and immediately our little bird friend felt at home.  The lady at the front desk whisked him immediately away into the back where we were assured he would receive the very top of the line bird-medical-care.  The lady did not ask us for a fee or a donation.  Nothing but a little bit of information about the bird and Jera's name and phone number for their record.

She told us that the bird (a sparrow, as she identified our little buddy) would be fed straight away and that within a week or two, if he hadn't sustained any incapacitating injury during his fall, he would be released back into the beautiful Longmont sky where I imagine he will find many feathered friends with whom to... fly and eat and whatever else birds do.

The moral of the story here is this: you don't have to be a vegan card-carrying member of PETA to care about animals or to help them out.  Just take your sick orphaned animals to the Greenwood Wildlife Rehabilitation Center and they will be on their way.  I am linking to their site, where you can make donations or learn about what to do if you find an injured or orphaned wild animal.  

As a side note: if you find an orphaned PETA member, you are in luck, because PETA members are DELICIOUS.  Grilled, baked, or cooked into a stir fry, they are simply delectable.  You can find a wide selection of PETA members in and around Boulder County.  The grass fed, free-range ones are harder to get ahold of and come at a premium, but you will be delightfully surprised when you taste that first delicious morsel.  It is well worth your money.  And because all PETA members are certified "Very Organic" by the USDA, you can rest assured that you are not messing up the environment with terrible pesticides or messing up your colon with horrible icky growth hormones.  PETA members have not been genetically altered in anyway, and since they tend to breed among themselves and have fewer children (doing so later in life than the average human), they are genetically equivalent to what could nearly be considered pre-historic man.  Yes, PETA members are your ticket to healthy and socially conscious eating.

If you have a recipe for cooking PETA or if you have your own story about saving an animal from certain doom like my ever benevolent girlfriend Jera, please leave it in a comment here.  Love to all.

Guest Blogger Margaret on "MySpace"

Greetings readers. 

Tonight's blog will be a guest blog from our second guest blogger. But first, an update on my non-smoking adventure: as I promised in my previous blog, I went for twenty-four hours (almost precisely) without smoking a cigarette. It almost killed me, and I was at the store buying a new pack of Parliament Lights right when my time was about up. I just couldn't take it...

What the hell do you want from me!?!?! I'm just a man! Although I do appreciate the offers from yall to kick me in the nuts and shit... real nice.

Anyway. I'm going to try again tonight. This time we will shoot for forty-eight hours. I think if I can make forty-eight hours, then I will be positioned better, physiologically speaking, to actually continue with an agenda of not smoking at all. As I mentioned before, please kick me in the crotch if you see me smoking any time in the next forty-eight hours (I hope this doesn't actually wind up getting me kicked in the testiclites).

Proceeding forward, I'd like to introduce our second guest blogger, my sister, Margaret. 

Margaret has taken a big step that hadn't occurred to me, but having seen her take this step I am tempted to do it myself.  Enjoy!

By Margaret

Big news!

This evening I went and did something that I never would have imagined myself doing.

Now I’m sure you’re thinking: “shit, what did she do? Did she mainline heroine? Did she survive a shark attack?”

But no. You would be wrong on both counts.

What I did tonight was bigger than those.

I’d almost call it “epic”. I deleted my MySpace account.

*Pauses for gasps from the crowd*

Ok, quiet down. I know it’s huge, but now that it’s done I feel like I just released a part of myself that was just, kind of like, that irritating thread that hangs from your favorite shirt that you can’t ever seem to pull off. I’m not sure if that makes sense to any of you. If you don’t get it, well fuck me right? I’m not rephrasing it because I happen to think it was a great comparison.

Anyway, I felt a lot of hesitation as I went to hit the “cancel account button”. I mulled it over for quite some time. My profile was something like a work of art that took years to complete. The problem is, once I got it to a certain point, I felt like I’d done all I could with it and started to neglect it. I would still check it daily towards the end of it’s life, kind of like how it is with old people. I realize that is a horrible thing to say, but I’m just trying to be clear.

Over the years most of my friends have shifted to other sites, like the always popular “Facebook”, so I just really had no use for it. I have to say I feel really great about finally making this decision. To anyone out there considering deleting a MySpace account, I would strongly suggest that you do. The feeling was exhilarating!

(Charles again, here. Anyone else have this same problem my sister had? I feel like I should delete my MySpace since I haven't logged in for... well over a year. But in the back of my head I'm like “what about those friends of mine on MySpace with whom I have no other contact? How can I just shut them out of my life?” But really, they're already shut out from my life right? I mean... clearly Myspace is just for trailer trash and meth addicts. I'll leave you with a picture of the average myspace user.) :

A Big Step

I think about quitting smoking every single time I light a cigarette (approximately seventeen times per day, give or take, depending on what pisses me off or calms me down that day).

I get anxious just THINKING about not smoking.  I'm thinking about it right now and it is making me woozy.

*loud crash*

*five minute pause*

Sorry about that.  I passed out from the stress of thinking about not smoking.  I fell down and cracked my damn skull open on this counter.  Now even more stressed.

The point I'm getting at here is that I need to quit smoking.  Quitting smoking is harder than quitting booze or blow or weed.  A few months back (before my most recent foray into active drug addiction), I managed to set a record for myself by not smoking a cigarette for about ninety days.  I was very proud of myself, but unfortunately, it is impossible for me to drink the quantities of alcohol that I began drinking shortly thereafter and NOT smoke.

The day I quit smoking, I said a prayer that I would be able to make it "one day without a cigarette".  (Atheists, settle down.  Go whack off to "The Selfish Gene" and then realize that, whatever you think the word "prayer" means, it doesn't apply to what I'm talking about here.)

....

(Religious people... whatever you think the word "prayer" means, it doesn't apply to what I'm talking about here.)

I said a prayer the same way I did the day I decided to withdrawal from alcohol.  A form of surrender.  A self-demonstration of humility.  A ritual in defeat admission.  And I'll be goddamned if it didn't work (until it didn't, due to a few idiot maneuvers on my part).

Since I need to quit smoking, and I am now unemployed and somewhat strapped for cash, now would be an optimal time to do so.

So this is the plan: I'm going to stop smoking for twenty-four hours starting at midnight, June 9th.  This is my pledge to you, my fickle reader: tonight, I will stop smoking for twenty-four hours.

"Why only twenty-four hours?" you ask?

Two reasons.

#1 I want to make a pledge here that I can certainly attain.  To make a pledge to stop smoking forever would be silly.  I have no idea what might come around the corner.  But I believe I'm capable of a day of not smoking.

#2 In the twelve step fellowship, we talk a lot about doing things "Just For Today".  We proceed as if we only have not to eat fistfuls of morphine for one day, because it allows us to focus on the present.  Focused on the present, we are less likely to freak out about the past or future and wind up high.

I'm writing this blog post as an experiment of sorts.  Things like this are always much easier if there is some accountability involved.  I've never quit drugs for any period of time without letting someone else know.  And so, I am hoping, it is with cigarettes.  The experiment is whether I care enough about my blog-author integrity, or about my readers, to make this an effective place to develop accountability for something like this.

Now, normally I try to stop smoking on a "Parliament Light", my preferred brand.

Tonight, however, I have Camel Wide Lights.

It will be awkward for me to quit on something other than a P-Funk, but I am not going to go buy another pack.  And, if I decide that now is not the right time, or that for tradition's sake I MUST quit on a Parliament, then I can just start smoking again after the twenty-four hour period has elapsed.

My challenge to you, the reader:  if you see me tomorrow (unlikely) and I am smoking a cigarette, please kick me in the testicles as hard as you can.

I will tell you honestly, after this is over, how the twenty-four hours went.  If I tell you that I failed to uphold my pledge, then I invite you to initiate massive bot-net, denial-of-service attacks on my blog here.  Hack my shit and replace all my family photos with animal pornography.  And hunt me down so that you can (that's right) kick me in the nuts as hard as you can (re: artist's rendition above).

If the twenty-four hours go well, I'll try for another twenty-four hours and I'll keep you updated.

I am freaking out.  I don't even really want to post this.  But... I kinda have to now.  It took me twenty minutes to write and make the cartoon, after all.

Here it goes.  Wish me luck, everyone.

Also: any advice on how NOT to commit murder while not smoking?  Last time I quit, four people died....

p.s. While I don't advise whacking off to "The Selfish Gene", I do advise anyone and everyone to read it.  It was a paradigm shift of sorts.  Memetics=yay

Georgia Air

Is This Just Weird?

I call this:

Experiment in Hyper-Consciousness: Number Four

or...

Billy Gets Bored

In Review: The Gore Divorce

The New York Times reported on Wednesday that Al Gore and his wife of many many dark and difficult decades had announced to the world via a series of professional and personal e-mails that they would be separating.

The Times article, found here, indicated little about the possible cause of the unexpected divorce.

It turns out, however, that the Gores just couldn't stand looking at one another's hideous faces anymore.

Al Gore was reported by anonymous sources to have said, sometime last week:

"She just looked like shit.  I couldn't take it anymore.  I used any excuse I could to get out of the house.  The whole "global climate change advocacy" thing was more or less bull-hockey.  I just wanted to get the movie and the book out there because my agents and advisers told me that they could schedule me almost solid throughout the year travelling away from home.  Book signings.  Screenings.  Conventions.  Whatever it was, it didn't matter.  The way her face looked like the back of John Goodman's ass after a beating with a meat tenderizing mallet was just KILLING me.  I suffered from insomnia, constant indigestion, and frequent spells of vomiting, all of which coincided with me having to even GLANCE at Tip's face."

Tipper, in response indicated that:

"...we just couldn't have sex without him putting a paper bag over his face.  The problem was finding paper bags that were big enough to stretch over that nose of his.  I swear to god that before we started getting stacks of those gigantic "Old Navy" shopping bags and cutting eye holes in them for him, it was like having intercourse with a pterodactyl.  I mean... there's "ugly", and then there's "Al Gore" ugly.  I was so glad when he started leaving town all the time to promote the "Inconvenient Whoosey-Whatsit", or whatever he named that boring ass movie.  The only thing that put me to sleep faster than sex with this freak was watching that movie (which he did almost every night)."

The political world has expressed sympathy for the Gores, and the nation mourns today over the fact that this two person sideshow was allowed to procreate, leaving an indelible mark of genetic unsightliness on the human race for perhaps centuries to come.

Neither Al nor Tipper are expected to ever marry, date, or have sex that isn't paid for ever again.

During a comercial break from his "Jerry Springer Stories", former President W. Bush had this to say:

"Who the hell is Al Gore?  And how do you work this damn Tivo machine?  Laura says you can pause it, but I'm pushing this pause button right here and LOOK..." he gestured towards the moving picture on the screen, "...NOTHING!"

Boner Ranch....?

Hello friend.

Sorry about no posts over the last couple of days.  Memorial Day weekend involved a trip to South Dakota to visit my family and to have lots of good food and fun and stuff.  My favorite part of the trip?  Funny you should ask.  My FAVORITE part of the trip was a short stop off that me and o' girl made to a little place I like to just call "The Ranch".

That's right folks.  I can't tell you what goes on at the ranch.  What goes on there, stays there (I hope).  Let's just say me and Jera still aren't walking totally limp free from our trip there yesterday afternoon.  They were giving Memorial Day specials.

Anyway, brief post now 'cause I gotta go chase this paper for a while (by "chase" I mean "call the unemployment payment request hotline").

Anyone else have a tremendous holiday weekend?