Friday, December 4, 2009

Anger And Cynicism

I'd rather be angry than cynical. If I'm angry, it means that I care. It's a warped form of hope.

Cynics are the clock watchers and time servers of life and society. If things aren't going to get better, why not kill yourself? Why stick around?

I say this to cynics: Leave. Put yourself out of your misery -- and us out of our misery when we're around you.

Oh, some people might be sad because of your death, but they're just fools and suckers.

Also, a cynic will exploit people. An angry person won't. An angry man won't associate with knaves and fools, no matter how much he can benefit from them.

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Some Offbeat Christmas Carols

For schizophrenics:
Do you hear what I hear?

For people with multiple personality disorders:
We three kings disoriented are ...

For narcissists:
Hark the herald angels sing -- only for me!

For manic people:
Deck the halls and walls and houses and lawns and streets and sidewalks and stores and offices and buildings and towns and cities and cars and buses and trucks and trees and bushes and cats and dogs ...

For depressed people:
Santa Claus is coming? What for?

For paranoids:
Santa Claus is coming ... for ME!

For people with attention deficit disorders:
Silent night, holy night ... oooooh, look at the nativity scene ... pretty! ... awwwww baby Jesus awwwww ... aw mother mary aw ... chocolate! ... eggnog! ... yeah, I want some ... hey, why is Santa's suit red?

For people with obsessive compulsive disorders:
Jingle bells jingle bells jingle bells jingle bells jingle bells jingle bells jingle bells ...

The Pick Up, And A Shameful Transaction

Hedges once picked up a girl in a bar.

"Hey, ya wanna ... sleep with me?" she asked him.

"Sure," he said. He was desperate and she wasn't fat or ugly.

"Let's go to your place," she said.

However, he was impotent and she had passed out, so they didn't fuck that night.

When Hedges woke up, he said, "I got a headache!"

She said, "Shit -- I got a HELL of a headache."

He said, "So ya don't wanna ..."

She said, "No. But -- can ya get me some aspirin for my headache? And some water to wash it down?"

He said, "Let's make a bargain."
*
Sometimes prostitution doesn't involve only money. It might involve such goods as a painkiller, some water to wash it down, and a glass.

A Student's Recollection

He remembered the teacher in the fall of his sixth-grade school year.

The teacher -- call him Mr. J. -- was an old man -- at least in his 50, He had gray-black hair slicked back by some pomade that the neon lights on the ceiling of the classroom made shiny.

Mr. J. once told two girls who were talking away in class: "You sound like two New York Jews on a street corner going vutt vutt vitty vitty vutt vutt."

He said it at least once, maybe twice or three times.

Mr. J. was replaced for the second semester of the school year. He didnj't know why, because the powers that be gave no explanation. But as he thought of it later, it probably was for that anti-Semitic outburst.

Ironically, Mr. J. wore a white shirt with buttonless collars, a black tie and a black suit -- somewhat like Hasidic dress.

Hitler And Stalin -- Contrasts

Hitler was mass-murderer crazy -- that is, he would go into a place and spray everyone there with bullets.

Stalin was serial-killer crazy -- that is, very secretive and furtive.

Hitler never had the atomic bomb, so we don't know definitely if he would've used it. But I believe he would have.

Stalin did have the atomic bomb, but he never used it -- and neither did any of the other men who followed him as rulers of the Soviet Union.

So you could say one thing about that. The communists were tyrannical bastards -- but SANE tyrannical bastards.

Proverbs ... Or Not

A first-grade teacher collected some well-known proverbs. She gave each child in her class the first half of the proverb and asked them to come up with the rest of it.

Their insights may surprise you.

While reading them, please remember that they are first-grade students -- kids 5 to 6 years old.

Better to be safe than ...
Punch a 5th grader.

Strike while the ...
Bug is close.

It's always darkest before ...
Daylight Savings Time

Never underestimate the power of ...
Termites

You can lead a horse to water but ...
How?

Don't bite the hand that ...
looks dirty.

No news is ...
Impossible.

A miss is as good as a ...
Mister.

You can't teach an old dog new ...
Math.

If you like down with dogs, you'll ...
Stink in the morning.

The pen is mightier than the ...
Pigs.

An idle mind is ...
The best way to relax.

Where there's smoke, there's ...
Pollution.

Happy the bride who ...
Gets all the presents.

A penny saved is ...
Not that much.

Two's company, three's ...
The Musketeers.

Don't put off 'til tomorrow what ...
You put on to go to bed.

Laugh and the world laughs with you, cry and ...
You have to blow your nose.

There are none so blind as ...
Stevie Wonder.

Children should be seen and not ...
Spanked or grounded.

If at first you don't succeed ...
Get new batteries.

When the blind lead the blind ...
Get out of the way!

Better late than ...
Pregnant!

Economical Politics

I remember, when I was a newspaper reporter back in the late 1970s, one certain politico -- I'll call her B.G., because those are her initials -- talk about people -- and potential voters -- as "the taxpayers."

As far as I know, she never called them constituents or, more importantly, citizens.

When you call folks taxpayers, it's equating them with customers or consumers, and you put a dollar sign -- or many of them -- on public life.

You can be bought. You probably will be bought. And you probably have been bought.

Equal Opportunities

In April of this year, I was in line at a book store on the northeast side of Indianapolis. I was behind a young black woman who was carrying a musical instrument in a pack on her back.

I asked her, "Is that a cello?"

She answered, "No. It's an acoustic guitar," with a snotty sound in her voice.

I thought: The only black woman who's licensed to carry an acoustic guitar and allowed to sing folks music is Tracy Chapman.

Then I thought: Hey, with the advancement in civil rights, black people how have the chance to sing boring, offkey, mediocre and unoriginal songs at open mics -- just like any white person.

America -- ain't it grand?

Monday, November 23, 2009

O Sole Mio!

Giovanni Bellovoce, the famous Italian tenor, agreed to undergo acupuncture to cure some recurring headaches he was suffering.

One needle was put into his scalp. He sang, "O sole mio ..."

A second needle was put in. He sang, "O sole ... "

A third needle was put in. He sang, "O ... o ... o ... "

After the fourth needle was put in, he began to sing, "Don't break my heart, my achy breaky heart ... "

Dating A Jewish Woman

Smitty used to date a Jewish woman. He liked her, but he got a secret thrill from dating a woman outside his religion and ethnicity.

One time, when they were making love, he was satisfying her so successfully that she yelled out, "O God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob!"

And when she climaxed, she said, "Holy Moses! I've been to the Promised Land!"

And one time during pillow talk after making love, she told him, "Jesus was just all right with me. He's just not all that, OK?"

Transactions By Gender

A lot of women have a hard time doing impersonal transactions.

For example, when they go to their local bank, they often go to a specific teller, or what to go to that teller.

They think: Oh, Molly's busy. I like her. I'll wait for her to get free. But I won't go to Mary Ann. She's a bitch!

A lot of men aren't like that. Their thoughts about transactions are a lot like their thoughts about sex: If you know them, that's OK, but you do it anyway.

Women, at the least, have to like them a little.

Take Me To Manhattan

Rick The Hick had saved his pennies, nickles, and dimes -- along with a few quarters -- until he finally had enough money to do what he had wanted to do since he was a teenager:

Take a trip to New York City.

He took the train from his small, rural midwestern town to Grand Central Station.

Once he was off the train, he got outside the station and hailed a taxi.

He got into a taxi and told the cabbie:

"Take me to Manhattan!"

The cabbie turned around and said:

"Buddy boy, this IS Manhattan."

He then added:

"Did you say that to see if I was awake? And if I understood English?"

Past Actions, Future Predictions

Those who are abused -- in the future, they abuse.

Those who were teased -- in their future, they tease.

Those who were molested -- in their future, they molest.

Sometimes, I wonder why this is, especially for molestation.

One reason, I believe, is this:

Subconsciously, the molester who was molested definitely isn't happy. And when he see happy children, he's often jealous of their happiness and wants to take it from them.

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Possession Porn

The Christmas holiday season is coming up on us. Retailers are starting earlier than usual to make up for terrible sales last year. Word has leaked out about specials that will be offered at Best Buy, Target, and WalMart.

With all this emphasis on possessions, I'll note this:

I used to enjoy looking at the gift catalogs that my parents used to receive. One I especially wanted to see was from Nieman Marcus, the very upscale department store in Dallas.

That catalog was what I'd call possession porn or what the writer Tom Wolfe would call plutography -- writings about wealth that raise emotions.

I looked at the items in the Nieman Marcus catalog. I wouldn't buy most of them because of they were out of my price range. Besides, I didn't want them.

It was a lot like looking at women on a web porn site. I couldn't screw most of them because they were out of my price range. Most of them, however, I wanted.

There's one big difference between pornography and plutography.

On the internet, some companies charge $29.95 a month -- or even more -- to look at pictures of naked women. No company that I know of charges anything to look at pictures of luxury cars, jewelry, and expensive geegaws on the net.

(By the way, my father never ordered anything from Nieman Marcus.)

Green Eggs And Hamlet

This verse must be the bastard stepchild of Shakespeare and Dr. Suess:

I ask to be, or not to be.
That is the question, I ask of me.
This sullied life, it makes me shudder.
My uncle's boffing dear, sweet mother.
Would I , could I, take my life?
Could I, should I, end this strife?
Should I jump out of a plane?
Or throw myself before a train?
Should I from a cliff just leap?
Could I put myself to sleep?
Shoot myself, or take some poison?
Maybe try self immolation?
To shudder off this mortal coil,
I could stab myself with a fencing foil.
Slash my wrists while in the bath?
Would it end my angst or end my wrath?
To sleep, to dream, now there's the rub.
I could drop a toaster in my tub.
Would all be glad if I were dead?
Could I perhaps kill them instead?
This line of thought takes consideration,
For I'm the king of procrastination.

Stealing A Kiss

Dave had just perfected what he thought was a slick move to steal a kiss from a woman.

On a day with Anne, he told her, "I think there's something in your eye. Let me get it out for you."

There wasn't anything in her eye. But as he leaned in to try to get it ...

He stuck his finger in her eye.

Dave had to take Anne to the hospital. He had hoped the date wouldn't end in the emergency room -- he had hoped it might've ended in her living room with a hot make-out session, on in her bedroom with some hot sex.

She had to get an eye patch for her injury.

There would be no second date -- obviously.

A week later, Dave saw Anne. She was still wearing the eyepatch.

With her still-good, uncovered eye, she gave him one of those looks that would've killed him if they could've done so.
*
Is there a statue of limitations for stealing a kiss?

A lot of guys have tried to steal a kiss from the object of their affections. In response, they committed assault and battery upon those guys.

That's a time where the punishment did not fit the crime.

Medical Costs

Do you know why medical costs are so high?

Well, when you need to go to an emergency room, you can't really shop around.

Say you get hit in the head, or have a stroke or heart attack, or you've cut yourself and you're bleeding heavily.

You want to go to the nearest emergency room as soon as you can. You can't really do comparison shopping.

Or if you go to Dr. A, he gives you one diagnosis. Then do you go to Dr. B and get another diagnosis? And if they are different, do you pay for the one you don't want?

Examples of this are:
  • Sunburn vs. skin cancer;
  • A bad cough from bronchitis vs. lung cancer.

Life And Leaves

Life and leaves --
in autumn, both on the ground,
brown, yellow, red, orange, in piles
small and large,
and the trees are naked.
It's kind of embarassing to see
branches with no protection.
You remember the difference
between naked and nude,
and you remember
the girl, the copper head,
the copper top,
the brown/yellow/red/orange hair,
so nice in her short haircut,
white turtleneck, blue pullover,
and the way she wrinkled her nose
when you told one of your bad jokes.
She's kind of skinny, but
you'd like to see her nude
and do all the intimate
things that can happen
between a man and a woman.
But such reveries are best
for spring -- not autumn,
when the leaves are on the ground
and you have other things
to do with your time
like get your storeroom filled
with your choice of nuts
for the winter, upcoming.

Capital Punishment ...

I'm not against it. I believe that, for some crimes, the guilty owe a life as a punishment.

One of those crimes is murder -- an eye for an eye, a life for a life.

Others are treason and crimes of sexual coercion, such as rape or child sexual abuse.

But if governments ban capital punishment, I wouldn't be against that. Life in prison is a good alternative punishment for the guilty.

Pray, Mantis

For what, pray tell, does a praying mantis pray?

Fresh blades of grass to eat?

A hot lady mantis for mating?

A healthy green sheen on his carapace?

No birds around to eat him?

No humans around to step on him?

I'm sure he's thankful that he's not a germ or a dung beetle. To give thanks is one reason to pray.

But what if a praying mantis is an atheist or an agnostic? What does he pray for then?

Or what is a praying mantis would rather be a playing mantis? If he is, what game would he rather be playing?

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Jewish And Other Delis

Isn't the term Jewish deli redundent -- like striped zebra?

I've never heard of a Methodist or Baptist or Catholic deli.

I've heard of a Hindu deli ... it's a new one, though.

Lucking Fuvly

Sometimes Ted stumbled for words.

A neurologist told him that, when he was tired or nervous, his brain often mixed up the vowles and consonents in words.

When Ted heard that, he said:

"Well, that's lucking fuvly! That's a doddgamm bunch of shull bit!"

After Ted read a book about the Third Reich and all the atrocities committed during it, all he could say was:

"Those nucking fatzis! Those crucking fouts!"

A Productive Member Of Society

Recently, I found another letter from my friend Frank, who often sends me some screeds. I humor him by keeping them and posting them at this blog.

He wrote is early in 2008, obviously before Obama was elected president.

people friends and family members especially ask me Frank when are you going to become A PRODUCTIVE MEMBER OF SOCIETY ... and i tell them folks, let's review ... for the last eight years, this country had a willfully ignorant, if not stupid, man as stubborn as a mule, as its president ... and as our vice president, we had a man some compared rightly i say to satan himself ... we're in this mess is mesopotamia and things aren't getting better ... we're spending $2 billion a month on it ... the rest of the world hates us because of these two men and their followers and half the time they hate us for every good reasons ... people are unhappy with their lives, but they can't change or won't change because they're up to their eyebrows in debt for a bottomless lust for goods ... or they're afraid to change ... and a lousy economic situation doesn't help either ... people are denying their true calling to please others to whom they give their power of approval ... they're either restlessly running around, filling their minds with worthless busyness and junk culture so they don't have to think or won't have to think or can't think about how miserable they are ... or they act conformist or willfully ignorant like the president unfortunately ... we're poisoning ourselves with pollution ... a man with one joint of marijuana can get life in prison for one joint mind you but a convicted murderer might get out in less than 10 years ... and high members of the current administration will not get one day in the slammer ... and this is the topper, the insult atop the injury ... you have star wars stamps for 41 cents but a stamp for jonas salk who discovered a cure for polio and is the main reason you and i aren't crippled costs 63 cents ... and they want me to be a productive member of THAT society ... i stay away from it as much as i can so i don't add to the mountains of 100 percent bullshit ... hell, if i'm not a DESTRUCTIVE member of this society, i know i'm doing something right ... and the only reason i don't head for the hills is because central indiana has no hills ...

Differences Between Companies

An imagrent once said: "X is my mother country. But Y, where I imagrated to, is my spouse country."

That's an interesting comparison.

That imagrent moved away from an old life to a new one while he still respected the old one.

It's like the old saw: Make new friends but keep the old. One is silver and the other gold.

Crapitalism

I've read about technology that will reduce CDs and DVDs to the size of a quarter. To replace the old copies that they own, people must buy the new versions.

Folks, that's an example of what I call crapitalism -- business that's not illegal or immoral, but profits the seller much, much more than the buyer.

Whenever I criticize actions like that, some will say: "What are you -- a communist? Are you against business?"

I reply: "I'm against theft and its first cousin -- ripping people off."

The next supporter of capitalism I learn of who criticizes shitty practices like that will be the first supporter of capitalism I'll learn of.

Unfortunately.

Here's an example of what I mean:

Ron is selling show cones from a cart in a city park. Joe, his nephew, comes up to him.

The usual, Joe?

Yeah, Uncle Ron ... aww, man, you got the cheap, crappy cones again. They taste like wood!

You don't have to eat them, you know.

When you retire, I'm gonna take over your cart and I'll sell quality cones. No cheap, crappy ones. And I'll make lots of money.

Joe, you have a lot to learn.

Like what?

Quality is only for rich people because they're the only ones with true freedom of choice. Everybody else must pick from what they can afford. And what they can afford means cheap, crappy stuff.

That's not true. My bike is a good bike.

It's not quality. It's value. It's good only for the price your dad paid for it. You think Wal-Mart is big because of the quality of their goods and services? Is McDonald's on top because they have the finest cuts of meat? And say what you want to about my cones, but I sell out this cart every day.

I see. You make your money by deliberately selling mediocre products to people of modest means.

That and Eight Balls.

What's an Eight Ball?

Eat your crappy cone.
*
This is by L.D. Harrod. I found at blurrrville.com. And yes -- the site's name has three Rs.

True Hates

In the book Love and Will, the psychologist Rollo May said:

Hate is not the opposite of love; indifference is.

How true. If there's hate for something, there's still some emotional attachment.

For example, I love the National Football League, but I don't hate soccer. In fact, I'm indifferent to it.

If love is a feeling of Live Forever, hate is a feeling of Die Now -- No, Die Yesterday.

The Half Bird

Much of the time, it isn't the big things in life that bother me the most.

It's the little things. They are truly annoying and bothersome.

They aren't worth a full bird -- that is, the middle finger extending from a fist.

They're worth a half bird -- that is, the little finger extending from a fist.

One Mean Pizza

"Hey -- you oughta get a pizza from Iaccobetti!" a friend told me.

"Never heard of them," I said.

"It's a new store. And they make a mean pizza there!"

"Okay. I'll try it."

So one weekend night, I called Iaccobetti's and ordered a pizza -- a large with pepperoni, black olives and mushrooms.

The driver brought it to my home. I paid him and took the pie inside.

On the lid, it said -- "ARE YOU SURE YOU NEED THIS, FAT ASS?"
*
That's when I woke up.

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Jack And Jill, With Other Jottings

If a man can do a lot of things, he's called a jack of all trades. But if a woman can do a lot of things, she's rarely called a jill of all trades.
*
If male stormtroopers wear jackboots, do female stormtroopers wear jillboots?
*
You often tell an ignorant man, "You don't know jack!" But you don't tell an ignorant woman, "You don't know jill!"
*
Men go jacking around, but women don't go jilling around.
*
Men do -- and often are -- jackoffs.
But if women do the same things, are they jilloffs?
*
*
If you want to know if a man is an optimist or a pessimist, show him a picture of a woman in a bikini. If he says she's half naked, he's an optimist. But if she says she half dressed, he's a pessimist.
*
Success, according to some real estate agents, can be said -- location, location, location.
Another way to say it is -- Caucasian, Caucasian, Caucasian.
*
Will your friend find a smile in the 25th aisle?
*
"I won't kiss a man's ass to get in good with him ... it's too unsanitary ... instead, I'd rather bribe him ..."
*
A mind scrubbing is trying to remove a horrible image from your mind.
*
When he was younger, he had imaginary friends. He has them now, but the psychologists call them hallucinations.
*
What did the Jewish Mexican man say when he was surprised?
"Oy! Caramba!"
*
They were a couple of small spuds in the big, big potato patch of the world.
*
"That band -- The Frey -- they sound like the bastard spawn of John Mayer and Coldplay."
*
A person who thought Tuesday got its name because it was the second day of the week ...
*
While some jobs pay peanuts, some pay worse. They pay peanut shells.
*
When you're with a black man, when something goes wrong, or you get caught doing something sneaky -- please don't way the jig is up.
*
Anger and
Anarchy
Arises
From a heart
That's broken
And blue.
*
Some people think life's going to be easy -- that they can pay their dues with a credit card.
*
People die from complications, but not from simplifications.
*
The philosopher's cousin asked him if he believed in free will. He said he did because he had no choice.
*
Anna Maria Warshowski, a native of Krakow, danced at what's often called a gentleman's club. Therefore, she was a Polish stripper using a stripper pole.
*
He was the type of man who had performance anxiety when he masturbated ...
*
A friend used to play the guitar. When he's with that woman, he plays the fool.

Aliens And Labor

Ace: Hey, Deuce, look over there!

Deuce: I just see some Hispanic guy. What's so special about him?

Ace: I bet he's an illegal alien.

Deuce: I bet he is. By God, they steal our jobs! If it wasn't for them, I'd be mowing my neighbor's yard!

Ace: Or fixing your neighbor's roof!

Deuce: Or busing a table at a restaurant!

(Reworded from a dialog I found on the net.)

A Girl And Her Dog

J.T. once dated a woman who owned a dog.

She always showed the dog more affection that him, and that ticked him off.

One time, when he picked her up for a date, she gave him a little kiss on the cheek and said, "Hi, J.T. Let's go."

When they got back, the dog came up to the door to greet them. He rolled onto his back, put his legs in the air, and showed his belly.

She scratched the dog's belly and said, in a baby-talk voice, "Oh, how's my boy? How's my big boy?"

So J.T. got on his back and put his legs in the air.

But she did nothing.

Each of them said they broke up with the other person.

Body Parts

Since the world is so uncertain, it's nice to know you can count on some things.

Like your fingers.

And if you take off your shoes, you can count on your toes.
*
You've heard the expression, "I wouldn't give an arm or a leg for it."

Well, would you give a hand or a foot for it?

How about a finger or a toe for it?

Maybe you'd give a little toe, because it's like the appendix. You don't it to live.

But if you do that, you must remember that you can't count on that toe any more.

Or surely you'd might give a fingernail or a toenail for it.

Store Vs. Shop

Store is a man's word, while shop is a woman's word.

Men go to a store to get stuff. As soon as they get, they're gone.

It's a lot like hunting.

Women go into a shop, stay in it for a while and browse before they buy the things they went to the store to get ... and maybe some other things.

It's a lot like nesting.

For examples: Hardware stores. With a name like that, they appeal mostly to men.

A woman in a hardware store is like a rabbi at a pork barbecue ... or any other fish-out-of-way situation ... like a fish out of water.

An exception to this is the workshop. That's where men take the stuff they bought at the hardware store and make things from it.

Sometimes, they're so busy making stuff that they don't notice their wives or girlfriends have gone to some shops to buy things.

Many times, they pay for those things with the men's money.

Sunday, August 30, 2009

How I'm Feeling Nowadays

This picture is a perfect example of how I'm feeling nowadays, as summer turns to fall.

I might tell you why someday. It's too long and complicated to get into now. Besides, I must organize my notes about it.

So -- screw it. I'm getting out of here.

I'll post later. Don't know when. Until then ... take care.

Let Me Count The Ways

I once broke up with a woman. After a week had passed, she wanted to get back together.

I told her, "Honey, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways:

"Zero ... nada ... zilch ... none ... no way ... nein ... nyet."

That was seven ways of nothing. So seven times zero equals zero.

I think she got the message, because she went on her way and I haven't seen her since.

Stalking and Hunting

When you think about it, stalking is a lot like hunting.

Both the stalker and the hunter are stalking something. The stalker follows a person, usually a woman. The hunter follows a game animal.

Neither want the object of their search to know they are following.

The hunter, however, carries a weapon and might be wearing camoflage clothing. If a stalker does that, he might be looking at some very serious jail time.

Who Doesn't Love Money?

Some assholes say that Jews love money.

Hell, everybody loves money. Why blame the Jews for liking it more than gentiles?

When I get paid, I don't say, "Boss, give that money for my work to Goldberg. Hell, he loves it more than me. Just pay me in fireworks and beef jerky."

10 Percent

I had a friend who in the middle of his life left a sales job and became a minister.

He tried to get me to go to church as a way to, as he said, "reform" me. I declined because I didn't believe I needed "reforming" like that.

However, he had some interesting words to say as he tried to recruit me. He quoted the old saying that we only use 10 percent of our brains, and added the line from the movie The Wedding Crashers that we only use 10 percent of our hearts.

To that, he added that a lot of people only use 10 percent of their souls, and that church attendance would help raise those figures.

Saturday, August 8, 2009

Sun Up, Fun Up

On a morning of a summer day, when Sam was between second and third grades, he woke and especially noticed the light shining outside.

Sun up, fun up, he thought.

So he jumped out of bed, ready for the new day.

Sam wore his shorts, shirt and underwear to bed so he wouldn't waste any time getting dressed. He also was at a stage that some gradeschool boys enter; they wear their underwear to bed under their pajama pants.

He ran down the stairs of his house and went through the front door and was about a third of the way to his family's garage, where he had parked his bike the evening before, when his mother called to him. "Come and eat breakfast!" she said.

Four decades later, as that memory came back to Sam, he didn't remember what happened to him or what he happened upon the rest of that day. He didn't remember if it was a good day, a bad day, or a medium day. He didn't break a limb or wasn't kidnapped then molested by a stranger. But he didn't see a wonderful wild animal or notice a spectacular cloud in the sky.

And as he thought of that day, it was as if it happened the week before.

Overbearing Fathers

Some fathers are very overbearing.

If their kids don't come in first place, those fathers blame them, call them failures, and say they've disgraced their families.

The best reaction to that is this: The kids ought to commit hari kari right in front of the old man.

But when they're supposed to push the swords into their stomachs, they ought to turn and stab the old man.

Chinese Athletes

There are many famous athletes of either Chinese or Chinese-American descent.

There's the figure skater -- Michelle Kwan.

There's the basketball player -- Yao Ming.

Then there's the surfer -- Hang Ten.

Gender Craziness

The more I think about it, women -- in general -- are the saner gender.

It's men -- in general -- who are the ones who'll climb the highest mountain, dive as deep as they can into the sea, fuck any thing, every thing, and all things if they could, and go as fast as possible.

Women go crazy when they try to fit into the rules of men or society.

Sunday, August 2, 2009

Climbing The Ladder

Here we have a young woman climbing the corporate ladder.

However, we tell her this. She should not rely mostly on her youthful beauty and sexuality to get ahead in work. Those things fade. Skills and a good work ethic never do.

Toejamming

Art was sitting in his favorite chair and reading a newspaper when he remembered the time he got his toe stuck in a bathtub faucet.

He was a teenager and taking a bath, fooling around when he put the big toe of his right foot into the tap to stop the flow of the water. He did it successfully a few times, but it only took one unsuccessful time before he got it stuck.

He didn't know how he could get it out. He didn't want to ask his dad for help, because his father would get upset -- that was part of his emotional distance from his children.

He didn't want to get his mom involved because he was going through puberty and would be mortified.

And he didn't want to get his brothers involved because they wouldn't help -- they would just stand around and laugh at him.

So he squirmed his toe around before it came loose.

Some White-collar People

Some white-collar people are just as ignorant and belligerant about it as some blue-collar people. They just have a better polish.
*
You could say a lot of things about me, but not if you're mute.
*
"Smothered in mushrooms."
"Smothered in onions -- and big tits!"
"Big, sweet tits!"
"You got that right!"
*
I got in touch with my feminine side. She slapped me and took out a restraining order.
*
A guy once said to a gal, "Hey, let's do 68. You blow me and I own you one."
*
You've heard of the race card.
Then there's the race royal flush.
That's the ace, king, queen, jack and 10 ...
of spades, of course.
*
Some people can take the heat, but the folks in Minnesota and the Dakotas during the winter take the cold.
*
Will it be tough love but soft or easy hate?
*
Seven
stunning
nude girls
sunning
on the flat roof
of an apartment
building
as they talk
about
their love lives ...
*
There are vanity plates, but never narcissism plates.

And there aren't any selfdepreciation plates for people with low selfesteem.
*
The Three B League -- the breasts, the buns and the bagina.

That's for vagina. I'm using poetic license, and there's no way it can ever be revoked.

The three B League is also known as the boobs, the butt and the bush.
*
As you know, it often rains cats and dogs -- but never, say, badgers and wolverines, or elephants and hippos.
*
Can a person be a hypocritical liar and lying hypocrite at the same time?
*
A Dutchman once put his finger into a dyke.
She didn't like it.
She preferred that it be done by a Dutch woman.
*
There's the line of fire.
There's also the ring of fire.
But you never hear about the rectangle of fire.
Or the isosceles triangle of fire.
*
There's malice aforethought -- but not malice aneightthought -- that's twice as bad.
*
If opinions are like assholes, and we all have one, then what about those folks who've had colostomies?
*
Never ask an OBGYN 'twat's new.
*
A woman once said, "I've been called a cunt before, but it was always by some prick."
*
Is a bear catholic?
Does the pope shit in the woods?
A broken clock at least can find one truffle.
And a blind pig is right at least twice a day.

Evil Bub

It seems like every small town has some interesting, if not strange, characters.

In the small town where I grew up, it was Evil Bub Evans.

His real name was either Gilmore or Wilmore Evans, but he wanted everyone to call him Bub.

That was short for Beezelbub -- also known as the devil.

But when I look back, he wasn't that evil. It was more like he was a jerk -- and a bad one at that.

To many members of his family, he was the relative that no one wanted to talk about unless they had to -- and that was in court and under oath.

He was so bad that he flunked out of Sunday school -- at three different churches.
.
In his high school physics class, he told the teacher that he wanted to split the atom and make a nuclear bomb. "Anything else is a waste of my time," he explained.

Even if no churches wanted him, some let him play on their softball teams, for he was, at the least, decent at baseball.

But he got kicked off a lot of the teams, and even out of some of the leagues.

He used to steal bases. That was against the leagues' commandments.

He also bet on the games and one time, he was caught screwing the wife of the first baseman.

The pin on his ATM card was 666 -- 69.

You've probably seen those change holders at convenience stores, where is you need a penny for change you can take one, and you can leave a penny.

Bub always took the pennies in them.

To suppliment his income, he also sold porn out of his car.

One time, he was parked in his car. A kid walked by. Bub said:

"Hey, kid -- you wanna buy some pornography?"

The kid replied, "No thanks, mister. We don't have a pornograph at home."

He also declared bankrupcy. He told a cousin, with who I keep in touch, that he wanted to sell his soul to the devil, but that the devil couldn't collect on it.

His cousin said, "Bub, you can declare Chapter 7 or Chapter 11, but you don't have much choice when the devil comes. You've already declared Chapter 666."

Bub said, "Shit. I'm gonna try to refi."

His cousin said, "Bub, you ought to change your life when you're on a firstname basis with the folks at the 911 call center."

He also was thoughtless. He once told his cousin that he thought reality television shows were lame.

You'll never guess who came by right at that monent.

It was Stephen Hawking.

He said to Bub, "Hey -- look at me. There's no way I'm going to be running a fourminute mile anytime soon. And if I could get out of his wheelchair, I'd kick your ass."

Instead, Hawking ran over Bub.

Saturday, August 1, 2009

Not A Sports Bar ...

I once had this horrible idea.

Instead of a sports bar with the television sets turned to ESPN and other sports channels, there could be a politics bar, with MSNBC, Fox News Network, and other channels like them being broadcast.

There would be more fighting in those bar between partisans, who would look like their idols -- overweight, plain if not ugly, and with lots of bad haircuts and combover.

However, they wouldn't have any mullets -- too hillbilly.

A Vision Of An Anthill

Once when I was walking around downtown Indianapolis, I stopped to look at a building that housed one of the city's major insurance companies.

I truly looked at. Then I thought of what I saw.

The building was like an anthill and the employees inside were ants in human disguise. If I could remove the side of the building, I could have seen the antpeople scurrying around.

I damned the building and the ones around it. The people inside were in the death in life that is zombie life and wondered if any of them were happy, or at least satisfied, and if any of their efforts as they scurried in the building would be good at all.

Indifference

I don't care
How you are
As much as I
Don't care
Who you are,

Alleged superior --
To me? Ha!
Prove it!
By age? You're probably senile.
By money? I'm not yours
To buy and sell.
By brains? Wise men persuade,
And don't coerce.
By prisons? Lock me up.
I'll be free --
Someday, eveNtually.
Kill me and others
Will take my place.

You wanted a reason?
I just gave you four.
And you don't like them?
Tough shit. Fuck you.

Flip For The Nickle

Burke was a trust officer for a bank in a small midwestern town. He handled trusts, estates, and other things like that.

Most of his work was routine and peaceful. One case, however, exasperated him greatly.

He handled the estate of a man who well call Smith. It was worth between $30 million and $35 million.

He had two heirs -- a son and a daughter.

In the middle of probate, however, Smith's daughter and his daughterinlaw started to disagree about who would get a few things in the estate. And as it sometimes happens in these things, the disagreements became a strong conflict.

It got the point where Burke was in his office with Smith's son, his daughterinlaw, and his daughter, going through the contents of a jar that held some assorted loose coins.

He got to the last coin. It was a nickle.

In exasperation, he took it in his hand and said, "Who gets this?"

Smith's daughter said, "Flip for it."

All That Different?

Actor, director and artist Dennis Hopper ...


And actor and butter scotch stallion Owen Wilson.

Because of the age difference, this doesn't fit into the Separate At Birth category. However, they look enough alike to resemble kinfolks: A father and son or an uncle and nephew.

Mangled Language -- Two Examples

I know people who say seen for saw. They often use double negatives, too.

Those people don't have the best education and they aren't encouraged to speak correctly, so I understand their mistakes.

But what I especially don't like -- and don't understand -- if people who know better but use English pretentiously.

They'll say something like, "Prior to the soiree, I engaged ... "

Damn it! Say, "Before the party, I did ... "

I wonder who they're trying to impress. It certainly isn't me.

Also, you can say that English is polluted by double entendres.

For example, you can't say Oral Roberts or Oral Hershiser without some fool giggling and saying, "How about their cousin -- Anal?"

Thank you, good sir, for bringing the level of discourse down to the level of a gradeschool playground.

The Good Brother

Recently I read The Good Brother, a novel by Chris Offutt, a native of eastern Kentucky who often writes about Appalachia and its people. I had read Kentucky Straight, a book of his short stories, and The Same River Twice, a memoir, and had enjoyed them.

In the book, Virgil Caudell, a resident of eastern Kentucky, kills a man who had killed his brother. He flees so he won't be killed, which would continue the blood feud, and changes his name to Joe Tiller.

(
By the way, that also happens to be the name of the former head football coach at Purdue Univerity. I don't know if Offutt knew that; someday I might ask him through an email.)

He ends up in the mountains of Montana and meets some hardcore antigovernment survivalists. But he doesn't share their beliefs about the feds:

Joe didn't consider the government an enemy. It was more of an entity to manipulate if you wanted fresh gravel on your road, or a family member out of jail. People at home didn't worry about the government; they ignored it. Men hunted out of season to feed their children. Families made moonshine for export, and when demand changed they grew marijuana. Laws didn't have much bearing in the hills, especially when the sheriff was an elected official.

And that's an interesting point.

Friday, July 31, 2009

If That Is How It Is

If that is how it is, then there's no negotiation.

If that is how it is, then I am surely saddened.

If that is how it is.

You gave your heart to another and now it's in his hands.

If the circumstances had been different ... yes, I know ... but I wish you hadn't said that.

You know, honey, I had a dream once.

You were wearing a medieval dress and standing in a tower. I climbed the tower and embraced you from behind. Your knight for you, fair lady.

But it won't be. Can't be.

You see, honey, what I wanted to do was to break through to your privateness, your withdrawl from the world, and take it from you.

Or did I want to join you there?

It would cover me with comfort like a blanket, true.

It would've been nice. But would it have worked?

I tell myself I'm not ready for sleep yet. And I don't when that will be.

Maybe never.

Goodbye, honey. I wish you well.

Take care, honey, Watch out for life's griefs.

And what about me? O, don't worry.

This'll hurt me -- hell, NOW it hurts me -- but I'll get past it.

Eventually.

Drive Time

This happened during September 1985.

I drove west on 38th Street in Indianapolis and had passed Keystone Avenue before I noticed that the buildings were old and some were vacant -- shells of the businesses that had left them.

I imagined how it was 60 or 50 or even 40 or 30 years ago, when the street was the main business through a neighborhood, with groceries stories, cleaners, hardware stores, and other businesses within easy walking distance of the residents. Now it was inhabited with people of various social and economic levels, most of them low.

I thought the windows of the buildings looked like sockets for dead and gone eyes and the buildings looked like skulls. I shuddred.

By then I had passed the grounds of the Indianapolis Art Museum and immediately rolled through what looked like a park but what was the museum's' grounds, the former estate of a pharmaceutical tycoon and his family. I noticed trees which were about five to 10 years old according to their height, planted in rows like a nursery.

I went under an overpass and saw car lots, strip malls, and the rest of a transient commercial area where businesses were here today and gone six months from now after a decision by the central office -- usuall somewhere out of state.

I compared this area to the area along Shadelane Avenue between Washington and East 38th streets and decided that the only way this section was better was that the asphalt of the srtreets wasn't crumbling.

By then, I had driven past where west 38th Street intersects Interstate 465. The cars in the opposite lanes reminded him of insects and their headlights of bug eyes.

I had driven past my destination, so I turned around.

Reading The Shakes

Ace: You know I never read any plays by Shakespeare before, so I went to the library and took one out.

Deuce: Which one?

Ace: Romeo and Juliet.

Deuce: What did you think about it?

Ace: I wasn't impressed.

Deuce: What? Why not?

Ace: The play was full of cliches.
"But soft -- what light through yonder window breaks?"
"Romeo, Romeo. Wherefore art thou, Romeo?"
"A plague on both your houses!"
I've heard them before. That Shakespeare's a damn thief. He stole those quotes from other people, put them in his plays and called it his own work.

Deuce: Shakespeare wrote those lines, idiot. Back in the 1590s.

Ace: So he didn't take those lines from other people, but they took those lines from him?

Deuce: Right.

Ace: Well then -- never mind. Guess the joke's on me.

An Incident

He went into a tavern on a dark, damp night when halfway wanted to go home and sleep, but his soul felt darker than the night and he wanted the two of them to be equal. He though a few beers and some food would help the balance.

As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he saw people scattered throughout the tavern. He took a seat at the bar.

As he drank a beer and ate a sandwich, he looked at the liquor bottles behind it, then at his reflection in the mirror behind them.

In the mirror, he noticed that a man who was sitting at the bar was holding a shot glass and toasting his own reflection. The hand that held the shot glass was trembling as the man lowered it to the bar. Then he leaned his head back and whipped it forward, quickly but awkwardly.

He saw the man's flushed face and red eyes.

That man has just walked in the door of the House of Intoxication, he thought. He'll stay there for a while, stumble around and hit the walls, then fall asleep with his hangover around him like a sleeping bag. He was trying to stop his awareness if only for a short time.

He wondrered if if should help the man, but decided he wouldn't because the man wouldn't want it. The best way he could help was not to end up like him.

He drank his beer, ate his sandwich, paid his bill and left the bar -- for bed, for sleep, for waking and for action, so he could live another day and drink another might at a nother tavern.

A Very Naughty Girl

Dave once dated Paula, who was a freak.

One time at his place, he was sitting on the couch when she came up to him and said, "Look!"

She lifted up her dress.

She wasn't wearing any panties.

And she was as bald down there as Charles Barkley.

Dave looked, swallowed strongly, and told Paula, "You've been a naughty girl ... go to my room."

When they got there, he spanked her with a peacock feather.
*
By the way, Dave called the situation where a woman had shaved her pubic area a A.A. Bottom, because it was the opposite of Z.Z. Top.

Dragon Flies

Some people only skim
the surfaces of life --
touching only lightly,
and never deeply,
from fear of drowning,
the death that can make you
heavy,
sink you from sight,
and therefore from memory,
or from fear of burning,
the death that can make you
light
like ashes, to be blown away
and gone and forgotten,
with nothing to show for
a memorial.
They are like dragon flies.
They glide over the top.
They never give back,
but always take, And sometimes,
they leave behind
a great pain.

Where Superman Shops

I just figured out where Superman shops.

Where else but ... Super Target.

Clark Kent, however, shops at regular Target. That's to protect his secret identity.

I wonder if the same thing applies to cuts and Supercuts.

And don't you wonder why you never see any supermodels at Supercuts?

Home Depot?

A lot of white kids in the burbs act gangster as a joke.

They call themselves Home Depot.

They think it's ironic, but it's not. It's sarcastic.

Irony is sarcasm, but with a college degree.

Some Possible Friends Of Your Girlfriend

When you're dating a woman, you might get involved with her friends.

If you do, beware of those friends who have been impregnanted and/or incarcerated.

In other words, they've been either knocked up or locked up.

Saturday, July 25, 2009

Some Cheesecake And Some Details

Before you is the latest piece of cheesecake from my blog's bakery and kitchen.

Her name is Marcy Hanson. I found her picture on the net and downloaded it my hard drive.

I put it before you because I've written 12 posts today --that's a lot more than what I've written during the last few months -- and I bet you could use some sweetness in your life. I know I do.
*
Posting will be irregular in the future -- at least for the next month -- because I'm still involved with matters -- some personal, some related to the health of some relatives -- that keep me from my home base.

So this is all for today and probably for sometime soon.

Goodbye for now.

And please -- keep watching this space.

A Few Things At The Gas & Go

The time was nearing 7 on a weekday evening, and Art was late getting home. After work, he had browsed a bookstore, then stopped to buy some grtoceries.

As he was driving home, he saw that his gas tank was about three-fourths empty, so he stopped at a convenience store to buy some fuel.

As he stood in line to pay for his gas, he realized that he stopped at convenience stores for one big reason:

Restrooms accessible to the public.

And when he used the restroom of a convenience store, he often bought something. It was usually a candy bar or a soft drink. If he used the restroom of a fastfood place, he usually bought a small drink to go.

He did that as an obligation that he must fulfill. He used their services, so he had to buy something. If he didn't do that, he often felt guilty because he was ripping them off.

He didn't know how or where he ever got that idea.

As he got closer to the clerk at the cash register, he moved by a food display case that contained sandwiches made at the store and ready to be eaten after they were bought. Often when he was hungry, he bought one of them, but usually didn't do that because the bread in the sandwiches was dry and white and the meat was often tasteless and sometimes a sickly shade.

He saw one of the sandwiches had been squished into a shape that resembled a ball.

Then he chuckled at a memory.

In high school, he played halfback on the freshman football team. A teammate who also played halfback had a bad habit; he didn't carry the football close to him, so when he was tackled, he often fumbled.

The coach, Dan McGraw, would scream at the player:

"DAMN IT, SON -- DON'T CARRY THE FOOTBALL LIKE IT'S A LOAF OF BREAD!"

McGraw was nicknamed Goon. He was a minorleague Woody Hayes. He thought yelling and screaming at his players was the best way to motivate them. This was during the time when half the high school football coaches in the Midwest were minorleague Woody Hayeses.

And now, after all those years, in front of Art was a loaf of bread that looked like it had been carried like a football.

Then he remembered that the player was often nicknamed Loaf or Loafer or Light, as in light in the loafers -- a slang phrase for an effeminate homosexual.

When Art got to the clerk, he decided he wanted some change for a $20 bill. He asked for two $5 bills and ten $1 bills. Then he said, "I'm not going to use them all at a titty bar."

Right after he said that, he wondered:

Why the hell did I tell him that? He didn't need to know what I was going to use the bills for. Besides, if the clerk had been a woman, I wouldn't have told her that.


The clerk gave him the change and then replied:

"Hey, if you were going to a titty bar, you'd want all ones."

As Art drove home, he thought:

I told that guy what I wanted out of habit. I usually tell people why I do something or what something done to defuse their possible objections. because they have objected in the past. Because what I want from life is often different that what most people I know want from it. So I must explain so they might understand it and therefore approve it because most people usually don't approve of things they don't understand.

BUT

From now on, if no one asks me for a reason or an explanation of my actions, I won't give them one. And if they want a reason, I'll tell them the truth, no matter how they'll react.

And another thing: Quit feeling guilty for using the rest rooms at those convenience stores. That is what they are there for. If they weren't for the public to use, they wouldn't be so easily accessable.

After Art made those decisions and followed them, his life became a little less smooth that it was before. But he felt more satisfaction as he lived it.

A Very Good Reason For Shaving

Ace: I'm shaving.

Deuce: Well, I never would've noticed if you hadn't told me that. And by the way, I don't remember if you ever grew a beard or a mustache before.

Ace: Nah. I'm shaving somewhere else besides my face.

Deuce: Where, by chance?

Ace: My genitals.

Deuce: WHAT DID YOU SAY? YOU'RE SHAVING YOUR COCK AND BALLS? OH HELL -- WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING THAT?

Ace: It makes me look bigger in the bedroom.

Deuce: Yeah, it helps you find your goddamn dick when you jack off.

Ace: Hey, what the fuck you mean by that remark?

Deuce: If any one has less luck with the ladies than me, it's you. And you better not have used my razor for that bullshit.

Man And Basement: A Book Review

Recently I've been reading a lot more books than usual. I'm doing that to decide which ones I want to sell or donate.

A book I read was The Man In My Basement, by Walter Mosley, probably better known as the author of the Easy Rawlins mystery series. In the book, a man named Anniston Bennet imprisons himself in the basement of a home owned by Charles Dodd-Blakey, who lives in the Sag Harbor area, which is near the Hamptons in eastern Long Island. Bennet did it as a form of penance. He was a player in international political economy, for lack of a better term, and he committed many, many evil deeds.

I will donate the book. It was interesting enough to read once to pass the time, but not for another possible read in the future.

However, Mosley had several passages that caught my attention and gave me new angles on and explanations about life. So I'll post them here.

Here's the first. In it, Dodd-Blakey meets a neighbor, a young white woman:

She was from a local family and therefore accepted me as part of the community. Being a Negro, I was different. We would never be real friends. But neither of us really wanted that, nor did we feel left out of something. And so it was pleasant when we did cross paths. Good morning meant just that.

Here's one where Dodd-Blakey is watching some deer:

I loved to watch deer watching me. They were so timid and ignorant of everything but the possible threat. People think that they're cowardly, but I've been charged by a male or two. I respected them, because with no defense except for their quick feet they lived out in the wild with no law or protection. I once saw a group of 15 or more of them swimming out to Shelter Island. Their heads were just above the water, they looked frightened and desperate out there. Cowards don't face terror. Cowards live on back roads, behind closed doors, with the TVs blasting out anything to keep the silence and darkeness from intruding.

A third one is when Bennet explains love to Dodd-Blakey:

"Love, as the poet says, is like the spring. It grows on you and seduces you slowly and gently, but it holds tight like the roots of a tree. You know until you're ready to go that you can't move, that you would have to mutilate yourself in order to be free. That's the feeling. It doesn't last, at least it doesn't have to. But it holds on like a steel claw in your chest. Even if the tree dies, trhe roots cling to you. I've been men and women give up everything for love that once was."

In this one, Bennet explains how people are motivated:

"My actions were ... evil, criminal. But it was not me; it was the world around me. Not me but the commerce and the language of our world ... Death and starvation are integral parts of our language system, our form of communication.
Do what I say or else. Do your job or you're fired. These words carry consequence. To avoid pain we comply. Or we don't and then we die, Our logic is evil, so the the smartest and most successful are devils. Like me, I am a good citizen ande the worst demon."

And the last quote is Dodd-Blakey's casual thought while reading a science fiction book:

Why was I alive and seeing and thinking and dreaming if everything was just stoplights and television, test and failures, red wine and death?

I've wondered something like that many times and found that quote was an elegant way to say it.

Brooklyn FTW!

To him, there was only two true boroughs in New York City.

One was Brooklyn, where he was born and raised and lived. The other was Manhattan, the true capital of the world.

The Bronx was the home of the asshole Yankees and their asshole fans.

Staten Island was really New Jersey.

And Queens thought it was in New York City, but it really part of Long Island -- half suburbia and half farmland. If you gotta live in the city, he thought, you gotta go full force -- all out and gritty.

While Brooklyn was a good place to be born, the true city of Manhattan was south of 14th Street. That area was more like a burg, a village, an intimate town.

The rest of Manhattan was full of grids: Lines upon lifeless lines. Nice to use to get around, but as for the rest of life ... not so much.

Hardships

A white man, a black man, and an Indian walk into a bar.

The white man said, "Man, I've had it hard in my life. My grandparents came over from Europe and lived in poverty. I grew up in a trailer park and had to work very hard to make something of myself."

The black man said, "Hey, motherfucker, what about me? My ancestors didn't come over on their own; they were kidnapped from Africa and turned into slaves. And after the slaves were free, my people suffered from racism and segregation."

The Indian said, "Cry me a river, white man, black man. Cry me a river as long and deep as the Mississippi. MY PEOPLE WERE HERE FIRST. And look what happened to them after your people came here."

A Puzzle About Crosswords

How do we know if the crossword in yesterday's newspaper is new? That it wasn't printed before -- say in 1957?

Does the crossword puzzle industry police itself? Or are there independent monitors?

Do the crossword puzzle creators follow a sense of duty and of honesty to be original? Or do the folks that syndicate the crossword puzzles have records to check?

Carpe Carnum

Carpe carnum is Latin for seize the meat.
*
It's all fun and games until someone brings out the firearms.
*
It's interesting how young poets think about death while old poets think about girls.
--Bohumil Hrabel, Czech poet.
*
A new word I heard is vulturing; it's waiting for your parents to die so you can get your inheritense.
*
He wasn't reading the book. He was moving his eyesight over the text on a page. Also, he just wasn't understanding what was written, although he tried.
*
If it's better to have loved and lost than not to have loved at all ...then is it better to have children and then neglect them than not to have had children at all?

I ask that especially about a lot of fathers.
*
I've never seen the word ensue, which means strive to attain, used except in the phrase hilarity ensues. I don't know why. I don't know if I want to find out why.
*
I had some Canadian Mist.
I mixed it with some Canadian Club.
And with it I ate a Canadian bacon sandwich on the side.
I also had some maple syrup.
Then I watched a hockey game.
Truly True North, eh?
*
O Canada ... by the way ... why are your people so polite ... and your geese so rude?

The Dog In Every Man

When I was 20 years old, a guy once said one of the wisest things I've ever heard:

"Harrison, every man's got the dog in him. Ya gotta know when to let him run loose and be a wild wolf, and when to let him be a playful puppy."

Society and religion want to kill off, if not spay, the dog. They use the pressions, which my friends Alf and Zed had once explained.

All of those often lead to depression.

As for the balance between the wild wolf and the playful puppy: every man must figure that out for himself.

Thanking And Fucking

If you substitute the word think for the word fuck, these statements sound very offensive:

  • Thank you.
  • That you very much.
  • Thank you in the mouth.
  • Thank you in the ass.
  • Thanks a lot.
  • Thanks a whole hell of a lot.
  • I thank your mother every day.
  • I thank your father every day.
When that happens, people will call thank the T-word, and it joins the T-bird, the T-bill, the T-ball -- and especially the T-bag.

Writ On Water

When I saw this picture, I was reminded of this quote by the English poet John Keats. He wanted to have it on his tombstone:

Here lies one whose work is writ upon water.

It isn't a putdown of his talents and his works. It was a statement that he thought his work would only last for a brief time.

In a way, you could say the same thing about the Internet. Here today, gone maybe in a week if not less. And it's not writ on water but on electrons.

(At one time, Keats was my favorite poet. Although I haven't read him in years, I still like his work. Also, the phrase from La Belle Dame Sans Merci -- made sweet moan -- is one of the best euphemisms for making love that I know.)

Five Women

As he drove one night, he thought of five women for whom, at one time, he felt some sort of attraction or affection, if not love.

A. was a cat in the worst way. She was one of those women who was protected by her parents from the time she was young. She spoke in a little girl's voice -- breathless but without the hint of sexual innocence that some women project. She was one of those women who would turn on a person in less than a second. She had long fingernails, and that didn't surprise him. You would expect them to become claws, best used for gouging out eyes.

B. was rich. It was good that her family had money because she wasn't smart enough to make a living on her own. Because of her high social and economic class, he thought she would meet and marry a man who would take her in like a pet, if she hadn't done so already.

D. spoke in italics. That would've been tolerable since those who did that wanted to make a point. But she spoke italicized words, like those in a J.D. Salinger story, and not sentences, as if she questioned the words said to her to see if they were correct. Because of that practice, he learned to despise her.

H. had a face that looked cruel and hard. But that was a defense. Someone some time in the past had hurt her and probably enjoyed her pain. But the flip side of the cruel and hard face was a look and a smile that would welcome you -- if she wanted to do that. Such a face, especially if it had large eyes, can be enchanting. as time goes on.

P. had seen a lot of shit in her life, especially when she was young. And when she was a teenager, she had decided that enough was enough. And she went beyond it without knowing what she did and why she did it. She had too much pain to tolerate in her life. Her wisecracks and cynicism masked a deeper hurt. It got so that you couldn't tell if the laughs would turn into either tears or screams of anger. He guessed that she would've killed herself by now, or had gone insane.

Sunday, July 12, 2009

Brides And A Specific Piece Of Clothing

Note: Years ago -- I don't know when -- I wrote these words. I post them here for you to ponder, like I have.
*
How many brides have walked down the church aisle during the wedding ceremony without underwear?

Why do they do that? For the hell of it? The last yell of a free spirit? Defiance of the parents for putting on a big ceremony that wasn't wanted?

And how can you or I or anyone know how many brides have done that?

That's impossible to know, but I believe you would get some very interesting stories if you asked why the brides did that.

But if you post a request like that on the internet, it sounds creepy.

I guess we'll never know.

One Smokin' Reunion

During the summer, many families have reunions. Mine had one last year, when some cousins, their spouses and their children visited from the East Coast.

Now if you have a reunion and the people attending it include:
  • You;
  • Your parents;
  • Your stepparents;
  • Your siblings;
  • Your stepsiblings;
  • Your grandparents;
  • Your stepgrandparents;
  • Your cousins;
  • Your stepcousins;
  • All their spouses and exspouses;
  • Everybody's inlaws and exinlaws;
  • A couple of families from their neighborhood who are there because you're so friendly with them that they're like family;
  • The local mailman because he's a good guy;
  • And at least four dogs;
Now, that's a reunion.

And, with all that, if you have these things:
  • At least two bowls of potato salad;
  • A place where oldtimers can sit and talk about the past;
  • And a place to play croquet with serious wagering on the results.
That, dear readers, is one seriously smokin' reunion.

Water On Mars

Science always revises theories and premises, based upon new information and proofs.

I can think of two examples in astronomy.

The first is the change of category of Pluto. It's no longer consider a separate planet in the solar system. Instead, it's considered to be more like an asteroid or a moon of Nepture.

Here's a picture of the second:



Proof positive that there is water on Mars.

Saturday, May 23, 2009

A Lack Of Posts, And Why

I haven't posted since April 14, a little more than five weeks ago, because of matters that are more important than this blog. Some were personal. Others involved the health of some family members.

When things get back to how they were before, I'll post then. I might even post about those matters. At the least, I wanted to post one item this month.

In the meantime, watch this space. And enjoy the Memorial Day holiday and all the days of this summer.

Sunday, April 12, 2009

A Disconcerting Look

Gorman had a disconcerting look in his eyes.

When you saw his profile, it was as if his eyes always looked straight ahead and focused on the horizon. They rarely, if ever, looked to the side.

It was as if he didn't see you or you weren't around. Or it was as if he was trying to hide from you, or embarrassed or ashamed to be where he was.

No Good Answers

Some questions have no good answers.

One is: Were you a virgin before you were married? If you answer yes, you seem to be a loser. If you answer no, you're a slut.

Another is: When did you stop beating your wife? If you answer that with a date -- say, November 1, 2000 -- you're a wife beater. If you say you never beat her, you're a liar.

If I can think of any more, I'll post them.

If You're A Mofo

If you're a mofo, you love your mother -- but in the wrong way.
*
If there's a near riot close to you, get away from it as far as you can.
*
The lacerations of failure, of frustrations, and their deputies were on and in her face.
*
She was one of those women who was a sorority sister at a second-rate of third-rate college -- a teachers' college that tried to dignify itself by adding the word university to its hame.

He wonder if she was naturally ignorant and stupid, or if alcohol and tanning sessions had affected her brain.
*
A new word I heard lately is confusement. I think it's self explanatory.
*
Love was the word that defined and dignified his desire.
*
He made a mad dash to the door.

That's opposed to a sane dash, which is another name for a brisk walk.
*
I said to Actress X: "You're always willing to get naked, and I'm always willing to watch."
*
Put that bitch's body on a platform, make sure it's 10 feet off the ground, and let the buzzards feast on it.
*
A band plays instruments. A group just sings.

So the phrase "boy band" is wrong, wrong, wrong!

Besides, you never hear of a marching group.
*
Lust, for the male, is the only visible deadly sin because of the erect penis. It can be flaccid during the other ones.
*
My friends drug me to what they called a gentlemen's club and what I called a titty bar.

While I was there, I saw a stripper who was so fuggly, I dressed her with my eyes.
*
He once told a woman: "Shut your fucking mouth and close your fucking legs, bitch. No one wants to see your open holes."
*
What is the cutoff age when kids stop being brats and start being punks?
*
Meltage: The state of melting ice or snow.
*
Cootage: The state of having cooties.
*
The movie was bad. It wasn't released countrywide. More likely, it escaped.
*
I don't date a crazy woman because I don't want to be a supporting actor in her psychodrama.
*
I once owned an old T-shirt that's a few washings away from falling apart.

It wasn't on its last legs. It was on its last arms.

So I cut it up to use as rags.
*
When he was a teenager in the early 1970s, a lot of his classmates left school at lunch time to smoke marijuana.

They were definitely putting the HIGH in high school.

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Changes, Starting Today

I have decided switch from all lower-case letters in my posts. From today on, I'll use upper-case letters when it's appropriate.

I just thought this blog could use a change. Also, it was time to get more serious and less whimsical.

I'm not going back to apply this to all of my past posts. That would take up times better spent on this blog and other things. But I applied this to the posts I wrote earlier this month.

Also, I've created a new category for some posts. It's called Promes. They are posts that live in the gray areas where poetic prose or prose-like poetry meet.

Today, I've given some vignettes that label. Other changes might come later. I need to check some posts that could fit the new category.

The Pro From Dover

One morning, A.J., a newspaper reporter, woke and realized that he would rather run to the South Pole -- or even to Hell -- before he would enter a room where a city council or board of zoning appeals were in session -- let alone report on their actions.

Before then, he was professional enough to report on many things he found dull and distasteful. "I'm The Pro From Dover and I'm taking over," he often said as a joke.

But he felt, thought and said that phrase fewer and fewer times until it seemed that The Pro was gone, had moved back to Dover and took A.J.'s pride with him.

If It Wasn't For That

He'd be a lot different if it wasn't for that.

Because he believed the actions of the outside affect the actions of the inside.

He brooded upon it, often at night, when he was alone and he couldn't sleep, as he smoked cigarette after cigarette.

He thought about it as it stood in the middle of his mindscape.

And his thoughts about it were under the mindscape like a paved-over river that flowed through a city, and it was in his mindscape like a fog. it was always in and on his mind and thoughts. It just wouldn't go away by itself, and he couldn't push it away.

And just what was it, exactly?

He couldn't say for sure, because if he brought it to the front of his mind, it overwhelmed him and stop him from speaks. It felt as if his blood had been replaced by quick-drying cement.

But can we -- that is, you and I -- talk about it?

Sure. I know what it was. And I know you want to know about it. But if I told you now, then we wouldn't have much of a story left, would we?

What it was.

What it was.

What it was.

The Girl From The Class Of 1970

The Girl from the Class of 1970 wore lipstick that tinted her lips to match the color of her skin. (By the way, she was Caucasian.)

She also had a flat-looking face that showed no emotion. It came with a turned-down mouth and strangely dark eyebrows and eyelashes.

She also was skinny.

Harrison felt disgust when he saw her. He thought: She must want to look like a corpse. Maybe because she wants to be a corpse? Maybe because she wants to die?

It wasn't until years later, when he first saw a picture of a Kabuki actor, that the resemblance between him and her came to him.

He wasn't surprised when, about eight to ten years later, he read in the local newspaper that she had died. He heard it was from an overdose of sleeping pills mixed with alcohol.

The Passover Card

At sunset today starts Passover, the Jewish holiday that marks the exodus of the Hebrews from Egypt to the Promised Land of Canaan.

I once bought a Jewish couple I knew a Passover card. Its front showed the hand of God pointing to the Ten Commandements written on two stone tablets. He was telling Moses: "Take two of these of call me in the morning."

Little did I know that:
  • He was stealing from his company;
  • She was cheating on him.
When I found that out, I definitely took the Lord's name in vain.

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Silent, Stifiled, Sleeping Screams

One

Somewhere in the back of his mind sleeps a scream, because the time for it to fly has not yet come.

Besides, men don't scream unless they just can't stand their tortures any more and their souls go down. Or the pain flows like water high and strong enough over the dams, dikes, and levees of the ego.

Such are the screams in the back of his mind. It's as if he's in a room, with the door closed, anxious to sleep, but the screams prowl and sound in the halls outside the room like rabid and ravenous wolves.

Two

Many have been the times that he stifled screams because of repercussions:
  • It's not that important;
  • Not here;
  • Not to him or her or them or it;
they build like steam or strongly running water. they should've been blown off long, long before now.

such repressions lead to strokes, anurysms, and heart attacks.