Originally published March 4, 2009
It was a normal Treehouse open mic, just like the several others I had performed at and done quite well. But this night turned out to be much different. For those of you who don’t know or never cared, I do standup comedy. I have been doing it quite a while now with much success. I started doing some performances at a bar in the deceptively dangerous town of Bridgeport, Connecticut. From there I was able to get a gig at the Good Life Café here in Carlisle. For the most part I felt the crowd there liked me. Most of the people there were there to see a folk music group and I went on during the intermission. Some of the older people seemed horrified at some of my more lurid material, but I got a lot of laughs. Unfortunately, I have not been invited back.
Running out of venues to perform at, a friend suggested I should perform at the treehouse. I was a little reluctant to perform there since I thought it was mainly a venue for music. Plus, I wasn’t sure how a group of people who take sustainability so seriously would react to my material. Environmentalists are notorious for having no sense of humor. It was a little strange going to an open mic that didn’t have a microphone, but I killed anyways. After a few successful performances my confidence had increased substantially. I even began to refer to myself as “bombproof”, not in conversation, just in my egotistic internal monologue. It was only a matter of time before my hubris got the better of me.
I went to the treehouse only to find that not a single person I asked to come see me perform showed up. This was a little disheartening but I wasn’t going to let it get to me. Once I got up, I began with one of my successful opening lines and I heard an unusual sound afterwards, silence. This lack of laughter completely threw me off. I went on with more previously successful material only to hear more silence. The feeling I had was like the awkwardness of a long pause in a conversation. If you multiply that awkwardness by fifty, that’s how I felt. The worst was when I tried some new material that was focused on how ridiculous anti-Semitism is. I said something along the lines of “Now I’m Jewish…” Suddenly I was interrupted by a person who laughed loudly and deliberately at my saying this. A heckler, a Jew hating heckler. I should have torn into him, asking him how long he had been a member of the Nazi party and the like, but instead I froze up. I finished my set and proceeded as quickly as I could to the exit. Two people stopped me to say it wasn’t as bad as I thought, but that was little consolation.
There is no way to describe the pain of bombing on stage. Especially when you question your comedic ability. This was very problematic for me since comedy is pretty much the only thing I’m good at. After a little research I discovered that bombing is inevitable. Every comedian there has ever been has bombed at one point or another. This was very reassuring, and now I am more concerned with trying to redeem myself. Despite the soul crushing pain of the experience, all in all it’s just a bump on the road.
Monday, March 16, 2009
A New Way to PSA
Since I’ve been attending
My doubts first arose when I told several non-Dickinson students about the green devil and every single one of them laughed in my face. I guess that at the college level it’s pretty ridiculous to have a cartoon to persuade us to be more civic minded. That should probably stop at around the beginning of 7th grade. Although I have at times been critical of the methods which sustainability is being promoted, I absolutely support sustainability and understand that it must be promoted. But being told to conserve electricity by such a puerile symbol is kind of patronizing. The green devil clearly does not respect my intelligence. However, sustainability must continue to be promoted. So how can we promote sustainability without childish mascots?
The first thing we can do is look at advertising strategy. Believe it or not, the use of a character like the green devil used to be very common in advertisements. Cartoon characters like Joe Camel and the Frito Bandito spoke to young consumers in order to get them to buy something unhealthy. This tactic is beginning to be frowned upon because it manipulated children’s inherent lack of common sense. The green devil could be just as bad as any of those mascots, except he stands for a noble cause. But that also makes him much less cool and therefore much less influential. There is another advertising strategy that works especially well, using sexual imagery.
The term sex sells needs to be applied to our sustainability campaign. I can’t promise that hot women promoting sustainability will work, but I can promise you it will grab everyone’s attention. Just look at those commercials for Axe body spray. People don’t buy it because it smells good. It smells like vinegar mixed with cinnamon. People buy it because of the commercials that insinuate that if you wear this body spray you will get laid by hot women. Right now environmental movements are severely lacking sexy spokespeople. Al Gore is not going to cut it. We need to show someone recycling and then sexy women congregate around him. I’ll admit this is less dignified than the green devil. In fact it may also be more insulting to our intelligence, but let’s face facts, sustainability doesn’t sell itself. We all are going to have to be willing to make sacrifices if we’re going to save the planet. Some may be offended if sex is used to promote sustainability, but how else are we going to convince people to conserve energy? The only other way that is equally effective is scaring the crap out of people to get them on your side, and let’s not forget how the Bush administration screwed things up doing that.
A Tradition of Pointless Holidays
As some of you may have been aware last week we had the very strange holiday of Groundhog Day. If you’re like me you were unaware of this. I had forgotten about it until I read that the groundhog, Staten Island Chuck, had actually bitten mayor Bloomberg during the New York City Groundhog Day ceremony. Even though groundhogs’ habitat is not
Remember Earth Day, of course not. Oddly enough there are actually two earth days every year. One on the 22 of April and one on the vernal equinox, both are equally pointless. There may have been a time when we needed to devote a whole day to conservation, but ever since “An Inconvenient Truth” came out everyday is earth day. Arbor Day is similar to earth day except it is more tree concentrated. I like trees as much as the next man, but growing up in suburban
Valentine’s day is not pointless, but it seriously needs to be changed so it doesn’t make single people like me want to kill themselves. Throughout the first half of February I constantly see commercials about giving chocolates, flowers, and jewelry to a significant other. Every time I see one of these commercials it reminds me to get a bottle of vodka as a Valentine’s gift for myself. I have to imagine that as well as jewelry and candy companies do on this holiday, liquor companies are also comparably successful.
So we may have a slew of ridiculous holidays, but at least some of them give us days off from work. I would have spoken about Columbus Day earlier in this article, but that holiday has a point. Christopher Columbus sailed across the
Obama's Range of Change
President Obama has promised that change is coming to the nation. Personally, I am not entirely sure how much change he means to bring. We all certainly expect that he will be different from Bush because he will actually use facts and logic in his decision making, but is that enough? Some other things are going to have to change to.
First off, President Obama must stop the treasury from constantly changing our money. This is probably one of the most pointless things our government does. Aside from the one dollar bill, every other bill has been changed dozens of times. The ten dollar bill has an orange tinge to it now for some reason and the five dollar bill has a purple five on it. I have to think that retooling the printing presses and making new engraving plates cost a lot of money. Believe it or not there is actually a congressional committee whose sole purpose is to come up with new ways to screw with our money. Remember those one dollar Sacagawea coins that were around for a while then just disappeared because nobody used them? Good one treasury subcommittee. These guys are elected officials who get paid by our tax dollars to sit in a room and think of new color schemes for money. Well I say no more.
The next thing that needs to be done is to stop declaring figurative wars on things that have always existed. The war on drugs, the war on poverty, the war on terror, the war on crime. When we declare war on something we expect that eventually it will go away, but there will always be terrorism, poverty, and drugs. We can slow these things down but we will never eradicate them. So, President Obama, come up with a new term for trying to lessen these things. When we declare war on things that can’t be killed it just sounds stupid.
Lastly, a new approach towards foreign policy needs to be taken. To get nations like
It’s a bright new day for
Forbidden Comedy
Originally published November 19, 2008
Well, I hate to say it, but I have been deprived of my right to free speech right here on the campus of
Sure my material is a bit raunchy, but it’s also educational. Children hearing about things I saw in
We let our children watch far more horrible things on TV everyday. Have you ever actually watched an episode of the teletubbies? It is disgusting. My stand up routine looks like the family circus compared to the teletubbies. I ended up watching an entire episode while babysitting babysitting my 2 year old cousin. He was laughing the whole time while I watched in terror as his mind slowly became corrupted by the teletubbies, who should be known as the four fluorescent colored horsemen of the apocalypse. The only message I can perceive from that show is this: take lsd. The whole show is more or less based on someone’s acid trip. It’s just a bunch of bizarre little alien people with televisions in their stomach who live in a meadow where the sun has a baby in it. That’s it. Nothing else. At least my stand up has some context and coherence, teletubbies teaches our children that a plot is unnecessary to be entertained. The whole show is clearly a devious British plot.
So children will continue to be corrupted into unproductive members of society while my art is censored. And yes, my stand up comedy is art. It will reach you on a spiritual level and make your life richer. And if you’re reluctant about bringing your kids to see my act, just remember, they’re going to have to learn about junkies and prostitution sooner or later.
The Heart of Artness
Originally published November 12, 2008
Last week I was invited by a friend to an art show reception featuring some of his art. I of course accepted, despite the fact that I’ve never felt entirely comfortable around art. As soon as I arrived at the studio I was filled with a tangle of emotions. The most prominent feeling I had was one of awkwardness. Before I go any further I want to make it clear that I like art. In fact, I am rather envious of artists. The ability to take a mental image and make it into something tangible is a talent I have never had and never will have. I can vividly remember attempting to draw when I was younger, but since I can barely write my own name legibly I never got very far. What makes me feel uncomfortable around art is the fact that I’ve never really understood it. To understand a piece’s meaning you have to look at it in dimensions that my mind is simply unable to comprehend.
I remember visiting the Tate Liverpool last year. Many of the pieces there were very interesting, but some were beyond my understanding. An example of this was the paintings in the genre of monochrome. For those of you who don’t know, monochrome is when a canvas is painted a single color and that’s it. Yellow or blue pieces of canvas just don’t seem that artistic to me. The piece that sticks in my mind the most was a photo of a woman pulling a long piece of paper out of her vagina. The paper contained a speech where the woman recounts a conversation she had with a film director. As far as I can tell, the only point of this piece was to haunt my dreams for months.
The art show on campus had much less confusing art. Despite this, I still felt uncomfortable. The reason for this was because the artists who made all the pieces in the show were present, but it was impossible to tell whose art was whose. I knew most of the artists there, but I didn’t know how to compliment their work. The most articulate things I could come up with to say were “This is cool,” or “I like this.” These statements were true, but made me sound like an idiot.
I have to apologize to Parry Grimm because I may have offended her with my extreme lack of artistic knowledge. I was looking at a photo with a friend and said something along the lines of, “I’m not sure I understand this. Why is the picture so small?”
“Oh that’s one of Parry’s.” My friend said pointing her out to me. Much to my horror, Parry was well within earshot of my previous idiotic statement.
“Uh, I like your picture, Parry.” I said in an effort to cover up my stupidity.
“Thank you.” She replied. I walked over to the refreshments in order to regroup after my embarrassing display. I later tried to compliment Rachel Warren on her sculpture of a wall. The most interesting question I could ask was, “Is this a real piece of a wall?” She said it wasn’t and that she constructed it herself. After an awkward pause she walked away leaving me to reflect on how stupid a question I had asked.
So, let me now set the record straight. I did like the art there. I liked Parry’s photography. I liked Tawi’s paintings of people. I like Judith’s collages. I liked Rachel’s wall sculpture. I liked Navajeet’s ink blot city maps. I liked Kristan’s body tracings and her sequin dress. (Her dress was not part of the art show, but it was cool.) There was not a piece of art there I didn’t like. So if my compliments about anyone’s art seemed insincere because they were so simplistic, I apologize. Artists of Dickinson, I like your art even though I’m too stupid to describe why.
Last week I was invited by a friend to an art show reception featuring some of his art. I of course accepted, despite the fact that I’ve never felt entirely comfortable around art. As soon as I arrived at the studio I was filled with a tangle of emotions. The most prominent feeling I had was one of awkwardness. Before I go any further I want to make it clear that I like art. In fact, I am rather envious of artists. The ability to take a mental image and make it into something tangible is a talent I have never had and never will have. I can vividly remember attempting to draw when I was younger, but since I can barely write my own name legibly I never got very far. What makes me feel uncomfortable around art is the fact that I’ve never really understood it. To understand a piece’s meaning you have to look at it in dimensions that my mind is simply unable to comprehend.
I remember visiting the Tate Liverpool last year. Many of the pieces there were very interesting, but some were beyond my understanding. An example of this was the paintings in the genre of monochrome. For those of you who don’t know, monochrome is when a canvas is painted a single color and that’s it. Yellow or blue pieces of canvas just don’t seem that artistic to me. The piece that sticks in my mind the most was a photo of a woman pulling a long piece of paper out of her vagina. The paper contained a speech where the woman recounts a conversation she had with a film director. As far as I can tell, the only point of this piece was to haunt my dreams for months.
The art show on campus had much less confusing art. Despite this, I still felt uncomfortable. The reason for this was because the artists who made all the pieces in the show were present, but it was impossible to tell whose art was whose. I knew most of the artists there, but I didn’t know how to compliment their work. The most articulate things I could come up with to say were “This is cool,” or “I like this.” These statements were true, but made me sound like an idiot.
I have to apologize to Parry Grimm because I may have offended her with my extreme lack of artistic knowledge. I was looking at a photo with a friend and said something along the lines of, “I’m not sure I understand this. Why is the picture so small?”
“Oh that’s one of Parry’s.” My friend said pointing her out to me. Much to my horror, Parry was well within earshot of my previous idiotic statement.
“Uh, I like your picture, Parry.” I said in an effort to cover up my stupidity.
“Thank you.” She replied. I walked over to the refreshments in order to regroup after my embarrassing display. I later tried to compliment Rachel Warren on her sculpture of a wall. The most interesting question I could ask was, “Is this a real piece of a wall?” She said it wasn’t and that she constructed it herself. After an awkward pause she walked away leaving me to reflect on how stupid a question I had asked.
So, let me now set the record straight. I did like the art there. I liked Parry’s photography. I liked Tawi’s paintings of people. I like Judith’s collages. I liked Rachel’s wall sculpture. I liked Navajeet’s ink blot city maps. I liked Kristan’s body tracings and her sequin dress. (Her dress was not part of the art show, but it was cool.) There was not a piece of art there I didn’t like. So if my compliments about anyone’s art seemed insincere because they were so simplistic, I apologize. Artists of Dickinson, I like your art even though I’m too stupid to describe why.
Technological Knockout
As some of my loyal readers (if any) may have noticed that I had not published articles in the last two issues of the Dickinsonian. The reason for this is not laziness. Well it kind of is. Some time during the weekend before last I attempted to turn on my laptop and nothing happened. My computer sat there lifeless as I repeatedly pressed the power button. Feelings of panic began to enter my mind as I started to hyperventilate. I picked up my cell phone and dialed tech support as fast as I could. After listening to crappy “hold” techno music I spoke to a woman with a thick Indian accent. She revealed that I would need to send my computer to be repaired, but my computer was out of warranty. Fortunately, it wouldn’t too expensive. As my Indian telephone operator began to transfer me to the repair department from half way around the world, something horrible happened. My cell phone completely crashed. I say the word “crashed” because “died” has the connotation of the phone simply running out of power. My phone was completely unable to function. It turned off and refused to turn on or charge. After punching several holes in my wall I curled up in the fetal position on my bed while muttering to myself “This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening.”
After some quick e-mailing I was able to get my mom to make the necessary phone calls to get my computer fixed. By the end of the day, a box was on its way for shipping my computer to the repair shop. With that taken care of I was able to steady myself enough to contact Dan Officer to drive me to the Verizon store. I mention Dan by name because he saved me. I cannot live for more than 72 hours without a cell phone or computer in my possession.
Now that my survival was assured I had to deal with the reality of not having a computer. The internet is something I need to keep my sanity. As long as I can remember my mind has always come up with questions that need to be answered. The internet allows me look up the answers to what things are and such. I like to say that I do this because I’m a smart person, it’s mostly that I’m very curious. If I hear something I don’t know about I look it up on the internet, no matter how useless the information could be. I recently heard the word “necrosis” and I had to look it up on Wikipedia. Apparently necrosis is a kind of cell death where cells are not recycled by the body. I doubt I’ll ever need to know this, but I feel satisfied that I know it. Without a computer I was forced to work in the library, some people prefer this to working in their room. Personally, I cannot stand it. There are too many unexpected distractions. I will get completely distracted if I think someone is typing too loudly. I like my room where the distractions are more along the lines of procrastination. If something is going to keep me from my work, it’ll at least be enjoyable. I like having my music and my normal internet sites to distract me. Lastly, I enjoy working on the computer in my underwear; this is not possible in the library. It is actually the only way I can write my column. You may think that’s weird, I prefer to think it’s eccentric.
After 9 horrible days of having to walk outside to go check my e-mails, my repaired computer arrived in the mail. I felt so happy to get things on an even keel again. I could write in my underwear to my heart’s content. This experience made me realize how important my computer is to me. It is my tool for expressing myself and my link to the answers for my mind’s incessant questions. It kind of sucks that a grey box is so important to me, but it could be worse. I could not have a computer at all and never have ended up writing. The only possible path for me aside from writing is heroin addiction.
A Bizarre Weekend
Originally published October, 2008
I hate to say it, but I’m running out of ideas. Under normal circumstances I would take a broad subject and be a smartass about it. But now, I am almost out of social commentary. So instead I am going have to regale my readers with an epic story, the story of my weekend. Now stay with me here, I swear to you it’ll be funny. As the title implies, it was a bizarre weekend.
On Thursday night I had plans to go have some drinks with friends, when I met them they decided to add an unexpected twist to the night.
“Hey there’s a bikini contest tonight at the red devil tonight. We’re going.” One of my friends declared. I was of course intrigued by the idea of a bikini contest. What was strange to me was that a bikini contest was happening in the land locked area of
By the time we got there the place was packed. We paid our five dollar cover fee and found a place among the crowd. I was surprised to see that a good percentage of the audience was female. I had always thought that the audience for such an event would be only male, but seeing that women were present made me feel less like a pervert. The event ended up starting forty five minutes later than scheduled. Despite this, the audience refused to leave until they had seen the show. It’s amazing the feats people will go to to see a scantily clad woman. Finally the show began. A man got on the microphone and called the winner of last year’s contest to say a few words. She basically said something about handing over her title, and than she called out the contestants. They consisted of three girls and one man. They paraded around to the hooting cheering of the audience. After all the contestants had come out, the highly sophisticated judging technique of applause was employed. A winner was crowned, and everyone cheered.
It occurred to me that I could have seen women in bikinis for free at a beach, it would be less crowded and I wouldn’t have had to be surrounded by horny guys. The next thing that happened was rather unexpected. The announcer got on the microphone and said, “Alright, we now have some professionals here, if you give them five dollars they’ll give you a lapdance.” Three women came out in bikinis, it was clear that they were strippers by trade because of their familiarity with giving a lap dance, and the appearance of their breasts. The women looked as if someone had taken two halves of a basketball and spot welded them their chests. My friends urged me to get a lap dance, but I declined. I didn’t feel it would be worth paying five dollars for the illusion of sex.
The other lees strange thing that happened to me this week was my performance at the tree house open-mic. I have recently been doing standup comedy and many friends who had missed my performance at the good life café back in September wanted to see my routine. The tree house open-mic seemed like a good place to show everyone my routine. When I arrived at the tree house I was a little bit surprised. Open-mic is not an accurate term for what was happening there. This is because there is no stage or microphone. It was mostly people lying around waiting for someone to get up and do something in front of them. In between performances there were long stretches of nothing happening because no one wanted to perform. This led to several impromptu poetry readings.
The nature of the performances made me feel out of place. It was a few musical acts and poetry readings. This did not seem like the right environment for standup comedy. I remembered at the good life café, the act before me was a folk music group. Most of the audience there had come to see that, when I went on I definitely got most of the audience there laughing, but a few people were clearly horrified by some of my material. Would the residents of the tree house take me too seriously? They clearly took their sustainability very seriously. They even had a sign that said, “If it’s yellow let it mellow, if it’s brown flush it down.” Would I be able to make fun of this or would it offend their system of values. When, I finally got up to do my act was when I felt the least comfortable. Not because of the audience, but because I was basically standing in the middle of a living room to do my performance. Fortunately, I ended up doing very well. No one was too stuck up to laugh at jokes about old people or dildos. This was a great relief.
So, now my strange weekend has ended, and now I have to return from the glory of stand up comedy, and the overrated experience of a bikini contest. It’s back to dull work and sobriety. However, I hope to have more strange weekends. They are always good to bring up for conversation and give me something to write about when I am out of ideas.
The Green Routine
Originally published September 24, 2008
A little while back I was in a clothing store looking at T-shirts. I was surprised to find one that was advertised as being sustainable because it was made from 100% organic cotton. I didn’t really care about that, but the price was only three dollars so I bought it. It Later, it occurred to me that the shirt was so cheap because it was probably made with slave labor. This makes the sustainability of the shirt a moot point. Trying to help the environment by exploiting slave labor is not the right thing to do.
Situations like this are happening all over. People are being too self righteous about sustainability. Now, don’t get me wrong, I know that it’s important to be eco-friendly. But I just don’t like everyone shoving sustainability down our throats. All the time I’m seeing commercials about companies changing something to make them more sustainable. This is fine, but the reason they’re doing this is just to make themselves look better. They feel the more green they are the less evil they will seem. It’s a legitimate marketing tactic, but I’m certain they spent more money advertising their sustainability than they did on actually becoming sustainable. If a big corporation wants to get me on their side they’ll have to do more than that. Personally, I like getting stock rather than hearing about sustainability. In fact giving me stock would be sustainable. All intangible forms of assets are very sustainable.
The last thing I want to address is the pessimism associated with going green. The level of fear that is driving everyone to be sustainable is not healthy. Everyone needs to take a deep breath and tell themselves that the apocalypse is not as imminent as many would lead you to believe. Convincing people to be more sustainable through fear is not a good way to motivate people. If you’re taking the whole green thing as far as possible, good for you, but if you are telling everyone that they are killing the planet and you’re bragging about how green you are, then please, for the good of us all, shut the hell up.
A Year Abroad
Well, it was a beautiful fifteen months. I spent two semesters studying in
So now I look back on the time I spent overseas and reflect on what I learned. Much of it was academic, but the lessons I will really use I learned outside of the classroom in various seedy places. Here are some of my pearls of wisdom.
First, in
The best advice I could give someone on
I would have to say the city with the meanest people is
So now I’m back here reflecting fondly on my past experiences and wondering where the winds of fate will blow me next. Hopefully it will be back to Amsterdam.
Eastern Medicine on a Western Man
Aside from writing, the only other thing I might be good at is being stressed out. I can be stressed about anything. If it’s remotely unsettling, I can be stressed out about it. It could be something big like the CIA falsely accusing me, or something small like the way a girl on the street looked at me. You name it and I can be stressed out about it. However, my versatility with my stress is the only thing I can take pride in with it. The stress itself is quite horrific.
The person who is concerned by this the most is my mother. Aside from being a loving parent the reason she cares so much about my stress is because my level of stress is surpassed only by hers, so she probably feels responsible for passing her stress level down to me. We both deal with our stress in different ways. She generally uses alternative eastern medicine practices while I use whiskey and not leaving my house. For some reason she thinks this is detrimental to my over all well being. Go figure. So she decided to set up a session with me and her acupuncturist.
I of course was a bit apprehensive about it, but it did get Eric Clapton off of heroin. If it’s good enough for him it’s good enough for me. I walked into the acupuncturist’s office and my nostrils were instantly assaulted by a mixture of sweet smells. The combination made me a tad nauseous. A Chinese woman greeted me and led me to the back.
“So how exactly does this work?” I asked
“Well we all have different elements inside us, earth, water, wind and fire. When those get out of balance we have problems.” She replied with a thick accent. This wasn’t exactly the answer I was looking for. I was hoping for something a little more scientific. Instead I was more confused than before I had entered.
In the back room I met a Chinese man who spoke no English. The woman instructed me to sit down and stick out my tongue. I reluctantly did so and they conferred with each other in Chinese. The tone they used made me think that they had discovered something wrong with my tongue but I never found out if that was true. The woman then asked me a series of unsettling questions.
“Do you have bowel movements?”
“Um, yeah.” I replied.
“Do you finish.”
“Uh, yeah I do.” This was kind of strange because I had never thought anyone could start shitting and than stop halfway through. I really feel sorry for anyone who has this problem. It must be very messy.
After the questions the actual acupuncture began. I laid on the table and the woman stuck needles into me. She put a few in my arms and legs which didn’t really hurt, but then she put one between my eyes and one on top of my head which was a little uncomfortable. If I could give advice to anyone about acupuncture it is keep your eyes closed while you have these needles sticking out of you. The experience is relaxing but it is a little disturbing to see needles sticking out of you. It makes you feel like a pin cushion.
So I must admit that the acupuncture does make you feel very calm. You actually get a buzz that is on par with a couple of beers. There is a sense of well being and I kind of felt like I was floating in warm water. It was very cool. The needles were removed from me and we proceeded onto something called “cupping”. Basically what happens is you lay on your stomach and glass cups are placed on your back. The cups are than heated so that the air is sucked out creating a vacuum. The idea is that negative energy is sucked out of you. I would have been less apprehensive about that if I hadn’t seen it used in the film “The Madness King of George”. There I was lying on my stomach being administered a treatment that hadn’t been used since the Hanoverians had been in control of
Before I left I was given a small paper bag containing herbs. I was never told what kind of herbs they were but that they would help me. I got home and opened the bag. It contained several little packets of a light brown powder. At first I thought it was heroin, the ultimate anti-stress medicine. It was actually a sweet substance that was meant to be mixed in water and than drank. I did and it wasn’t half bad. I’m not sure the herbs helped much, but the treatment itself was effective. I do have to say I was surprised that it worked at all. I guess the lesson I took from this was to always keep an open mind. I am even considering going back, but I’ll skip the cupping. So until next time my loyal readers. Stay happy and always know that I love you.
My First Protest
Last weekend I did something I always thought I’d never do. I went to
I went to
We kept chanting and we did get people’s attention. Mostly dirty looks and a crazy person who cursed at us, but some people did take interest. After a while the chanting was giving me a sore throat, so I diverted my attention to looking at one of the hot female police officers, until one of the organizers handed me a megaphone. This was a mistake on her part. The chants were getting monotonous, so I tried starting my own chant with the megaphone. “Whoooo! Yeah! JP Morgan Sucks!” I yelled out. The woman immediately snatched the megaphone back and my chant never even got a chance. I actually was having fun doing this. Protesting actually combined two things I enjoy, yelling things at people, and trying to create obscene chants. Though I felt some of my fellow protestors were a bit upset with me. Apparently when you’re protesting egregious violations of human rights you’re not allowed to have fun.
After we were done with JP Morgan, we walked over to the Guatemalan consulate to protest the fact Rios Montt, the former dictator of
“Because genocide blows!” I yelled out. The organizer handed the megaphone to a girl so she could answer the question “Why are we here?”. She replied “What that guy said,” she replied pointing to me. “Because genocide blows.” For once I had most of the crowd behind me, and I decide to take advantage of it. “Genocide blows!” I chanted. For roughly four and a half seconds people were chanting my chant. It kicked ass.
We all began to disband and head back to our cars when I heard something fantastic. One of the organizers told us that JP Morgan agreed to clean up
Occupational Hazard
Originally published April 26, 2007
As I write this I have great fear for my future. It’s not my normal fears of the future like bad weather tomorrow or becoming a mall Santa. It’s my fear of having to compete for the job I want on national television. Television has already made a competition out of becoming a chef, a nanny, a singer, an assistant to Donald Trump, a boxer, and a gold digging whore. Now television has besmirched its holy counterpart, film. The show “On The Lot” has made a competitive series out of becoming a film director. This is very bad. Being a director is one of my lifelong dreams. I can’t win a competition to become a director. I wanted to make my career like all the other directors by rigging the Oscars.
Is everything anyone wants to be going to turn into a reality TV show? These shows are basically all the same. Take a bunch of people who want the job, make them all live together, and add huge, unrealistic portions of conflict. The conflict is usually utilized by having the host be a huge douche bag. If not that they have several of the contestants be douche bags. They could be mean, overly sensitive, alcoholics, or just plain stupid. With all this drama any job can become a reality television show. Take a bunch of idiots who all want a bank teller job, throw them in an apartment somewhere, film it, and you’ve got “The Bank” the new reality television show. Producing reality TV is that simple. All you got to do is follow the formula or copy a reality TV show from another country.
I’m very afraid that one day all of us may have to fight each other on television to get a job. The only job that will be safe is reality TV producer. They’re not gonna make a show out of their lives when they’re sitting pretty making shows out of everyone else’s lives. The only hopeful sign is that the winners of these reality competitions never really have successful careers. If you win “American Idol” you get a far worse contract than a normal singer gets and your career goes nowhere anyways. One of the most successful people to come out of that show was William Hung. He was that weird looking Chinese kid who had teeth like Jerry Lewis in “The Nutty Professor”. He sounded like him too. William Hung has an album and appeared on numerous television shows. He actually made a career out of being bad at his job. His job technically is being a singer, believe it or not. But I can’t help but say I’m impressed with him. How many people can be successful by being good at being bad? He’s a living paradox. Perhaps I could make a living by being an excruciatingly bad director? I’m putting that plan into motion as soon asSegway Enforcers
Originally published April 19, 2007
I was in
After I left Union Station I saw a band of people riding around on segways. This is getting out of hand. The world is not ready for segway proliferation. The first problem with them is that they make walking obsolete. If I had a segway I’d ride it all over the place and I’d become fat as a cow. Policeman already have a bad rap of eating donuts and looking like fat pigs. The segway would only reinforce this stereotype. We need our police to stay in shape in case a criminal runs where a segway can’t go. Like up a stairway for example. If the police keep using the segways they will become out of shape and unable to do anything work related except ride their segway. Than gangs of hoodlums would get the upper hand and they would simple have to climb a ladder or go up some stairs to escape the cops. We cannot let the criminals take over.
The other problem with the segways is the perception people have of them. Not just policemen, but nobody looks threatening riding a segway. If you saw a group of Hell’s Angels riding around on segways in their own segway gang, would you be scared? Of course not. You’d point and laugh. We can’t have representatives from other countries coming to our nation’s capital and seeing people riding around on these goofy little machines. They will think we’re weak and we simply cannot be perceived as weak right now. Unfortunately the damage may already have been done. I have seen a picture of George Bush on his segway. Even worse the picture was him falling off of it.
One day I’m certain the segway will be as main stream as cars. We’ll have segway races, and segway magazine, and maybe even a segway television show called “Pimp my Segway”. But right now it just doesn’t seem right. Segway races and “Pimp my Segway” all seem ludicrous ideas now. I assure you one day people will be unable to imagine life without them. Police will cruise around on segways and the president will be able to segway where ever he pleases. Until then, people of authority should not ride segways. So until next time my loyal readers. Stay happy and always know that I love you.
Adolph "Bong Hit"-ler?
Originally published April 12, 2007
April 20th is a very confusing holiday to me. For those of you who don’t know April 20th, more commonly known as 420, is the day when pot heads all over the world celebrate their hobby of getting high by getting high. But there is something a lot of people don’t know about April 20th. It is also Hitler’s birthday. I remember the first time someone told me that it was 4/20 and that they were going to celebrate. I didn’t understand why they were celebrating, but than I remembered Hitler’s birthday was April 20th and I thought this person was simply being anti-Semitic. It turned out he was simply a stoner.
The origins of 4/20 had always been confusing to me. What did the date of April 20th have to do with marijuana? Did Hitler’s birthday have anything to do with it? Apparently it started when some kids in the 70’s would get high everyday after school at 4:20 PM. This turned into a codeword for marijuana and eventually it turned into a holiday.
So Hitler’s birthday has nothing to do with 4/20. Though it is possible to look at the celebration of marijuana as being strategically placed on Hitler’s birthday. A lot of bad things have happened on April 20th, aside from Hitler’s birthday. The Columbine shootings happened on that date in celebration of Hitler’s birthday, The Oklahoma City bombing took place a day before April 20th, and certainly dozens of white supremacist groups rally on Hitler’s birthday. So perhaps the reason the marijuana celebration is on Hitler’s birthday is so that these hateful psycho’s just get high instead of committing acts of terrorism. You show me a guy who sits around all day smoking pot, watching cartoon network, and eating fritos, I’ll show you a guy who is not a threat to society. Wouldn’t it have been better if Timothy McVeigh had just gotten baked instead of bombing a building. Or if Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold had stayed home and smoked a bowl instead of going on a shooting rampage. The Red Army faction actually dissolved itself on April 20th in 1998. It might have been because they all just wanted to get high instead of trying to bring communism to
There is one thing about 4/20 that makes me a little nervous. That is potheads taking it too seriously. I saw the editor of “high times” magazine on the news once saying that pot heads are persecuted for their use of marijuana as a sacrament and that they are like the Christians who were persecuted by the Romans. I’m not a religious scholar, but a comparison of the persecuted Christians to current day potheads is not very accurate. If you were a Christian in roman times, you were fed to the lions. If you are caught with pot today, you are arrested and granted bail. When you start to bring religion into a cause it becomes dangerously close to becoming a terrorist cause. If you smoke reefer it won’t bring you any closer to God. It’ll just bring you closer to eating a ton of junk food. Marijuana has inadvertently thwarted several malicious acts on Hitler’s birthday, and hopefully it’ll keep doing that. So until next time my loyal readers. Stay happy, and always know that I love you.
High-dration
Originally published April 5, 2007
Energy drinks have gained a tremendous amount of popularity. It seems impossible to walk in a convenience store or gas station without seeing them. So why are they so popular? I believe the reason is because of their addictive nature. Or at least the marketing that makes them seem addictive.
The first time I really noticed this was when I heard about the drink “Cocaine”. This is blatantly trying to appeal to people who want a drink that will get them high. The writing on the can is made to look like lines of coke. So crank up some K.C. and the Sunshine band, put on a leisure suit, and drink can after can of “Cocaine” drink until you are strung out and completely broke.
Energy drinks are actually causing a lot of concern in the medical community. If young children drink them it can cause heart palpitations. This stuff is powerful. Also, many people don’t realize that many of these drinks come with alcohol in them. These keep you drunk and awake. The tiring nature of alcohol is counteracted by the caffeine so you can be uninhibited and reckless for an indefinite period of time. So what lies in the future for energy drinks? Probably prohibition. I’m certain congress will lead some sort of hearing to determine whether energy drinks are addictive, just like tobacco was investigated before them. A bill will be passed outlawing over caffeinated drinks, or at least strictly taxing and regulating them.
I have a sneaking suspicion that the companies that produce these drinks have suspected that this would happen all along. When the drinks are outlawed a huge demand for them will be created. People will have to smuggle them from
I plan on becoming very wealthy because of this. I will become a modern day bootlegger. I plan on running shipments down from
The Fame Game
Originally Published March 29, 2007
I have been writing my column now for a while now and I like to think I have a fair sized following. Even though it mostly contains illiterate people, I’m still content with it. But being content isn’t enough! I want more! More I tells ya! I want super stardom! Now normally to get fame one must be talented enough at something to gain recognition, but I’m sure as you read this you have discovered I have no talent. Even my vast illiterate fan base knows this. But if we look closely at some other famous people, we can see that there are loopholes to becoming famous.
The first trick is to make a sex tape. Case subject: Paris Hilton. Everyone knows who she is, she has appeared in movies, modeled in magazines, and she even coined the incredibly stupid catch phrase “That’s Hot”. She may have even have trademarked that phrase, so I may have to pay her to use it in this article. So aside from being greedy enough to exploit a helpless, talentless columnist, she is very famous. How did this fame start? A sex tape. She was just known as an incredibly rich heir and now because of her shameful sexual display she is a household name. So every time you see her on television or anywhere else, remember why she’s there. She filmed herself getting plowed and everyone saw it. This certainly is an expedient way to fame but would be difficult for me to achieve since I don’t have a woman who would be willing to be in a sex tape with me. The only alternative is to make a sex tape of me having sex with myself, but I doubt that would yield any gain in fame.
The next trick is to have sex with a politician. Case Subject: Monica Lewinsky. She was a simple white house intern who fell under the sexual spell of Bill Clinton like so many women before her. It eventually came to be noticed by the public and the republicans did all they could to gain from the situation. Monica certainly had a lot of problems, but I guess you could say it was a blessing in disguise. She ended up hosting Saturday Night Live and came out with her line of purses. All this because she blew the president. So what politician could I have sex with? Since I don’t want to have sex with a man my options are pretty limited. It’s really just Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, or Laura Bush. I think I’ll just compromise and have sex with the Bush daughters.
The most popular way to gain fame right now is to claim you are the father of Anna Nicole smith’s baby. So I will do that right now. It was me who sired Anna Nicole Smith’s daughter. We met during a snooker tournament in Fargo, North Carolina. We totally screwed and the kid’s mine. Now I want my money. On the subject of Anna Nicole Smith, the last way to get famous is to die an unnatural death. Anna Nicole Smith wasn’t particularly famous until after her sudden death. Before that she was known for having married a man so old and rich that he may have actually been William Randolph Hearst, and having a TV show where she said and did stupid things. Also she was fat and got thin and started shilling for Trimspa. After she died, she was on every television channel. Dying unnaturally when you’re even a little bit famous will make you very famous. The only problem is you’re not around to enjoy your fame. Unless there’s an afterlife and you are able to take fame with you there. It’s risky, but if it works it’s worth it. Unless of course you go to hell. And if I do all the things I mentioned above to gain fame I surely will be cast into perdition. So just do what people have done before and you too can become a shameful celebrity just like Courtney Love or Tanya Harding. So until next time my loyal readers. Stay happy, and always know that I love you.
I have been writing my column now for a while now and I like to think I have a fair sized following. Even though it mostly contains illiterate people, I’m still content with it. But being content isn’t enough! I want more! More I tells ya! I want super stardom! Now normally to get fame one must be talented enough at something to gain recognition, but I’m sure as you read this you have discovered I have no talent. Even my vast illiterate fan base knows this. But if we look closely at some other famous people, we can see that there are loopholes to becoming famous.
The first trick is to make a sex tape. Case subject: Paris Hilton. Everyone knows who she is, she has appeared in movies, modeled in magazines, and she even coined the incredibly stupid catch phrase “That’s Hot”. She may have even have trademarked that phrase, so I may have to pay her to use it in this article. So aside from being greedy enough to exploit a helpless, talentless columnist, she is very famous. How did this fame start? A sex tape. She was just known as an incredibly rich heir and now because of her shameful sexual display she is a household name. So every time you see her on television or anywhere else, remember why she’s there. She filmed herself getting plowed and everyone saw it. This certainly is an expedient way to fame but would be difficult for me to achieve since I don’t have a woman who would be willing to be in a sex tape with me. The only alternative is to make a sex tape of me having sex with myself, but I doubt that would yield any gain in fame.
The next trick is to have sex with a politician. Case Subject: Monica Lewinsky. She was a simple white house intern who fell under the sexual spell of Bill Clinton like so many women before her. It eventually came to be noticed by the public and the republicans did all they could to gain from the situation. Monica certainly had a lot of problems, but I guess you could say it was a blessing in disguise. She ended up hosting Saturday Night Live and came out with her line of purses. All this because she blew the president. So what politician could I have sex with? Since I don’t want to have sex with a man my options are pretty limited. It’s really just Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, or Laura Bush. I think I’ll just compromise and have sex with the Bush daughters.
The most popular way to gain fame right now is to claim you are the father of Anna Nicole smith’s baby. So I will do that right now. It was me who sired Anna Nicole Smith’s daughter. We met during a snooker tournament in Fargo, North Carolina. We totally screwed and the kid’s mine. Now I want my money. On the subject of Anna Nicole Smith, the last way to get famous is to die an unnatural death. Anna Nicole Smith wasn’t particularly famous until after her sudden death. Before that she was known for having married a man so old and rich that he may have actually been William Randolph Hearst, and having a TV show where she said and did stupid things. Also she was fat and got thin and started shilling for Trimspa. After she died, she was on every television channel. Dying unnaturally when you’re even a little bit famous will make you very famous. The only problem is you’re not around to enjoy your fame. Unless there’s an afterlife and you are able to take fame with you there. It’s risky, but if it works it’s worth it. Unless of course you go to hell. And if I do all the things I mentioned above to gain fame I surely will be cast into perdition. So just do what people have done before and you too can become a shameful celebrity just like Courtney Love or Tanya Harding. So until next time my loyal readers. Stay happy, and always know that I love you.
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