Brief update, to be followed by much more

The other day I was at work when one of the new supervisors told me I was needed in the bathroom. "Wonderful," I said into the radio, in my badass imagination. "Does a customer want to defecate into my open mouth? Or does the management?"

It turns out that the little boys' room was out of paper towels and that one of the stalls "wasn't working." My job was to replace the paper towels and discover how, exactly, a small room designed for shitting in can "not work."

First, I found out that the stall was "not working" because someone had locked it from the inside and then somehow left--presumably by crawling under the door. I also discovered that I had no idea how to open the paper towel dispenser. This left me posting an "out of order" sign on the door and standing outside the bathroom with a roll of paper towels in my hand.

A young girl approaches me. She needed help finding something, and decided to ask me the following question: "Do you work for the books, or do you just work for the toilets?"

Let me just restate this. I work at a job in which a situation arose that prompted a small child--the universal harbingers of innocent truth-telling--to ask me if I worked for the toilets. A child asked me if I labor on behalf of, and in service of, inanimate objects that function only as poo receptacles. Apparently, in this little girl's eyes, the shitters are, collectively, my boss.

And my response? I merely sighed and told her that I work for both the books and the toilets, and that I couldn't help her at that moment. I sent her off to find someone else.

Anyway, I have a couple posts in the Tubes. The next one is a long one, several weeks in the making: The Food Monster Final Tour. That's right, more of my friend committing dangerous acts of shameless gluttony for our amusement! Take that, TV ads of starving, near-homeless brown children!

Canada Jackson's Doctoral Challenge 2: This Time It's Personal

I've recently resumed the downward spiral of self-flagellation and misery that is applying to doctoral programs in philosophy. Hopefully I will detail my adventures in this mire of Lovecraftian terror better than I did last time AND MORE IMPORTANTLY MAYBE THIS TIME I WILL BE SUCCESSFUL.

I am currently struggling with the various essays I have to write. First I need a writing sample. Last time I used my senior thesis from the Honors program at the University of Scranton. Somehow this seventy page pile of sparsely cited thirteen-point-font madness, written in the space of twelve hours four days after it was due, did not manage to impress upon anyone that I can tie my shoes without pissing myself, let alone communicate complex thoughts coherently. "The Death of Democracy," it's called, and it's horrifyingly available at the Weinberg Memorial Library here in Scranton. My thesis, as I recall, is that I am a retarded person who should be put in government care--or, at the very least, have someone with me at all times to slap things out of my hands that I am slowly putting in my mouth.

So, new writing sample, written whole-cloth and hopefully not the worst thing that has ever happened to anyone, ever. My topic ideas:
1. Technology!, or: Why Heidegger and Marx Can Suck On It ("It" Being My Penis)
2. Plato's Republic vs. The Constitution of the United States, or: Plato Was a Dickhead, USA! USA! USA!
I'm leaning more towards the second one, as everyone knows that Plato was a dickhead, but not everyone knows that Heidegger and Marx should suck my dick.

They will, however. They will.

Furthermore, there are these strange little things I have to write up that are called "Personal Statements," "Statement of Purpose," "Statement of Intent," "Academic Statement," &c. As far as I can cobble together these are all the same things...unless one institution requires two of those things. Apparently some schools ask that I explain the following:
1. Why I want to study philosophy. (Money, power, women.)
2. Why I want to study philosophy at their particular school. (I don't. I want to go to the place that will give me the most money. If you are not that place, then I don't want to go to you.)
3. What makes me so god-damn special. (According to my family and friends: my incredible ability to embarrass myself in front of large groups of people I respect. According to my professors: my ability to find new and interesting ways to avoid any cognitive functioning above that required for respiration and, on my best days, wearing clothes. According to me: one time in Halo I killed my friend Annie with a rocket that I fired from the other side of the map. Yeah, Cornell. I know you want me.)

I think I might just write "I am a winner and sex machine." and see how far that gets me. I think honest-to-god philosophers would have a lot of fun with that one. What does me mean by "a winner"? Does that mean that he has won things in the past or simply has the potential to win things in the future? And what things? Grocery store sweepstakes? Carnival prizes? The affection of the masses? Why is his status (possibly--nay, probably--self-proclaimed) as a sex machine relevant? Is his proclamation positive or negative--a deconstruction of the modern feminist idea of a "sex object"? Can a man be a sex machine?

Clearly, I can. Just look at the airbrushing on my van, bitches. Plus I think it would be cool to have people ask "Doctor, why did you offer Mr. Jackson a position as a graduate student here?" And the answer be, simply, "Oh, he's a winner and a sex machine."

Now if only SQR could mass-produce an "I AM A WINNER AND A SEX MACHINE" t shirt.

Anyway, I'll keep you idiots updated on my quest to further debase myself in a manner second only to walking around downtown Scranton wearing a beautifully hand-written sandwich-board sign saying, "I shat my pants."

My Summer Vacation by Canada Jackson

Gentlemen! Pack your tobacco and clean your sidearms for I have returned.

(I would have said "Ladies and gentlemen," were it not for the common knowledge that women are not allowed to use the Intranets.)

I have not found time to bore you with embarrassing episodes of my miserable existence recently because of my increased duties as the weeping dwarf that the universe--like a mad medieval king intoxicated with feudal power, brain ravaged with a timely combination of syphilis and questionable grog--forces to dance in its dining hall, the only thing approaching recompense being the occasional chicken bone chucked halfheartedly at my head.

Ah, Jackson, you readers may say, if you're not viciously attacking random passersby with ad hominem like a hipsterish ancient mariner, you're bemoaning the existential despair of your comfortable, middle-class existence. It's the only game in town, says I.

Recently [Demarcations] hired six new bright-eyed and enthusiastic no-names as grist for the all-hungry soul mill that is their book selling operation. I felt nothing but pity when I saw them in the back room, eagerly absorbing their training. You poor, feckless motherfuckers, I thought. No training on this world can prepare you for discovering a naked, homeless man bathing himself from the toilet bowl in the public restroom. You will never be prepared to have a man--angry about not being allowed to cut the long register line--throw a book at you. But you will most certainly be familiar with being supervised by hill-folk whose knowledge of the product they're selling--literature--is taken up entirely by the crudest of facsimiles--pornography and Glenn Beck.

These delightful young pups are starting off at the registers, as I once did a little more than a year ago. What I was thrilled to discover, however, is that they are somehow getting paid fifty cents more than me. From day one. So, for the slower folks at home: new people, less responsibilities, less knowledge, less experience...more money. I, instead of starting a fire in the stockroom and spelling out "I quit" in urine on the carpet, discussed this discrepancy with the general manager. He was shocked by this difference in pay and said he would try and do something about it.

Apparently "something" is cutting my hours to one day a week. My last paycheck was fifty four dollars. I think I am going to work on my urine calligraphy. Either that or pimp this pitiful blog out in some fashion as to get an insane billionaire to finance the publication of a book--which, due to my brain's inability to (medically speaking) do anything will never actually see the light of day. And I highly doubt there is an audience out there for pompous, obscene rambling on the subject of everyday annoyances peppered with misused, misspelled ten-dollar words. Hurr hurr, beer, farts.

Speaking of not doing things, my good friend in New York City keeps harassing me to update this blog, citing the fact that she knows people who actually read it. Poppycock! It occurs to me, though, that if I mention her in this blog that I must come up with a handle for her, ala RJP4 and Mr. Midnight a.k.a the Food Monster. I find myself unable to do anything with her name, save the fact that her first name is more Irish than drunken morning premarital sex in a sheep pasture with a fiery barmaid named Moira, and her last name is more Jewish than complaining simultaneously about the air conditioning being too high and the soup temperature being too low in a deli in Manhattan. I expect a text message from her any minute ending our friendship. I'm just saying that if you need both a pub and a pyramid built in the same afternoon that I might know someone. Hi-o! Stereotypes.

Anyway, what I'm saying is that I'll try more to keep this damn albatross better fed. I know I say this with almost every post. But this time I might mean it. But probably not. Although now I do have tons of free time and no money to do anything else...

Maybe I'll passive-aggressively turn my posts into a more typical kind of blog in which I detail the horror of my daily activities. For example: "I wake up at eight o'clock sharp and then nap until around 11, when I am awoken by my stocky, homosexual pet cat's effort grunts as he climbs onto my bed. At this point I waste fourteen hours watching youtube videos of animals walking into things. My girlfriend sends me a text: 'What are you doing?' and I respond 'Working on grad school applications.' I eat several doughnuts and lose consciousness in my own filth--but not before a quarter-turn in order to prevent bed sores."

Is this really what you want, America?

Food Monster

A few days ago I spent the afternoon in the company of an old friend, Mr. Matthew "Midnight" Serverster. He has recently moved back to Scranton after a stint of substitute teaching in Delaware. He's a good man and will make some lucky fella an excellent wife some day if he manages to get his rampant body hair problem under control. (You see, the joke is that I implied that Mr. Midnight is a homosexual--and it's funny because homosexuality is morally wrong and socially unacceptable).

There are many interesting things about Mr. Midnight besides his uncontrollable man-loving and his thick matte of ape-like, full-body bristle. For instance, he is well known amongst our group of friends for being an impressive eater of foodstuffs. "An 'impressive eater?'" you may ask, "What does that mean and why might that be even remotely interesting?"

Well, first off, fuck you says I. Mr. Midnight's eating ability is truly incredible--incredible in the proper sense of unbeleivable, in that you can witness him eat something and literally be unable to process what you have witnessed. Mr. Midnight's eating ability is not just limited to quantity of food ingested, but also the food itself. He can, and does, eat things that would cause decent, church-going cardiologists to rip off their doctoring hats and stomp on them in impotent rage.

It should not be inferred that Mr. Midnight is unhealthy or morbidly obese or any such thing. It is simply that, on occasion, he seems to get considerable amusement from eating the most disgusting things possible in front of horrified villagers and making them lose their faith in God, reason, and basic laws of physics. It is because of these unholy proclivities that he has earned the title of "Food Monster."

One of the tales surrounding Mr. Midnight's obscene abilities is that he has--on more than one occasion--consumed something called a quad stacker from Burger King. A quad stacker is a hamburger that has four beef patties, four slices of something similar to cheese, topped off with bacon and what might be thousand island dressing. I ate three quarters of a double stacker once and for the rest of the night my stomach felt like it was trying to forcibly secede from my body. But, as if to prove something I never asked him to prove and never would, Mr. Midnight decided to show me that these legends of him eating a quad stacker were true.

The quad stacker is not even on the god damn menu anymore. That's how terrible this thing is. He had to order off-menu to get it. It felt like we were not only doing something biologically wrong but also morally and legally wrong.

Watching Mr. Midnight eat at least for years of his life away without struggle or difficulty is something that will stay with me for some time. By the time he effortlessly popped the last bit of burger into his mouth I realized that I had only eaten half of my pitiful chicken sandwich and no longer desired to finish it or any other kind of food for some time. But Mr. Midnight simply smiled and asked if he could finish my fries. I stared at him in astonishment. He just kept smiling at me like a retard who has just killed a small animal and doesn't understand the horror of the situation.

"I'm going to shit my pants," he said, finally--still beaming with delight.
"There's a bathroom ten feet from us," I replied.
"It's not close enough. I'm going to shit my pants. We need to leave."
"I don't want you in my car if you're going to shit your pants."
"Then I'll just have to walk home."

In the end he didn't have to walk home, nor did he shit his pants. After leaving burger king we went to Target. We were standing in the electronics section talking about Bioshock or something when he cut himself off mid-sentence to declare, "Oh God. I have to go." He then walked very quickly to the unisex bathroom.

An uncomfortably long time after this he returned, smiling again, only to declare, "That was actually pretty painful. A woman walked in after me and I actually heard her say 'Good Lord!.'"

This was my day, ladies and gentleman. This is a day in Scranton. Long live the Food Monster.

Brief [Demarcations] update

Yesterday I sold a book to a fat lady called "Crystal Reflexology." On the cover some retard was jamming a crystal into her ear. No joke. Real thing.

Too bad Bea Arthur died. An important part of American life in times past was the right to tell people that not only were they wrong, but also too stupid to remain not in the care of some kind of state-certified attendant. It's not "mean." It's doing your duty as a rational human being. Instead of "And yet it moves," Gallileo says, "Oh, well, sure."

If your back hurts you can shove crystals in your ear until they start poking out of other orifices and it won't help. Losing some of that gelatinous burden, however, might do the trick. Or, like your ancient mammalian cousins, realize that the land-walking life is not for a person of your grandeur and waddle into the embrace of the seas where gravity is not so unforgiving.

Six degrees of Canada Jackson.

I have, in my long and glamorous life, met two whole celebrities. Well, kind of celebrities. In that if you saw them walking down the street you might say, "Hey, is that that guy from ______?" and then realize that even if it were that guy from ________ it wouldn't matter because they would probably ask you for bus fare if you tried to talk to them.

Oh, wait, I've met three. I once got into a bar fight with Doris Kearns Goodwin. She kicked my ass.

Anyway, these are the true stories of my celebrity encounters.

First, I met Henry Winkler. That's right, the Fonze. The lawyer from Arrested Development. The beleaguered football coach from Adam Sandler's moving portrait of anger and mental disabilities, The Waterboy.

I met him while working as a bartender at the Scranton Cultural Center, which was by far the worst job I have ever had--and hopefully ever will have. There were times when I worked for fourteen hours straight and went home with nine dollars in tips. There were times when I was in real danger of physical harm at the hands of drunken concert goers because we ran out of beer. And, once, while standing outside in the rain, I witnessed a man vomit in the gutter--myself having to take quick evasive action as the currents pulled the former contents of his stomach towards my shoes. The reason the Scranton Cultural Center is called the Scranton Cultural Center is because excessive drinking, violence, and public vomiting are all an important part of Scranton's culture. As my friends and I paraphrase the very misleading TV show "The Office:" There ain't no party like a Scranton party, because at a Scranton party someone dies.

But anyway, Henry Winkler. He was coming to Scranton to hype his children's books about a kid with dyslexia. First there was a little party with champagne on the second floor of the building, followed by Mr. Winkler giving a little talk to an audience of kids in the theater. During the little pre-party I swiped a bottle of champagne, thinking it would be excessively cool to have a champagne bottle signed by the Fonze. Why did I think that? Because Scranton is full of radiation that makes you retarded.

I waited backstage while he was giving his talk to the little tykes. After he was done I asked his manservant (I assume his manager or assistant or sex slave) if he would sign my bottle. Mr. Winkler said, through his concubine, that he would not. Crushed, I decided to have him sign one of his books about kids who can't read.


Even though I spent a good ten minutes in Mr. Winkler's presence, he neither spoke to me or made eye contact with me. Instead he spoke to his manservant about how he was going to sign the books across his picture on the back because no one does that, and how will you know it's really his signature if he doesn't sign it accross his picture? "Why didn't anyone else think of that?" asked. Clearly, it's because Henry Winkler is a fucking genius. He also piqued my ire when he asked me, again through his chattel, to bring him some water. I did so, and received no acknowledgement whatsoever.

But, the life of celebrity is tiring. With this in mind I decided to sign my champagne bottle for Mr. Winkler.
My next dramatic semi-celebrity meeting was at my current semi-job at [Demarcations]. In this case, I met Bronson Pinchot. That's right, Balki of TV's "Perfect Strangers."

Bronson Pinchot on the left.

According to Wikipedia, Bronson Pinchot owns a god damn town near Scranton. He moved there and bought all the buildings with his "Perfect Strangers" and Beverly Hills Cop money. And, for whatever reason, he occasionally relaxes with a warm cup of the distilled, burned offal we call coffee at the Scranton [Demarcations]. How he has not killed himself is anyone's guess.

Now, I should say that in actuallity Mr. Pinchot is a nice guy. When I was ringing him up I didn't realize that he was Bronson Pinchot until he handed me his credit card with BRONSON FUCKING PINCHOT on it. Also, someone behind me asked a manager if he could take his lunch break. This struck Mr. Pinchot as funny, as it was eight o'clock in the evening.

"Lunch?" said Mr. Pinchot. "That train has sailed." I am not ruling out that Bronson Pinchot was intoxicated during this interaction.

Bronson Pinchot on the left. Wokka wokka.

It has occured to me that nearly everyone has some cool story of meeting a real life celebrity or otherwise important public figure. My cousin got to shake hands with President Clinton while he was still president. RJP4 has met several celebrities during his exile in New York City. My sister saw Jake Gyllenhaal and Kirsten "Beastly Whore" Dunst buying rice--and was once yelled at by Sean Connery.

I, however, have been irritated by Henry Winkler over the course of an evening and shared a surreal three minutes with Bronson Pinchot. Clearly I am the winner.

----------------------------------------------------------

PS: Hopefully, children, I will have more time and motivation to post as [Demarcations] continues its steadily more entertaining shit show of a downward spiral into irrelevance and bankruptcy. Rumor has it that the new CEO is randomly visiting stores and firing people. Oh please, Father Christmas! Oh please let him visit humble Scranton, Pennsylvania to find me and set me free! And please, dear Father Christmas, let me tear off my stupid nametag and tell him to take his fraudulent charity book drives and maddeningly arbitrary sales goals and go fuck himself to death.

Cheers!

More reasons I hate my job.

1) Thanks to this here recession we got goin' on my hours have been cut to the point of having one day of work a week. Sometimes I have a full 8 hour shift, sometimes not. One week I was only scheduled to work four hours. Somehow this hasn't stopped me from hemorrhaging money like I have the Dollars-Tuberculosis. I cough demurely into a white handkerchief and look anxiously as dimes fall from it.

2) At my one day of work this week I heard two teenage girls discussing me.
Girl 1: Doesn't he look like [inaudible]?
Girl 2: Yeah. Maybe the hobbit version.
[Assorted giggles.]
I briefly imagined myself flagging them down and saying, "Hey, I don't come to where you work and tell you that you are too fat and pock-marked to work the pole while holding back tears of shame and thinking about your step-dad." But I would never do that. Bible says that would be wrong.

3) I had to alert the general manager to a teenage boy walking around the store with a gigantic inflatable cartoon penis.

4) That same night the store was visited by a living, breathing, cautionary tale against drinking while pregnant. This was the clearest and most obvious case of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome the world has ever seen. Eyes spread about seven meters apart, the classic "elfin" features, and, of course, the full house of behavioral problems. He yelled, he screamed, he demanded people help him find horror books even when we were engaged with other customers. When someone finally did free up to help him he was incomprehensible. His sister-mother had the same features and yelling issues. Clearly we were dealing with a multi-generational illness. In the end, she bought him the uncut version of the original Friday the 13th. I should receive a promotion for not immediately demanding to know why the mother hated the world so much as to use her genitals as a weapon against us all.
After they had left the store I went to the horror fiction section to see the damage left in their wake. The child had somehow knocked down a bookshelf. That took me a while to fix. I then went to the horror film section--only to find more of a mess and several empty DVD cases.
"Why didn't your fat ass get an abortion?" Imaginary Jackson asks.
"Because Bible says that would be wrong," says hillbilly woman, as she and her mongoloid son steal DVDs and cut in line in the public sphere. Wrong indeed, you horrible inbred deep-woods nightmare--now stop your walking talking miscarraige from biting me.

And with that my hate catharsis is complete. I will now resume rubbing my cat's belly and telling him what a handsome fellow he is.

Handsome devil.

Asshole Taxonomy presents: "The Neo Nerd."

I have bemoaned, here and elsewhere, that while the Internet is a wonderful invention in terms of its capacity for expanding freedom of expression and thought—and possibly democracy itself—it is also killing us all, dammit. While there is a certain charm in the idea that any dribbling hill person can have an Internet Web Log in which to stammer out the innermost machinations of his or her brain (long Swiss-cheese’d by a combination of Creutzfeldt-Jakob and turpentine cocktails), the Internet is fraught with the same perils of all cultural expansions. Not only does it open up an unprepared West for all the horrid perversions of the Orient, it also allows groups formerly relegated to the outskirts of acceptability and decency a place to congregate, confabulate, and masturbate.

It in this unforeseen capacity that the Internet is mostly responsible for this post’s Asshole: The Neo-Nerd.

“But Jackson!” you might say, as you typically do whenever I need this construction, “Cannot you, yourself, be classified as a nerd? Do you not enjoy an occasional science fiction romp? Are you not highly critical of the new Transformers movie due to your not-so-secret homorobotic crush on Optimus Prime? Do you not wear glasses and work in a book store and contribute to an Internet Web Log that regularly references such things as the Technodrome?” And, after hissing and shushing you because of the possible presence of ladies, I would admit it as so. And yet, while I may be a considerable nerd I am not—and as God as my witness will never be—a Neo-Nerd.

And what, pray tell, is the difference? What makes a nerd fit to walk upright among men while the Neo-Nerd, in a just and sensible society, would be banished to the sewers, forever to feast upon the refuse of the society that shunned it? Allow me first to properly secure my ranting hat.

Nerdiness has become an acceptable part of society. Everything from calculator watches to quoting Star Wars has become a-OK. Comic book movies are blockbusters and nominated for Academy Awards. Lost has made science fiction palatable. But there is always balance in the universe—and as such, some nerds were pushed into a dark wasteland opened up by once-beautiful openness of the Internet. Suddenly there is someone who does want to read your stories about Captain Kirk giving it to Obi Wan Kenobi. Suddenly there is someone who does want to argue with you about why it’s “Elvish” and not “Elfish.” Suddenly there is someone who also likes to dress up like a wolf and…do whatever Furries do. I assume rub each other and howl or something.

There is a Never Never Land, children, and good Lord in Heaven is it eye-meltingly horrible. Peter Pan doesn’t fight pirates and live in a kick-ass tree-house here, kids. Instead he insists he’s a vampire and can’t hold down a job to pay for his microwave burritos. Anyone who claims that it’s a virtue to remain a child at heart hasn’t seen the real world outcome: two physically mature sub-humans dressed as raccoons humping each other.

But, honestly, as long as they stay in their cold, dark corner of the Internet, I have no beef with the Neo-Nerd. If they stayed on their fan fiction and sword-collecting websites, all would be well. But, being completely unaware of their status as most undesirable, they occasionally venture out into the real world; their skin ghostly white, their sweatpants stained with long streaks of cheeto dust, hair greasy from an apparent abandonment of all tenets of personal hygiene, brains confused by light and three dimensions, compounded by their inability to separate themselves (worthless on virtually all measurable levels) from their MMORPG avatar (ninth level paladin dragon-slaying troll-bashing he-man love-machine). Whereas the Fattie is deluded enough to think that they can do magic, the Neo-Nerd is deluded enough to have a baffling amount of confidence.

You have probably encountered the Neo-Nerd if you are nerdy enough to read and understand SQR. He is the guy who will call you a “fag” even though he himself has never and will never know the love of a woman. He is the guy who will cite his skills at Halo as if they are really worth something beyond the typically advanced eye-hand coordination of the hourly masturbator. If you are stupid enough to engage the Neo-Nerd, he will spend the entire conversation criticizing you and everything you like or enjoy, even though later he will have to call his mother for a ride home. Basically, the Neo-Nerd’s mind and perception is so twisted by lack of reality that they believe their social inadequacies and unacceptability are actually benefits. Like all Assholes, the Neo-Nerd simply, and bafflingly erroneously, believes that they are better than you. Yes, you.

The Neo-Nerd is also incredibly skilled at the art of what we have previously termed conversation rape. Whereas the Fattie was maybe an apprentice-level conversation rapist, the Neo-Nerd will leave you in the shower, fully clothed and in the fetal position, sobbing and knowing that you will never be clean. There is one particular Neo-Nerd who stalks [Demarcations], whom the staff calls [Fat Bitch]. My latest encounter with [Fat Bitch] was when I was tasked with alphabetizing the science fiction series. I was working on our largest series, Forgotten Realms—which, as far as I can tell, is about long-haired people fighting abominable snowmen with crossbows. Because I was touching these books, [Fat Bitch] must have assumed I read them and would also like to talk about them even though I was clearly at work and too polite to put steel-toe to testicles. He stood over me for about ten or fifteen minutes, vomiting endlessly upon me his opinions on things with too many apostrophes and consonants to ever be pronounceable by anyone without a brain disease. Eventually I stopped even my stock of non-response responses (“uh huh”, “right”, “sure”, “K’frrd’nch does sound like a nice place to raise a half-elf”, etc.), hoping that he would get the subtle message that I hated him and wanted him to die. Just when I was about to open my jugular with my pen two more people walked into the section and [Fat Bitch] smelled fresh meat. I finished my section feeling like a helpless coward, not strong enough to protect those poor, innocent people from an hour-long conversation about which guild is the best in a place that is not real.

And so, friends, heed my warning! Should ye be approached by anyone wearing ankle-cuffed sweatpants who is not (A) in the immediate vicinity of a gym, (B) over the age of sixty-five, or (C) asleep, run! Run for the nearest and brightest source of light that is not a Best Buy or an establishment that regularly sells Hot Pockets! God forbid, if one should bite or scratch you, immediately wash the wound with soap, water, and the highest proof whiskey you can find, then fill your pockets with stones and walk into the nearest river or lake.

Remarkably, through this piecemeal taxonomy of individual species, we are quickly approaching a general rubric for Assholes. So far we seem to have two rules down:
1) Whereas the individual has a complete disconnect from reality (e.g. believing in magic, thinking that his or her Xbox Live gamerscore is comparable to carpentry or masonry or being actually able to do anything and be paid money for it).
2) Whereas the individual has a baseless claim of superiority (e.g. a lot of people reading their Smurfs fanfiction, having seen a boob once in Warcraft).

Be sure to tune in next time for more Asshole Taxonomy. Or other stuff. Or maybe I’ll go another two weeks without posting.

A Tale of Terror for the Whole Family, or: The Ballad of the Basement Man

Ok, scamps, has Uncle Jackson got a tale for you. It is about a dream I had recently--a dream that I have related to some of my colleagues, and they have been mostly in agreement as to its Internet Web Log worthiness.

Firstly, a "Marley was dead, to begin with..." type thing: my dreams are usually embarrassingly mundane. I dream about getting up and going to work. Or I dream about doing nothing or wandering around. Rarely do I ever dream about anything remotely exciting--and even more infrequently do I ever have nightmares. Actually, I cannot remember the last nightmare I had. It might have been as far back as elementary school.

But this, my friends, was a nightmare.

It starts with me wandering alone through a very nice house--bordering on what might be called a mansion. It was daylight, and everything was quite pleasant. I began to notice strange things rather quickly, however. The first thing was that the landscape outside looked blocky and unrealistic, like Nintendo 64 era graphics. Everything had the same pattern of green grass and yellow flowers stretched over simple three-dimensional objects in order to make ground and topiaries, etc. But more alarming was this growing sense of dread. I use the term "dread" specifically, because I believe that it properly describes the feeling: not unease, not discomfort, and not fear, but anxiety--something much more subtle. A feeling of some deep but unapparent wrongness mixed with the inevitability of my confrontation with the source; that undiscovered thing. Definitely dread.

As my dread mounted, I continued my slow but unstoppable exploration of this house. Eventually, at what I thought was the center of the building, I came to what can be described as an entirely closed-in sun porch. It was a room set up and furnished just like a sun porch--vinyl furniture and everything--but no windows. This was, of course, unnerving. But, to add to my misery, there were some magazines on the glass table in the middle of the room.

From a distance, these magazines looked like regular magazines: a person on the cover, blurbs, a title, everything nice and normal. But upon further inspection I discovered that they were, in fact, all about self-mutilation.

Magazines. Magazines about self-mutilation.

This is the point where any normal person would obey their Spider-Sense and book it. But apparently in my dreams I am a stupid-white-person, and just kind of thought "Well, how about that."

Then I noticed a locked door in the enclosed sun porch. This is where dream autopilot kicks in--that thing that makes you do things in dreams that you cannot control. If, in my waking hours, a situation combined a locked door and a distinct feeling of dread I would certainly not continue. But in this dream I unlocked the door (it had a deadbolt and one of those twisty things in the knob) and opened it. I was immediately faced with another locked door, which I also opened. Beyond that door was a short hallway and another locked door.

In the short hallway I began to notice that there were things scribbled all over the walls--mostly gibberish and stick figures. One of the stick figures was prominent, with a big D-shaped smile, and the phrase "Basement Man" seemed to come up quite a bit. My anxiety had reached near pants piddling proportions in this dark hallway, but my body continued to move towards the final door, and unlock it. It opened into what appeared to be an unused part of the house. There was a hallway, and across from the doorway in which I stood was a small room with dim sunlight coming in. There was dust everywhere and it was very very quiet. Another peculiar aspect of dreams is that you can be aware of things without any real sensory input, and in this case I became aware that there was indeed something in this part of the house and that my opening these fortifications was a very bad idea. I regained control of my body and, in a panic, quickly closed and locked the three doors.

At this point, in the real world, my cell phone began to ring. I woke up and talked briefly to my girlfriend, and went back to sleep--the dream and the apprehension already fading.

Buuut I immediately found myself back in the short hallway with all those warnings scrawled around me. I lost control of myself again, and again I unlocked the last door and opened it. This time I stepped past the threshold and into the gloomy part of the house. There was a noticeable temperature difference. The carpet was thick and my shoes sunk deep and didn't make a sound. The hallway I was standing in went to my left and right, and ended in perpendicular hallways. I began to walk to the left--though every inch of me wanted very badly to leave and lock and re-lock every possible lock I could lock.

As I walked towards the end of the hallway, someone came around the corner. And here, children, was the infamous Basement Man. He was barefoot and had tattered clothing and wide eyes, but most importantly he had removed much of the lower part of his face, revealing his teeth in that strange D-shaped smile represented in the drawings in the hallway. His teeth were perfect, but I guess when one removes the lips and outer part of the mouth it makes saliva an issue, and it freely fell from his maw. In one of his hands he carried a filthy and intimidating kitchen knife. We stood there for a moment, and, in the words of Ed Tom Bell, then I woke up.

Many questions do I still have about the Basement Man. Firstly, from what horrible pit of my subconscious did he spring? Second, if the dream had continued, would he have killed me and eaten me? In that order? Or simply run past me to the unlocked doors and the freedom beyond? Or, most likely, both.

And so, friends, the lesson here is clear: doors are very dangerous things. And locked doors in succession are meant to be locked and stay locked. And to always, always heed warnings on the wall.

Oh, and one more question: Why "the Basement Man?" He didn't even live in a damn basement. I could ask him, but I think all he would say is "glargleargleargle." I demand that my dreams return to reliable nomenclature, if not mundaneness.

Ringing in a New Year

DRock here again. Hahahahahaha! I'm back. I think you cats can tell that I really like this whole blog thing. Keeps my mouth off of people's ears and on their eyes instead, I guess. I want to talk about the holiday known as New Years. Or as I like to call it "I make promises that I don't keep and get stupid drunk in a pool of my own misery and disappointment while filled with false hope of a better year than last." Damn, I'm a joyous person eh?

' Like gettin' raped in the face.

AnyCindyLouWho...I personally think New Year's is a good idea. We reflect upon the past 12 months. We think about the future, and even enjoy celebrating in the present. It's probably the only time of year that the American collective consciousness is consistently alive and well in what has been, what is, and what may be. So cheers to that!

As far as my own plans go for kissing 2008 goodbye, I'm not sure yet. One thing's for sure though...I'm not kissing it goodbye...

I'M KICKING ITS WHORISH SLUT MOTHER BITCH CRAP ON YOUR DAY CRAP ON MY DAY INSULT YO MAMMA ONE IN THE STINK LOHENGREN CMON SHOW I DON'T CARE SO SCREW YOU SHAVED POSSE MEMBER YEAH FUCKED BY A TRANNY FUCKED BY YOUR DEAD RELATIVES WHILE RIDING A PINK HORSE AND WEARING A PINK BUNNY SUIT ERGO PINK NIGHTMARE SUCK ON A STICK O' DYNAMITE MY WIFE LEFT ME MY DOG LEFT ME MY OWN DICK LEFT ME FOR CHRIST'S SAKE EVEN MY FAVORITE PAIR OF SOCKS LEFT ME donkeycheese DONKEY PUNCHIN ASS GOODBYE!!!!!!

*hehe*

Yeaaaaah...it's been a shit year. So I guess I'm one of the false hope fools who longs for 2009 to have a shred of something better. We. Shall. See.

What do you all have in mind for this beloved and despised time of year? Please, comment and share. Let's all get crazy.beautiful.sexy.baby.buttsex.nutso on this one eh? Let's get it together. Meeting of the minds. HELL!!!!! LET'S MAKE IT A SPORTS QUIZ NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!!!!

We'll get all of our old guests together at Tinks in Scranton and reallllllly party it on down! Just think of it, Bill Cosby chastising everyone for drinking alcoholic beverages. Kermit the Frog committing racial crimes!! Chris Walken humping a barstool, mistaking it for a fine piece of ACE! Father P jerking off onstage!!! The list goes on and on and on.....and on............on...........

I mean it. Let's do it. Because if we don't, I'm just gonna have to settle for a threesome with Canada and Tyler, and although that's fun, we've pretty much exhausted our creativity in that arena already. (Unless someone's got a Crocodile we can borrow, and a can of powdered organic south African bee honey.)

Don't let me down peeps.

The Technodrome, Giant Robots, and the Collective Unconscious

On most Mondays during the Summer (and some Mondays during other times of the year) some of the Sports Quiz staff can be found at Cosgrove's--a nice, dark little pub on the edge of Green Ridge. Monday night is Quizzo night, which is fun for the whole family if your little ones enjoy hits of the 80's and 90's played at maximum volume, lonely old men, the occasional hip young twenty-something with nothing to do, and a host with a nearly supernatural inability to ask a direct question in less than fifty words.

I was there a few Mondays ago with my long-time friend and brother-in-arms, the playwright Robert John Parry, IV. As he steadily made disappear two white russians followed by a forgotten number of four horsemen (which would be enough to kill or at least induce considerable vomiting in mortal men), the questions became more and more sports-oriented--which is an area embarrassingly far outside of my expertise, while RJP4 is unmoved by our human proclivities for organized sport. Naturally, the conversation moved to a common topic of ours: namely, what in the crimson April fuck is wrong with Japan.

Well, to be fair, the conversation started out with Ninja Turtles. I am fascinated by the Technodrome, the lair/vehicle of the Shredder. From Wiki:

fig. 1.1: "The Technodrome at Sunset."

Even in this dramatic image, the Technodrome shows itself as an imposing and fearsomely ridiculous piece of equipment. The name comes from the German technodrommen, which means "big metal sphere with tank treads and an eyeball on top." Or, perhaps, is a portmanteau of technology and aerodrome. Which would make the Technodrome a really fancy airport. Or maybe they picked drome because it sounds cool, or because it sounds like dome and the whole contraption is kind of dome-like in a retarded way. The mystery continues.

One of the most fascinating aspects of the Technodrome was that it was always spoken about as if it were some hugely important and powerful weapon, but always ambiguously. One got the sense that even those that lived inside the Technodrome were uncertain of what, exactly, it did. Perhaps its greatest weapon was the confusion it would most likely cause upon arrival on the battlefield--its mysterious power being its complete inscrutability. And what, exactly, is the purpose of the gigantic eyeball? The Technodrome spent most of its time underground. The giant eyeball seems like more of a hindrance than an advantage in that situation. I imagine it was constantly getting stuck on rock formations. Or perhaps it was just a functionless hood ornament.

Furthermore, one can clearly understand the advantages of an underground lair. One can also clearly understand the advantages of a mobile liar. However, the combination of mobile-ness and underground-ness mitigates the advantages of both. An underground liar is difficult to get to while a mobile liar could be anywhere. If an underground liar is mobile, you are basically constructing a massive tunnel right up to your doorstep--and it can't really "be anywhere" because all one would have to do to find it is travel in one of two directions: follow the tunnel that goes this way, or follow the tunnel that goes that way. Also, cave-ins would naturally be an issue. I doubt the Shredder was some kind of rock doctor.

Aaanyway, RJP4 brought up that in the Japanese version of the Turtles they have the prerequisite Giant Robot which the Turtles drive or pilot or operate or transform into or whatever (I believe I found some evidence here: wait for the credits for the weird robots to start appearing). I also recalled that the Japanese version of Spider-man has this same confusing and unnecessary addition as well. This naturally brings about the question: why does Japan feel the need to insert the Giant Robot into everything--even places where it would be narratively inconvenient for a Giant Robot to be? If Japan does a production of Hamlet, does he scream into a wristwatch at the end, calling forth an enormous robotic version of himself, garbed in gunmetal with its trademark "ray of metaphysical doubt" weapon? And yet, here is Peter Parker, humble freelance photographer struggling to pay the rent--and also endowed with a robot the size of a skyscraper. With which to fight...gang members? Ah, like opening a can of peaches with a shotgun.

Because of the Giant Robots omnipresence not only in Japan's homegrown cultural artifacts but also being shoehorned into their imports and transliterations--regardless of the appropriateness--it becomes clear that the Giant Robot is some kind of Japo-Jungian archetype. Kind of like how all American heroes are basically cowboys in different wardrobes and situations...which is representative of our unconscious love of gay men.

RJP4 and I then spent the next hour or so trying to decipher what the Giant Robot may mean as a cultural symbol. I think most of Japan's fucked-uppedness in the eyes of the West can be traced back to the whole we dropped the World's most devastating weapon on them--twice. Unfathomable violence and destruction has the tendency to make people a little weird. Is it any wonder that the Japanese culture fetishizes innocence to a degree that would embarrass Holden Caufield? I mean, we disintegrated their children.

But that is really a separate and more disturbing discussion. I think that the Giant Robot fetish can also be traced back to that whole atomic business. It makes sense that a people that affected by devastating technology would in turn attempt to anthropomorphize and redirect that technology as some kind of protector. And who is it that almost always pilots or controls these Giant Robots? At least, in the original Japanese TV shows, it's most often children. Done and done. Another culture psychoanalyzed by Canada Jackson and RJP4, Existential Detectives.

The West has their own cultural warnings against nuclear warfare: post-apocalyptic visions of the future where the land is afire and Mel Gibson wanders in the midst of murder machines or vampires or zombies or vampire-zombies. But all of these are insufficient caveats. The strongest reason why we should never use nuclear arms is Japan. Japan shows us that the atomic bomb is more of a pervert bomb than anything else, and we would only surive through fondling each other on subways and showing hardcore animated sex on Saturday mornings.

"Look upon my works, ye mighty..."

But then, perhaps a couple of 20-something Japanese losers are examining our precious Technodrome and proclaiming how it clearly shows our obscene American obsession with small-to-moderate-sized robots and of-age, consenting human sexual partners. Is there nothing that relativism cannot fix?

Not with a bang but a LOL

With Tyler bringing up "Calvin and Hobbes" and my previous post waxing nostalgic about simpler times, I feel the need to complain.

Recently at [Demarcations] I was talking with an older employee about comic strips. This, of course, made me think of Calvin and Hobbes--with which he had little contact. As we were talking about the strip I had a very sad realization: Calvin and Hobbes has become anachronistic--dated! It focuses on a boy who spends the majority of his time outside, building forts and snowmen and riding in a wagon. The kid also has an imagination so powerful that it shakes the foundation of the material world he lives in: dinosaurs flying fighter jets, cardboard box time machines, and that constant, fabricated companion.

I'm afraid that the generations after mine would look at this strip and see nothing of a foothold. No context, no frame of reference. When I was a kid I seem to recall being nearly always outside. I climbed trees. I dug massive holes for the hell of it. I went to the park and rode my bike, and I remember being called from the back porch as the sun went down. But now it is rare for me to see any kids in the neighborhood. Sometimes, as I am going to work, I see them slogging their way up to the old John J. Audubon School #42--and sometimes I see them slogging their way home. But that is it. The park is full of old people and young couples with dogs. I haven't seen anyone on a bike here in ages--at least, anyone who didn't have sunglasses and lycra shorts.

And this is how I know I am old. I have started my what's-with-the-kids-these-days speeches. Next I'll be confiscating errant frisbees (if there were any) and lose my ability to use a remote control. But I really do feel that these generational changes are significant--moreso, perhaps, then the one behind me complaining about "the rap music and the em tee vee."

I think it is better for kids to be outside getting scrapes and bruises and playing tag or Cowboys and Indians than screaming homophobic obscenities at each other while one of their avatars teabags another.

I think that if this generation had a Calvin he would be a fat, lonely little fuck altogether medicated and crushed out of existence. We could call it "Calvin and No One," because he sure as hell wouldn't be able to imagine his way out of a paper bag, let alone come up with a separate being. Whereas the previous had remarkable insights and thoughtful observations, this bright and shining new Calvin would have fingertips stained orange from Cheeto-dust, pale skin from constant illumination-by-monitor, and would most likely grow up and go Columbine on all our asses.

Sweet Jesus, I just went back and read what I wrote and I come off as one of those internet assholes that are so popular these days. Sorry to put my grumpy pants on, all. But what else are blogs for but the late-night airings of our indignant rages passed off as legitimate social commentary and criticism?

The next post will be back on track. And will most likely mention vomit. I am noticing a pattern.

The Marty McFly of the digital age

I work at a local book store--shall we call it, perhaps, "[Demarcations]." Now, this being one of the few book stores in the area (draw from that fact what you will) we get some interesting people. Most of them are just unremarkably crazy. For instance, there is a person who regularly vomits in the men's room. This is not really worth much hullabaloo because this person has what we might call brain and behavioral problems, which means he may think that it is OK to purge oneself on the floor of a public place. This is something that everyone knows crazy people do, so why blog about it? It is not blogworthy to say that a crazy person did something that, to non-crazy people, appears crazy. (I imagine that crazy people have a kind of supra-sane communication and understanding, and that other crazy people would respond to a person purposely vomiting in public with sage nods and "good shows" all around. But then again I am not a doctor and am, by most rubrics, mentally retarded.)

But beyond the shuffling and vomiting hordes, [Demarcations] also provides its many services to some genuinely astonishing people. Tonight I had the pleasure of helping a young boy who had clearly traveled through space and time from the distant lands of what can only be called "1992."

(I have done a Google Image Search of the phrase "1992" in order to better show what I mean, but I got distracted by one of the results:This woman, who looks considerably like television's Ricky Gervais. She is also a "traffic manager" from 1992.)

At first I was struck by the time traveler's appearance: light blue tapered jeans; an oversized striped sweater of the colors green, orange, and red; white high top sneakers; a green down vest; and a perfectly shaped blond semi-mullet. Unlike a regular mullet, which was worn primarily by the lower class (a tradition carried on today only by idiot sub-humans), the semi-mullet was the rich man's mullet--being business in the front and slightly more drunken business in the back. For those of us who grew up televisually inclined, think of the blond Taylor child on Home Improvement.

Next came the mysterious time-wanderer's request: He wanted the Simpsons. "Ye Gods!" thought I. Trapped in the confines of the early nineties, this poor soul has yet to see the fate of the Simpsons! Sure that he would not believe me, I--with heavy heart--led him back to the glass DVD cases, where I unlocked for him seasons four and five.

After my brief encounter, I thought that he had gone. But he returned again to continue marveling me with his antiquated tastes and behaviors. He approached me, apologizing for taking up my time again. Can you imagine? A child! Apologizing and being needlessly polite! He wanted to purchase another boxed set--this one of some wrestling business. How can this boy afford all these boxed sets, I thought. But then, slapping my forehead, I remembered: the nineties were times of economic prosperity. Mulleted children with day glow slap bracelets and deep seated fears of a Negro President scampered around buying ridiculous shit all the time. Such a strange and terrifying world this boy had come from: a land where Sonic the Hedgehog is a cultural icon, where the "overall" is not extinct, and Star Wars--Oh! Those beautiful Star Wars!--remains unblemished. He probably still played outside, thought computers were only for doing math problems, and had never called anyone a "gay ass bitch faggot" after they "killed" him in cops and robbers.

As he left the building--surely to disappear in a ball of lightning--I could not help but think of such a brave old world.

But then some crazy motherfucker tossed his biscuits in the bathroom.

Scranton Stories

I have a shameful confession to make: I was born, raised, and currently live in Scranton, Pennsylvania. That's correct. That strange, nearly mythical, dying city in the Northeast is my home. Much has been made of Scranton recently, what with the popularity of The Office and Joe Biden's status as the Vice President elect--but even before this, Scranton was consistently in the national dialogue.

Granted. this city's mention is usually as the butt of a joke (e.g. Home Alone, My Father the Hero, and numerous Saturday Night Live appearances), but it is still strange that such an unimportant and largely inoffensive place should warrant such repeated reference. It's almost as if there is some strange fascination with Scranton--even though most Americans have never (nor will ever) grace our exceedingly humble shores.

I feel it is warranted, then, to not only jump on the Scranton bandwagon but to add a little clarity about this place. I will admit that, at times, Scranton can be used as proof that if God were to vomit on a mountain it would roll downhill and sprout semi-habitable buildings--but there are other times when Scranton can actually be a very nice place.

But, for the most part, the stories I will tell will be embarrassing and indicative of a serious corruption of the local gene pool. Fortunately, my parents are from Jersey.

Stay tuned.

P.S. Disregard the entire image of God vomiting, etc. The architecture here (the old architecture, at least) is actually one of the plusses.

P.P.S. Disregard the previous. The new buildings more than destroy any advantage the old buildings would have given us. The "new" high school alone--which resembles the hideous result of Dr. Seuss having violent sex with a federal prison--is enough to turn our architectural heritage into some kind of half-assed post-post-modern nightmare.