If you write an irrational tirade and someone criticizes some of the many, vaguely-interrelated points you spew out for not making sense, you can simply say, "Make sense? It's a fricken irrational tirade!"
So it's nice to write a rant. But how wants to read a rant? Apparently, a lot of people.
In school, we learn to write a coherent essay, making your points, having one fact tie into the next, in an effort to convince the reader that 1) you, the writer, are sane and worth listening to; 2) have given this issue careful thought; 3) are not making unsubstaniated claims; 4) are making a sincere effort to convince and reason with the reader, respecting the reader's intellect.
A rant is something else. Some rants are good and others bad. It's not taught, but we can recognize the elements of a good one. A good tirade is a groove, logging into a human mind, emotional, rhythmic-- it's a groove. A bad one makes the reader feel the urge to either contact the authorities to advise them of a potentially violent personality or bath in ritually cleansed water to purify oneself after contact with evil.
Up until now, I have praised a rant in essay form. I think this would be a good time to go ahead and rant to show you how it's done. It's like the jazz professor has written the liner notes and it's time to pick up the horn.
Bad rant, that would be my father. He is a freak from planet freakaziod. I look in the mirror and I look just like him and that is disturbing- I mean I seem really fine, basically, most of the time but how is that possible? He's a psychopath. I don't mean that like, "Cut it out. What are you, a psychopath?" No I mean like whispering, like a homocide may be the works, like the DSM4, like he doesn't really know there are other people in the world.
I'm on his spam list. Other than that, I try not to have anything to do with him. He rants. Wait, I'm ranting. Maybe I am a rat too... better get back to the essay. Or how about a rant-esssay hybrid?
Well, I was just warming up and got cold feet.
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Thursday, May 10, 2007
i'm so damn wise, man, dali lama better watch out
You better read this diary. Don't skim it, man, because I drop some serious science in this mug. I kick more philosophy than Spinoza. Yes, I am infected with parasites in my anus but that didn't stop me. You think Aristotle didn't have lice? I bet Nietzsche had a plethora of venereal parasites. Maybe not, we'll never know. Wait-- we could autopsy his corpse. We got to get to the bottom of this.
Wait, hold on, I got sidetracked. I don't want to dig up Nietzsche's grave. Not in the middle of winter anyway.
It's a digression, but a significant one. You don't think a great mind like mind can be squeezed into a linear thought process, some inane convetions of "sense" and "logic?" Hell no. Can't be done. I tried it.
I maintain a very strict sense of discipline in my thought processes. It's discipline, but it's chaotic. Can't discipline be chaotic?
I practice chaotic discipline all the time. That's my doctrine and you should read the rest of this and then you'll know what it is. Man, I am mad profound. You are not ready.
Guess what? I just figured out most of the great mysteries of life, like about 72 percent of them. Here's how I did it: the dog had gotten in the compost pile, as per usual, eaten something nasty and got pinworms. I digress (digest, then digress). I guess I digress. I'd digress in a dress. I'll digress anywhere, any way, any why, any any.
The dog couldn't be still, biting at his butt all night, doing his little "bite-my-own-ass" dance and I couldn't sleep. Yeah, I could throw the dog out but then he'd bark. I could put him outside but it was cold. Some point in that period of time I had my epiphany. Later on I got pinworms myself but that's another story. Little bastard got in the bed at night and a worm crawled out of the dog into my... well, you can check to CDC website to see what might have happened.
It's all part of the same cosmic mystery that I solved, the one, the many. But we're getting to that, First we have to manage this parasite condition.
Can you believe I both answered some of life's most vexing and profound questions and got worms? That's how fricken profound I am. I known so much AND have worms in my ass. That's a two-for. The book of life, man, you're reading the Cliff Notes version until you check in with me. The Pope called to ask if I want to be a saint. I have a deal pending with the Dali Lama and the Pope will have to wait.
Honestly, I don't like thinking about parasites. So I had to think about something else. What I thought about, brace yourself, it's deep. I'm so deep, it'll scare you. Just watch. Here it comes.
I'm enlightened like the Buddha. I left my physical self and ascended. You can't do that, man. You can't even meditate with your ADHD. In the West when a man dies, there is still a soul. In the East, there is a hole. Either way, I got more spirit than you, asshole.
Hold on. Wait a minute. I'm not sure you're ready for this wisdom. This wisdom is infinite, so get comfortable. It might take awhile.
First of all, God ain't shit. I've been trying to provoke that lame-ass for 20 years and he still hasn't smited me. I'm right here, dick head, come get me. All knowing, all seeing, all powerful, all good -- all bull yang. God of Abraham, man, I can kick your ass. You lied to Eve, you fat ass lier, worse than the snake, at least he didn't lie. "Surely die..." my ass.
Wait, that's idiotic. That's not what I thought. Let me back this bad boy up and hit it right out the park. I'm that good. Watch out. You know, no one pays any attention to what I say and that's fine. I know the deepest mysteries of the universe and I can't get a beer when I go to the bar -- bartender is off flirting with someone and looks right past me.
That's okay. I find inner peace by cursing her ass out later when she can't see me.
Alright, I think you're warmed up now and I can hit you with my wisdom.
Wait, you know what I sound like? I sound like some guy locked up in Attica who manages to find the address of some publisher in Manhattan and sends in an unsolicited manuscript, hand-written, bound with little tightly woven strands of toilet paper, talking about his wisdom and knowledge. All the editorial assistants are looking at it like it's radioactive, arguing about who is going to write him their most polite rejection letter and what kind of name they are going to make up to sign so that when he gets out he won't know who to murder in an insane, divinely inspired rage. I know: let the unpaid intern do it!
I do digress. You see, unlike that sucker God, I don't lie. Well, I do lie, but not in this case. I told my wife that I got pulled over for talking on the cell phone while driving but didn't get a ticket. That was a lie. I did get a ticket.
Oh, you didn't know I had a wife? She didn't know either until I showed her the wedding pictures.
I really ought to stop lying. Like the other day, I was running late. No one cared (please see paragraph above) but I called in to make up a damn lie. My co-worker was like, "Look, nobody noticed you weren't here so why don't I just not pass this inane excuse on to the boss?"
Now I'm ready. Breath in, breath out. Wisdom is coming, man, and it's a doosy.
So check this out: Human beings (homo sapien sapien) have something that no other animal has: culture. It's a new organ, a new system in the history of evolution. It's like when sexual reproduction first evolved billions of years ago or when live birth came along or flight (evolving many times): you cannot understand the new system by looking at what came before. Culture is our wings.
We are relational beings. We create culture. We have created it for so long, at least 100,000 years, that culture has also created us. We are made by culture -- our bodies, our minds -- and we make culture.
There are many cultures but interact. By interacting, they make the one culture that is ours. Interacting includes fighting. So even as we fight our enemies, we jointly build the ultimate human project that builds us.
Culture moves. There was a time when most people lived in a situation of amoral familism -- meaning, that what I do for my family is good. Hurting someone outside my family is not even something that would ever strike me as "wrong." If you see a man on the edge of a cliff and think it would be of some marginal benefit to you to be without that man, then push him. You should push him. That's right. This was the norm for the whole world at one time.
Then the spiritual domain, always there, acquired morality. Most prominently (not exclusively), the God of Abraham came along. The parameters of right and wrong expanded. Although the level of violent death probably increased from stage one to stage two, along with population density and a lot of other factors, hypocrisy was at least now possible. I guess that's a step up.
Eventually, the whole world took these steps. There were no isolated cultures. Even in reacting to or rejecting the Hebrew God, morality developed. Behavior didn't improve necessarily but the possibility of better behavior emerged.
Everything we do is about how we interact with other people. 75 percent of all human speech deals with relationships (gossip, for example). Music brings people together and drives them apart. Everything we do is culture.
Culture is this big, powerful thing that was here before we were born and will be here after we die. Culture is God. We made it and it remakes us. It is many and one.
When a tsunami hit Japan in the 1600s, there were no moral implications. God does not have anything to do with earthquakes and waves -- that's all physics. When the levies broke after Katrina, there were moral implications: global warming, our class structure. God was involved. Culture had changed. Now we understood things differently and the hurricane meant something different.
I used to think that people believed in God because we start out as children. We feel protected. Then at some point (depending on how lucky you are you could be 2 or 30), you realize you are on your own. Anything can happen to you and no one can really protect you. You crave that feeling of warmth you knew, so you imagine a God "father."
But that's too psychological. And now I think there is a God. It's culture. It's a huge, amorphous creature with desires, it moves and molds. There is no morality in nature but there is in culture. What happens outside of culture -- on Mars, for example -- is morally insignificant. What happens inside is subject to the evolving morality of our God and gods (there are many and one).
That's it for now. You see? I'm mad wise. Did you think of some shit like that? No. Why? Cause you're not me. You Mom wishes you were, that's why she keeps hitting on me. Wait, that's kind of sick.
I should sit on top of a mountain or some shit like that, grow a fricken bread. But I got get over to the pot to see what these worms are up to. Take care, now, and remember, I have worms. Wise with worms. But I digress. Where's my dress? A man in a dress, with worms, on a mountain, growing a beard.
Did I tell you I'm self employed?
Poll
how did you find me on top of this here mountian?
by looking for you
0% 0 votes
because the view is better
0% 0 votes
you didn't find me, I found you
16% 1 votes
didn't I tell you to leave me alone?
0% 0 votes
nevermind that, how do we get down?
16% 1 votes
came up in the ski lift
0% 0 votes
of course i found you, I'm a bear
0% 0 votes
well, when you knocked on the door and asked to use the bathroom, we became acquainted with one another
33% 2 votes
i never knocked on the door
0% 0 votes
you did
16% 1 votes
this is my house. you knocked on the door. now get out.
0% 0 votes
what? i'll call the cops.
0% 0 votes
call them then, they hauled me in, asked me where i got the ball of string
0% 0 votes
it's not a ball of string, it's my man's hairdo
16% 1 votes
Wait, hold on, I got sidetracked. I don't want to dig up Nietzsche's grave. Not in the middle of winter anyway.
It's a digression, but a significant one. You don't think a great mind like mind can be squeezed into a linear thought process, some inane convetions of "sense" and "logic?" Hell no. Can't be done. I tried it.
I maintain a very strict sense of discipline in my thought processes. It's discipline, but it's chaotic. Can't discipline be chaotic?
I practice chaotic discipline all the time. That's my doctrine and you should read the rest of this and then you'll know what it is. Man, I am mad profound. You are not ready.
Guess what? I just figured out most of the great mysteries of life, like about 72 percent of them. Here's how I did it: the dog had gotten in the compost pile, as per usual, eaten something nasty and got pinworms. I digress (digest, then digress). I guess I digress. I'd digress in a dress. I'll digress anywhere, any way, any why, any any.
The dog couldn't be still, biting at his butt all night, doing his little "bite-my-own-ass" dance and I couldn't sleep. Yeah, I could throw the dog out but then he'd bark. I could put him outside but it was cold. Some point in that period of time I had my epiphany. Later on I got pinworms myself but that's another story. Little bastard got in the bed at night and a worm crawled out of the dog into my... well, you can check to CDC website to see what might have happened.
It's all part of the same cosmic mystery that I solved, the one, the many. But we're getting to that, First we have to manage this parasite condition.
Can you believe I both answered some of life's most vexing and profound questions and got worms? That's how fricken profound I am. I known so much AND have worms in my ass. That's a two-for. The book of life, man, you're reading the Cliff Notes version until you check in with me. The Pope called to ask if I want to be a saint. I have a deal pending with the Dali Lama and the Pope will have to wait.
Honestly, I don't like thinking about parasites. So I had to think about something else. What I thought about, brace yourself, it's deep. I'm so deep, it'll scare you. Just watch. Here it comes.
I'm enlightened like the Buddha. I left my physical self and ascended. You can't do that, man. You can't even meditate with your ADHD. In the West when a man dies, there is still a soul. In the East, there is a hole. Either way, I got more spirit than you, asshole.
Hold on. Wait a minute. I'm not sure you're ready for this wisdom. This wisdom is infinite, so get comfortable. It might take awhile.
First of all, God ain't shit. I've been trying to provoke that lame-ass for 20 years and he still hasn't smited me. I'm right here, dick head, come get me. All knowing, all seeing, all powerful, all good -- all bull yang. God of Abraham, man, I can kick your ass. You lied to Eve, you fat ass lier, worse than the snake, at least he didn't lie. "Surely die..." my ass.
Wait, that's idiotic. That's not what I thought. Let me back this bad boy up and hit it right out the park. I'm that good. Watch out. You know, no one pays any attention to what I say and that's fine. I know the deepest mysteries of the universe and I can't get a beer when I go to the bar -- bartender is off flirting with someone and looks right past me.
That's okay. I find inner peace by cursing her ass out later when she can't see me.
Alright, I think you're warmed up now and I can hit you with my wisdom.
Wait, you know what I sound like? I sound like some guy locked up in Attica who manages to find the address of some publisher in Manhattan and sends in an unsolicited manuscript, hand-written, bound with little tightly woven strands of toilet paper, talking about his wisdom and knowledge. All the editorial assistants are looking at it like it's radioactive, arguing about who is going to write him their most polite rejection letter and what kind of name they are going to make up to sign so that when he gets out he won't know who to murder in an insane, divinely inspired rage. I know: let the unpaid intern do it!
I do digress. You see, unlike that sucker God, I don't lie. Well, I do lie, but not in this case. I told my wife that I got pulled over for talking on the cell phone while driving but didn't get a ticket. That was a lie. I did get a ticket.
Oh, you didn't know I had a wife? She didn't know either until I showed her the wedding pictures.
I really ought to stop lying. Like the other day, I was running late. No one cared (please see paragraph above) but I called in to make up a damn lie. My co-worker was like, "Look, nobody noticed you weren't here so why don't I just not pass this inane excuse on to the boss?"
Now I'm ready. Breath in, breath out. Wisdom is coming, man, and it's a doosy.
So check this out: Human beings (homo sapien sapien) have something that no other animal has: culture. It's a new organ, a new system in the history of evolution. It's like when sexual reproduction first evolved billions of years ago or when live birth came along or flight (evolving many times): you cannot understand the new system by looking at what came before. Culture is our wings.
We are relational beings. We create culture. We have created it for so long, at least 100,000 years, that culture has also created us. We are made by culture -- our bodies, our minds -- and we make culture.
There are many cultures but interact. By interacting, they make the one culture that is ours. Interacting includes fighting. So even as we fight our enemies, we jointly build the ultimate human project that builds us.
Culture moves. There was a time when most people lived in a situation of amoral familism -- meaning, that what I do for my family is good. Hurting someone outside my family is not even something that would ever strike me as "wrong." If you see a man on the edge of a cliff and think it would be of some marginal benefit to you to be without that man, then push him. You should push him. That's right. This was the norm for the whole world at one time.
Then the spiritual domain, always there, acquired morality. Most prominently (not exclusively), the God of Abraham came along. The parameters of right and wrong expanded. Although the level of violent death probably increased from stage one to stage two, along with population density and a lot of other factors, hypocrisy was at least now possible. I guess that's a step up.
Eventually, the whole world took these steps. There were no isolated cultures. Even in reacting to or rejecting the Hebrew God, morality developed. Behavior didn't improve necessarily but the possibility of better behavior emerged.
Everything we do is about how we interact with other people. 75 percent of all human speech deals with relationships (gossip, for example). Music brings people together and drives them apart. Everything we do is culture.
Culture is this big, powerful thing that was here before we were born and will be here after we die. Culture is God. We made it and it remakes us. It is many and one.
When a tsunami hit Japan in the 1600s, there were no moral implications. God does not have anything to do with earthquakes and waves -- that's all physics. When the levies broke after Katrina, there were moral implications: global warming, our class structure. God was involved. Culture had changed. Now we understood things differently and the hurricane meant something different.
I used to think that people believed in God because we start out as children. We feel protected. Then at some point (depending on how lucky you are you could be 2 or 30), you realize you are on your own. Anything can happen to you and no one can really protect you. You crave that feeling of warmth you knew, so you imagine a God "father."
But that's too psychological. And now I think there is a God. It's culture. It's a huge, amorphous creature with desires, it moves and molds. There is no morality in nature but there is in culture. What happens outside of culture -- on Mars, for example -- is morally insignificant. What happens inside is subject to the evolving morality of our God and gods (there are many and one).
That's it for now. You see? I'm mad wise. Did you think of some shit like that? No. Why? Cause you're not me. You Mom wishes you were, that's why she keeps hitting on me. Wait, that's kind of sick.
I should sit on top of a mountain or some shit like that, grow a fricken bread. But I got get over to the pot to see what these worms are up to. Take care, now, and remember, I have worms. Wise with worms. But I digress. Where's my dress? A man in a dress, with worms, on a mountain, growing a beard.
Did I tell you I'm self employed?
Poll
how did you find me on top of this here mountian?
by looking for you
0% 0 votes
because the view is better
0% 0 votes
you didn't find me, I found you
16% 1 votes
didn't I tell you to leave me alone?
0% 0 votes
nevermind that, how do we get down?
16% 1 votes
came up in the ski lift
0% 0 votes
of course i found you, I'm a bear
0% 0 votes
well, when you knocked on the door and asked to use the bathroom, we became acquainted with one another
33% 2 votes
i never knocked on the door
0% 0 votes
you did
16% 1 votes
this is my house. you knocked on the door. now get out.
0% 0 votes
what? i'll call the cops.
0% 0 votes
call them then, they hauled me in, asked me where i got the ball of string
0% 0 votes
it's not a ball of string, it's my man's hairdo
16% 1 votes
Monday, May 7, 2007
if I was a pig, I could talk my way out of a ham sandwich
I tried to drop my sister and her daughter off at the Amtrak station. She had pre-paid tickets and her credit card but no picture ID. So she couldn't get the expensive tickets she paid for already. Ok, I said, give me your credit card and the little one and I'll try. I jumped back in the line. Train is almost here. I get to the front. I hand him the credit card.
But this reservation is for a woman, Melanie, and a child... No, I say, the reservation is wrong: Melanie is paying for the ticket but I am the passenger. I give him my picture ID, get the ticket with my name and my sister makes the train, since no one checks the names at the track in all that commotion over there. Great security.
Proud, I call my wife to tell her the story, driving out of the parking lot. A cop pulls me over. No talking on the cell phone while driving. I say, but my mother is in the hospital. She fell down the stairs carrying a glass of water which broke and cut her leg, which wasn't so bad, but she got a staff infection in the emergency room, and we still don't know how that is going. I just picked up the call without thinking and I'm sorry. Cop said, I hope your mom gets better and remember not to talk while driving.
I park on the main street and go to the bank. I ask someone in line if they have put in that new feed the meter on Saturday rule and she says she thinks so. Damn, I didn't put a quarter in. I deposit my check and run back out on the street as the lechera is about to write me a ticket. But the new Saturday rule, I didn't know... Please...
I got off.
Now I'm feeling real good. As long as I get my story straight, seems like I can get away with anything. If I was walking in the wood and I fell in an ancient well, middle of January, water up to my neck and rising, sheer walls on either side, no way to climb, no one to call for help, I wouldn't worry... I would talk my way out.
Then I bought a bag of dog food. I forgot all about my recent hernia surgery and that no heavy lifting bullshit and, well, I couldn't really talk my way out, that hurt like a ... it just hurt. No need for profanity.
I looking to get myself in a few more pickles over the next few weeks to keep my talk story skills up.
Poll
best ways to talk yourself out of a jam
officer, i stayed the course-- that's the kind of guy I am. The tree should have known that and gotten out of the way.
2% 1 votes
it's not a broken headlight, it's a damaged but steadily improving headlight
8% 3 votes
niether you nor the media is considering all the good things I did prior to speeding at 85 mph in front of a school at 3pm
5% 2 votes
the guy who was driving this car before me also thought the speed limit was 65 mph
2% 1 votes
i have a passenger in the front seat and one in the back. they advise me about where to go. i am the decider. one said to turn left. the other said to turn right. while I was getting ready to decide, this tree popped up out of nowhere and smashed into me
5% 2 votes
i had to run into oncoming traffic and cause the crash: just think what would have happened if I had let that guy drive past me and he had turned about and shot someone?
8% 3 votes
i had to rear-end the vehicle. he may have had something to do with 9/11.
2% 1 votes
i'm sure the other guy was drinking. oh, he passed the field sobriety. give him a breathilizer. oh, he passed. but he wanted to drink and drive- I crashed into him preemptively
11% 4 votes
i warned the pedestrian to get out of the way. i shouted out the window to move it. i honked the horn. he remained in the crosswalk, so I ran him over and killed him. it was his choice.
2% 1 votes
of course i see that big red sign that says stop. but i had classified intelligence that said go.
8% 3 votes
at the time of the accident, no one, other that the few million people of the sidewalk waiting for the bus, knew what would happen if you drove at 85 miles an hour has a school at 3pm. now we know and it's easy to play monday morning quarterback.
5% 2 votes
what kind of car did I hit? a toyota shiite? a dodge sunni? what's the difference?
2% 1 votes
i know that two out of three passengers are dead, but look, the rest of the car is basically intact and runs well. i would call that a success.
0% 0 votes
the brakes don't work and it has no wheels, but other than that it is a terrific car
5% 2 votes
i have a rear-view mirror and a windshield window above the dashboard but I don't look in it. i have access to other, more powerful sources of information
23% 8 votes
But this reservation is for a woman, Melanie, and a child... No, I say, the reservation is wrong: Melanie is paying for the ticket but I am the passenger. I give him my picture ID, get the ticket with my name and my sister makes the train, since no one checks the names at the track in all that commotion over there. Great security.
Proud, I call my wife to tell her the story, driving out of the parking lot. A cop pulls me over. No talking on the cell phone while driving. I say, but my mother is in the hospital. She fell down the stairs carrying a glass of water which broke and cut her leg, which wasn't so bad, but she got a staff infection in the emergency room, and we still don't know how that is going. I just picked up the call without thinking and I'm sorry. Cop said, I hope your mom gets better and remember not to talk while driving.
I park on the main street and go to the bank. I ask someone in line if they have put in that new feed the meter on Saturday rule and she says she thinks so. Damn, I didn't put a quarter in. I deposit my check and run back out on the street as the lechera is about to write me a ticket. But the new Saturday rule, I didn't know... Please...
I got off.
Now I'm feeling real good. As long as I get my story straight, seems like I can get away with anything. If I was walking in the wood and I fell in an ancient well, middle of January, water up to my neck and rising, sheer walls on either side, no way to climb, no one to call for help, I wouldn't worry... I would talk my way out.
Then I bought a bag of dog food. I forgot all about my recent hernia surgery and that no heavy lifting bullshit and, well, I couldn't really talk my way out, that hurt like a ... it just hurt. No need for profanity.
I looking to get myself in a few more pickles over the next few weeks to keep my talk story skills up.
Poll
best ways to talk yourself out of a jam
officer, i stayed the course-- that's the kind of guy I am. The tree should have known that and gotten out of the way.
2% 1 votes
it's not a broken headlight, it's a damaged but steadily improving headlight
8% 3 votes
niether you nor the media is considering all the good things I did prior to speeding at 85 mph in front of a school at 3pm
5% 2 votes
the guy who was driving this car before me also thought the speed limit was 65 mph
2% 1 votes
i have a passenger in the front seat and one in the back. they advise me about where to go. i am the decider. one said to turn left. the other said to turn right. while I was getting ready to decide, this tree popped up out of nowhere and smashed into me
5% 2 votes
i had to run into oncoming traffic and cause the crash: just think what would have happened if I had let that guy drive past me and he had turned about and shot someone?
8% 3 votes
i had to rear-end the vehicle. he may have had something to do with 9/11.
2% 1 votes
i'm sure the other guy was drinking. oh, he passed the field sobriety. give him a breathilizer. oh, he passed. but he wanted to drink and drive- I crashed into him preemptively
11% 4 votes
i warned the pedestrian to get out of the way. i shouted out the window to move it. i honked the horn. he remained in the crosswalk, so I ran him over and killed him. it was his choice.
2% 1 votes
of course i see that big red sign that says stop. but i had classified intelligence that said go.
8% 3 votes
at the time of the accident, no one, other that the few million people of the sidewalk waiting for the bus, knew what would happen if you drove at 85 miles an hour has a school at 3pm. now we know and it's easy to play monday morning quarterback.
5% 2 votes
what kind of car did I hit? a toyota shiite? a dodge sunni? what's the difference?
2% 1 votes
i know that two out of three passengers are dead, but look, the rest of the car is basically intact and runs well. i would call that a success.
0% 0 votes
the brakes don't work and it has no wheels, but other than that it is a terrific car
5% 2 votes
i have a rear-view mirror and a windshield window above the dashboard but I don't look in it. i have access to other, more powerful sources of information
23% 8 votes
Sunday, May 6, 2007
don't mind me, I'm just eating a newspaper, lying on the sidewalk
I was lying on the sidewalk, stuffing pieces of newspaper into my mouth. My car was running, with the door open, somewhere in New Jersey. I had goddamn NPR on and had to sit there on the sidewalk and listen to Morning Eidtion all the way through twice. I should have shut the door.
The owner of the house next to the sidewalk came out and said, "I'm not comfortable with you doing this here."
I said, "I'm not comfortable with me doing this here either." I mean, it wasn't a bit comfortable. I had to explain.
willep's diary :: ::
The dog had jumped out of the car and ran away, not my dog, last night... I followed him all night, little bugger. I enlisted a group of high teenagers to help me at around 11 pm. They gave it their damnest best, until the muchies kicked in.
He slipped out at 9 pm. I had a sighting around midnight, one of my boys. He slipped away again.
I found a copy shop, then I put up fliers all over the nieghborhood. I tracked him at about 5 am and circled the block where he was when a cop called, he had seen the dog about 4 blocks away. He was moving around a very modern house that looked like it should be nestled over a ridge in Montana, not stuffed into a cul de sac in New Jersey. I knocked on the door because he seemed to be in the back yard, hoping they could open the door and invite him in. No one seemed to be home.
What was that town called? Somewhere, northern New Jersey, some place where they hate nature: every garden was so over-manicured and over-treated with over-the-counter poisons applied by over-the-border applicators (resident commute out starting about 7 and landscapers commute in about 7:30) that not one native or unauthorized plant lived in the whole town.
Anyway the cop called about 6:30. Traffic was building up, so I was getting desperate to catch little Ricky. At night, I hadn't seen but about 2 cars, so far he was safe enough.
He was about four blocks away, the cop said, saying the name of some street, which I couldn't fine. When I got there and saw him sitting on the stoop of someone's house, I leaped out of the car, didn't even close the door, then stopped at the sidewalk. I could get any closer: he would dart away.
The cop, on duty, pointed out that he had called. I said thank you. He noted that my sign said something about a reward. I said sure (you should be ashamed of yourself) but that reward was not for information leading to the sighting of the dog (he wasn't much to look at). To get the reward, you have to catch him, then you can name your price. He grumbled and took off.
The dog was moving away, looking nervious. I had no treats but there was this newspaper on the sidewalk -- a freebie cirricular really, full of ads -- so I ripped it up and put pieces of it in my mouth so he would think I had something to eat.
If I lay down on the sidewalk, not moving in any particular direction, just lying there, eating newspaper, He seemed to relax a little. He sat down and watched me.
Then he darted around the house. I ran around the house with him a few times and he seemed intent on staying in and around this house. These people turned out to be the only people in the neighborhood who didn't like dogs, so he must have known what he was doing.
There was a woman upstairs. She was too scared to come down so she called her husband, who came back from whereever he was. I explained. I pointed the dog out to him: there is the dog. He is scared. If you open the door, he might walk right in. He wouldn't.
See: dog. There. Dog. See him? Right there. A dog. Me? I want to catch him. He's right there on your stoop.
Now, I hadn't slept in 24 hours and I'm sure I didn't make a great impression down there on the sidewalk, but there was the evidence that I wasn't making this story up: the dude could see the dog, sitting on his damn stoop. PLEASE! If you just open the door... No.
He's not comfortable. Like I'm comfortable? Scarred little rabbit. Called the cops. Good.
It was a different cop, not looking for a buck. He talked the people into letting him come in the house, he opened the door, I ran up and caught the dog who promptly bit me on the neck. That was about 11 am -- more than 24 hours after he first slipped passed me.
Well, that was the last time I went to New Jersey. One time I got on the George Washington Bridge by mistake and I was heading over there, thinking, what the hell, I can go to IKEA and buy some cheap gas, when I remembered what it's like over there and I dove off the side and landed on my man's harbor ferry and we went for a toot around the port of New York looking for security weakness, praying towards Mecca under every bridge to see if anyone would notice, then I jumped on a whale and headed up the Hudson. In January. That was cold!!!
So why did I have this dog that wasn't mine and didn't listen to me? I found him somewhere in Brooklyn.
Poll
best way to catch a freaked out dog
eat newspaper
try some meat
lotus position -- they don't find that threatening
enlist high suburban teenagers with nothing better to do as helpers
roll on the ground
pray to the dog god
play some ring tone on your cell phone really loud
a net
dart gun
get the competent cop to come, not the one trying to make a buck on the side
meow and pretend to be a cat
corner him and leap
The owner of the house next to the sidewalk came out and said, "I'm not comfortable with you doing this here."
I said, "I'm not comfortable with me doing this here either." I mean, it wasn't a bit comfortable. I had to explain.
willep's diary :: ::
The dog had jumped out of the car and ran away, not my dog, last night... I followed him all night, little bugger. I enlisted a group of high teenagers to help me at around 11 pm. They gave it their damnest best, until the muchies kicked in.
He slipped out at 9 pm. I had a sighting around midnight, one of my boys. He slipped away again.
I found a copy shop, then I put up fliers all over the nieghborhood. I tracked him at about 5 am and circled the block where he was when a cop called, he had seen the dog about 4 blocks away. He was moving around a very modern house that looked like it should be nestled over a ridge in Montana, not stuffed into a cul de sac in New Jersey. I knocked on the door because he seemed to be in the back yard, hoping they could open the door and invite him in. No one seemed to be home.
What was that town called? Somewhere, northern New Jersey, some place where they hate nature: every garden was so over-manicured and over-treated with over-the-counter poisons applied by over-the-border applicators (resident commute out starting about 7 and landscapers commute in about 7:30) that not one native or unauthorized plant lived in the whole town.
Anyway the cop called about 6:30. Traffic was building up, so I was getting desperate to catch little Ricky. At night, I hadn't seen but about 2 cars, so far he was safe enough.
He was about four blocks away, the cop said, saying the name of some street, which I couldn't fine. When I got there and saw him sitting on the stoop of someone's house, I leaped out of the car, didn't even close the door, then stopped at the sidewalk. I could get any closer: he would dart away.
The cop, on duty, pointed out that he had called. I said thank you. He noted that my sign said something about a reward. I said sure (you should be ashamed of yourself) but that reward was not for information leading to the sighting of the dog (he wasn't much to look at). To get the reward, you have to catch him, then you can name your price. He grumbled and took off.
The dog was moving away, looking nervious. I had no treats but there was this newspaper on the sidewalk -- a freebie cirricular really, full of ads -- so I ripped it up and put pieces of it in my mouth so he would think I had something to eat.
If I lay down on the sidewalk, not moving in any particular direction, just lying there, eating newspaper, He seemed to relax a little. He sat down and watched me.
Then he darted around the house. I ran around the house with him a few times and he seemed intent on staying in and around this house. These people turned out to be the only people in the neighborhood who didn't like dogs, so he must have known what he was doing.
There was a woman upstairs. She was too scared to come down so she called her husband, who came back from whereever he was. I explained. I pointed the dog out to him: there is the dog. He is scared. If you open the door, he might walk right in. He wouldn't.
See: dog. There. Dog. See him? Right there. A dog. Me? I want to catch him. He's right there on your stoop.
Now, I hadn't slept in 24 hours and I'm sure I didn't make a great impression down there on the sidewalk, but there was the evidence that I wasn't making this story up: the dude could see the dog, sitting on his damn stoop. PLEASE! If you just open the door... No.
He's not comfortable. Like I'm comfortable? Scarred little rabbit. Called the cops. Good.
It was a different cop, not looking for a buck. He talked the people into letting him come in the house, he opened the door, I ran up and caught the dog who promptly bit me on the neck. That was about 11 am -- more than 24 hours after he first slipped passed me.
Well, that was the last time I went to New Jersey. One time I got on the George Washington Bridge by mistake and I was heading over there, thinking, what the hell, I can go to IKEA and buy some cheap gas, when I remembered what it's like over there and I dove off the side and landed on my man's harbor ferry and we went for a toot around the port of New York looking for security weakness, praying towards Mecca under every bridge to see if anyone would notice, then I jumped on a whale and headed up the Hudson. In January. That was cold!!!
So why did I have this dog that wasn't mine and didn't listen to me? I found him somewhere in Brooklyn.
Poll
best way to catch a freaked out dog
eat newspaper
try some meat
lotus position -- they don't find that threatening
enlist high suburban teenagers with nothing better to do as helpers
roll on the ground
pray to the dog god
play some ring tone on your cell phone really loud
a net
dart gun
get the competent cop to come, not the one trying to make a buck on the side
meow and pretend to be a cat
corner him and leap
Tuesday, May 1, 2007
you're a psychopath. sorry, a sycophant. no styrofoam, my bad.
Late at night, an older lady stepped on the train. I would have given my seat, but with only two people in the car, nothing but space... Even with all that room, she sat down next to the guy across from me. Sat down, then slid over and bumped him. He looked up out of his book, scanned the train, thinking about what he is supposed to do, turned to her and said: "The word is excuse me."
"No, the word is not excuse me" she said, "the word is f--k you."
At this point, I interrupted. "That's two words."
"What's two words?" she said.
"Acutally, both ' excuse me' and 'f--k you' are two word phrases."
"F--k you," they said in unison.
-----
"Welcome to Gusano's. Would you like to hear the specials?"
Yes, I do want the special. How did you know that? You must by a psychopath. No, a sycophant."
"Pardon?"
No, not a sycophant, that's a highfaluting ass-kisser. No, you're a misogynist.
"I'm a what?"
No, of course you don't hate women. You are a woman, not that you couldn't be self-hating. I mean, after all, my grandfather was Jewish and anti-semetic. I didn't mean that. I meant, clairvoyant. That's it. Clairvoyant: you can read minds and see the future.
"I haven't even told you what the special is."
Oh, okay, then, go ahead.
"Today we are serving Alaskan wild salmon on a bed of..."
Yes, fish on a bed. Exactly. See you are amorphous. No, that's ethereal, cloud-like. I meant, you know, are lackadaisical, Albequerque, Algonquin. So tell me, what am I going to have for dessert?
"After your main course, I would be happy to come back with the dessert menu."
What's on the dessert menu.
"Well, today we're featuring organic, free-range..."
Perfect. I'll have it. I don't know how you knew that. Wait, free-range dessert?
"It's actually a creme de la creme, crema catelana, with fresh seasonal berries."
Oh, pudding, my favorite. But no berries please: whoever shall eat of this fruit shall surely die.
"So far no one has."
Of course not. God lied. They ate the apple and they didn't die. The serpent told the truth. Why is he the villian? He's not evil, he's more like a whistle-blower. He's like that guy with the Pentagon Papers, Ellington, no he was a jazz musician, no Elsyian, no Ms. Butterworth... The serpent is like Duke Elsworth, that's who he's like.
"Actually this table is reserved for two or more patrons. Will anyone be joining you?"
The old lion perishes for lack of prey, and the cubs of the lioness are scattered. In famine he shall redeem you from death.
"I'll take that as a 'no.'"
The lamb shall lay down with the lion. They shall eat straw together and they shall all be lead by a child.
"Straw? No I don't think we have that. Are you sure you wouldn't like this order to go?"
The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their food in the summer; the locusts have no king, yet they all advance in ranks.
"Exactly. Always think ahead. Would it be alright, then, if you paid for this order before I serve you?"
I know your works, your labor, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil.
“Me either, buddy.”
For Lo, I have come to lead the serpent and lion to the straw of my father, like a child, that they should lay together, son of man. You shall lead your people to the promised land, but then you should lay in the straw. Turkey in the straw. Last straw. Straw of the son of man. Saw of the son of man. Daughter of woman. Cousin of executive producer. Lo, for it is written (chapter 2, verse 3), that it will be light. Straw Lite, where they shall lay.
The end.
Poll
better train hustles for panhandlers
don't use that "don't have to be a Rockefeller to help a fella" -- that's old -- try "you don't have to be bill gates to spill plates" or "you don't have to be warren buffet to be warned or stuff it." wait, I take those back. those suck.
listen, my friend, try this instead: go to this African importer on Broadway and 28: they sell shell necklaces bulk for 50 cents. do you sob story and sell them on the train, saying you made them yourself, for a buck
"you don't have to sam walton to give a man your whole wallet"
"you don't have to be steven jobs to have never seen you ass on the job"
i could be out robbing and stealling. instead, i am standing before you, lying my ass off. definitely something you should support with a donation.
i am not begging. this is a public radio fund drive. i'm out here in public and this is my radio.
you'll give a waiter 10 dollars in tip for bringing you your food and I didn't even touch your food>
"you don't have to be dick cheney to pick my annie's pennies out her ... deleted."
"ladies and gentlemen, lend me your ears, I have come here not to bury Cesear, but to rob him."
i won't come before you people and lie. i need your money. i can't say why without lying, but I need it. anything will help. expecially your money.
ladies and gentlemen, you get what you pay for. and what is a man worth? what am I worth, standing before you with my hand out? I have been denied my humanity and I come before your worthless. i am worth nothing. and soon I will be gone, back into the not
"No, the word is not excuse me" she said, "the word is f--k you."
At this point, I interrupted. "That's two words."
"What's two words?" she said.
"Acutally, both ' excuse me' and 'f--k you' are two word phrases."
"F--k you," they said in unison.
-----
"Welcome to Gusano's. Would you like to hear the specials?"
Yes, I do want the special. How did you know that? You must by a psychopath. No, a sycophant."
"Pardon?"
No, not a sycophant, that's a highfaluting ass-kisser. No, you're a misogynist.
"I'm a what?"
No, of course you don't hate women. You are a woman, not that you couldn't be self-hating. I mean, after all, my grandfather was Jewish and anti-semetic. I didn't mean that. I meant, clairvoyant. That's it. Clairvoyant: you can read minds and see the future.
"I haven't even told you what the special is."
Oh, okay, then, go ahead.
"Today we are serving Alaskan wild salmon on a bed of..."
Yes, fish on a bed. Exactly. See you are amorphous. No, that's ethereal, cloud-like. I meant, you know, are lackadaisical, Albequerque, Algonquin. So tell me, what am I going to have for dessert?
"After your main course, I would be happy to come back with the dessert menu."
What's on the dessert menu.
"Well, today we're featuring organic, free-range..."
Perfect. I'll have it. I don't know how you knew that. Wait, free-range dessert?
"It's actually a creme de la creme, crema catelana, with fresh seasonal berries."
Oh, pudding, my favorite. But no berries please: whoever shall eat of this fruit shall surely die.
"So far no one has."
Of course not. God lied. They ate the apple and they didn't die. The serpent told the truth. Why is he the villian? He's not evil, he's more like a whistle-blower. He's like that guy with the Pentagon Papers, Ellington, no he was a jazz musician, no Elsyian, no Ms. Butterworth... The serpent is like Duke Elsworth, that's who he's like.
"Actually this table is reserved for two or more patrons. Will anyone be joining you?"
The old lion perishes for lack of prey, and the cubs of the lioness are scattered. In famine he shall redeem you from death.
"I'll take that as a 'no.'"
The lamb shall lay down with the lion. They shall eat straw together and they shall all be lead by a child.
"Straw? No I don't think we have that. Are you sure you wouldn't like this order to go?"
The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their food in the summer; the locusts have no king, yet they all advance in ranks.
"Exactly. Always think ahead. Would it be alright, then, if you paid for this order before I serve you?"
I know your works, your labor, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil.
“Me either, buddy.”
For Lo, I have come to lead the serpent and lion to the straw of my father, like a child, that they should lay together, son of man. You shall lead your people to the promised land, but then you should lay in the straw. Turkey in the straw. Last straw. Straw of the son of man. Saw of the son of man. Daughter of woman. Cousin of executive producer. Lo, for it is written (chapter 2, verse 3), that it will be light. Straw Lite, where they shall lay.
The end.
Poll
better train hustles for panhandlers
don't use that "don't have to be a Rockefeller to help a fella" -- that's old -- try "you don't have to be bill gates to spill plates" or "you don't have to be warren buffet to be warned or stuff it." wait, I take those back. those suck.
listen, my friend, try this instead: go to this African importer on Broadway and 28: they sell shell necklaces bulk for 50 cents. do you sob story and sell them on the train, saying you made them yourself, for a buck
"you don't have to sam walton to give a man your whole wallet"
"you don't have to be steven jobs to have never seen you ass on the job"
i could be out robbing and stealling. instead, i am standing before you, lying my ass off. definitely something you should support with a donation.
i am not begging. this is a public radio fund drive. i'm out here in public and this is my radio.
you'll give a waiter 10 dollars in tip for bringing you your food and I didn't even touch your food>
"you don't have to be dick cheney to pick my annie's pennies out her ... deleted."
"ladies and gentlemen, lend me your ears, I have come here not to bury Cesear, but to rob him."
i won't come before you people and lie. i need your money. i can't say why without lying, but I need it. anything will help. expecially your money.
ladies and gentlemen, you get what you pay for. and what is a man worth? what am I worth, standing before you with my hand out? I have been denied my humanity and I come before your worthless. i am worth nothing. and soon I will be gone, back into the not
Saturday, April 28, 2007
an auto-fixating cow driving a bathtub... indeed
I would like a bathtub with wheels and a motor so after I take a bath I can drive it out in the garden and water the flower.
I would like a cell phone with crank charger, so I can just wind it up whenever the battery is low, like a forever flashlight. Why doesn't Toyota want you to plug the Prius in?
"Thank you for coming to the third anual human sexuality conference." Let's begin.
“The variety of sexual experiences possible in the human animal is enormous. For example, some 200 people a year die from auto-affixation during orgasm, in an attempt to mix the climatic experience with the sensation of suffocation. This is but one of an infinite variety of sexual experience. Imprinting or other process leads to sexual fixation and a gender aim is not inherent in sexuality. There is a latent capacity of any individual to a plethora of stimuli.”
200 people a year do not die from auto-fixation.
"They do."
They don't.
"I would know. Can I continue now?
Please.
"Thank you. Our first example, who we will call John,” Santa was saying, “It seems, dreams of having his buttocks removed by a Lesbian friend of his.”
What does that have to do with auto-fixation?
"Please, let me finish. The possible objects of sexual fixations include people, feet, shoes, sheep, goats, cows…” and at this precise moment, as he went to try to turn the page again, he was forced to pause as he could not separate sheets, “…of any age or gender,” he continued.
A cow of any gender is a bull.
“The cow, and we do see only domestic animals in the literature, is prominent in that in the example of sexual activity or the fantasy of sexual contact on the part…”
No tigers?
“The example of sexual activity or the fantasy of sexual contact on the part... of the cow.”
Naughty, naughty cow, or of any gender is a bull.
"How about a bathtub on wheels, so after you take a bath, you can roll it out in the garden, and let the water out in a flower bed? And it'll need a motor. And a steering wheel."
That was a way-wacky non-sequitur.
"It wasn't."
No, not unless there was a cow in the bathtub auto-fixating.
"What bathtub?"
I was on Mulberry Street and I saw a auto-fixing cow of any gender driving a bathtub.
"No you didn't."
Can I continue?
"Please."
Why no tiger? Just because it's not domesticated? I bet there is someone with a Tiger fetish.
"The ones with tiger fetishes were eliminated by natural selection."
And the ones with auto-fixation fetishes seems to keep on trucking?
"No one auto-fixates. It's an urban myth."
Started by you.
"Nevertheless, it's a myth."
Poll
what would be the coolest:
a cell phone you can wind up to charge
a bathtup with an engine and a steering wheel
a machine like the beeper on a portable phone so everything in the house beeps when you can't find it. You say "keys" and your keys beep
a phone that you can carry around with you whereever you go. wait, we have that already.
a big old 1984 pick up truck with a lot of rush and no functioning turn signal
a great big dairy farm right in the middle of manhattan
a computer monitor in your car that know when you're getting sleepy and has the voice of your mother and dead grandmother in it and says something wacky before you cruise control into a tree
a tree with a button on it, you push it and it turns into fire wood
a man with a button on him, you push it and he shuts up
a house with a button on it, you push it and your property taxes are paid
a button with a button on it, you push it and it turns off and on at the same time
I would like a cell phone with crank charger, so I can just wind it up whenever the battery is low, like a forever flashlight. Why doesn't Toyota want you to plug the Prius in?
"Thank you for coming to the third anual human sexuality conference." Let's begin.
“The variety of sexual experiences possible in the human animal is enormous. For example, some 200 people a year die from auto-affixation during orgasm, in an attempt to mix the climatic experience with the sensation of suffocation. This is but one of an infinite variety of sexual experience. Imprinting or other process leads to sexual fixation and a gender aim is not inherent in sexuality. There is a latent capacity of any individual to a plethora of stimuli.”
200 people a year do not die from auto-fixation.
"They do."
They don't.
"I would know. Can I continue now?
Please.
"Thank you. Our first example, who we will call John,” Santa was saying, “It seems, dreams of having his buttocks removed by a Lesbian friend of his.”
What does that have to do with auto-fixation?
"Please, let me finish. The possible objects of sexual fixations include people, feet, shoes, sheep, goats, cows…” and at this precise moment, as he went to try to turn the page again, he was forced to pause as he could not separate sheets, “…of any age or gender,” he continued.
A cow of any gender is a bull.
“The cow, and we do see only domestic animals in the literature, is prominent in that in the example of sexual activity or the fantasy of sexual contact on the part…”
No tigers?
“The example of sexual activity or the fantasy of sexual contact on the part... of the cow.”
Naughty, naughty cow, or of any gender is a bull.
"How about a bathtub on wheels, so after you take a bath, you can roll it out in the garden, and let the water out in a flower bed? And it'll need a motor. And a steering wheel."
That was a way-wacky non-sequitur.
"It wasn't."
No, not unless there was a cow in the bathtub auto-fixating.
"What bathtub?"
I was on Mulberry Street and I saw a auto-fixing cow of any gender driving a bathtub.
"No you didn't."
Can I continue?
"Please."
Why no tiger? Just because it's not domesticated? I bet there is someone with a Tiger fetish.
"The ones with tiger fetishes were eliminated by natural selection."
And the ones with auto-fixation fetishes seems to keep on trucking?
"No one auto-fixates. It's an urban myth."
Started by you.
"Nevertheless, it's a myth."
Poll
what would be the coolest:
a cell phone you can wind up to charge
a bathtup with an engine and a steering wheel
a machine like the beeper on a portable phone so everything in the house beeps when you can't find it. You say "keys" and your keys beep
a phone that you can carry around with you whereever you go. wait, we have that already.
a big old 1984 pick up truck with a lot of rush and no functioning turn signal
a great big dairy farm right in the middle of manhattan
a computer monitor in your car that know when you're getting sleepy and has the voice of your mother and dead grandmother in it and says something wacky before you cruise control into a tree
a tree with a button on it, you push it and it turns into fire wood
a man with a button on him, you push it and he shuts up
a house with a button on it, you push it and your property taxes are paid
a button with a button on it, you push it and it turns off and on at the same time
MAN SQUISHED UNDER BARN ON HIS BIRTHDAY: PARK AVE JACK RUSSELL MIRACULOUSLY SURVIVES
When my mother called me on my birthday, I said, "You will never guess where I am right now."
"Okay, then I won't try. Where are you?"
"I'm in the crawl space under the barn trying to get a multi-millionaire Park Avenue Jack Russell to quit eating rats and digging holes. Little bastard is going to undermine the structural foundation of this thing if she keeps it up."
"You're right. I never would have guessed that."
Why was a Park Avenue Jack Russell -- delivered by Limousine, chauffeur with, yes, patten leather shoes with little bangly things on them -- eating rats in the crawl space of my barn on my 40th birthday? Why rats under the barn? Why a Jack Russell? Why from Park Avenue? Why on my birthday? Why You'll have to keep reading to find out.
willep's diary :: ::
But before you find out why this Park Avenue Jack Russell was eating rats under my barn-- and there is a very good explanation, I'm sure -- let me describe the chauffeur that brought her and her little Jack Russell boyfriend to the house. His accent was thick and he was difficult to communicate with by phone. His cell phone had a Long Island area code. His car was a Mercedes. His suit was green. His shoes, well, his shoes were spectacular.
Driving around on these upstate roads, seems like with no GPS, wasn't working for him. Sounds like a nice gig in theory, but I think he was loosing it. He called to get directions, but since he didn't really speak English that well and had no idea where he was, it was kind of hard to send him the right way, which was frustrating him. I wasn't all that enthusiastic about the process myself. Like all those calls, that wasn't so great. And, being winter in the country, there weren't a lot of people to ask for directions. Finally, he did get someone on the phone and he put her on the phone. That was a step forward.
And he's afraid of dogs. Clearly, he hated dogs.
I think he had a bad day. I don't think it was his 40th birthday, but, still, if you are a city boy, and can't read a map and hate dogs, well, you better hope you're boss doesn't send you upstate with a couple of snappy, snarly Jack Russells. I was hoping I could get him to step in some manure on his shoes just to see the look on his face. That's a little mean, but hell, it was my birthday and I could use some entertainment. Would you like to take a look in the barn before you go? He didn't.
You see a lot of Jack Russells in and around Amish farms. I mean, Amish cats have Jack Russells, I mean no, the cat doesn't have anything to do with the Jack Russell most likely, they don't seem to take a real clear shine to cats. "Amish cats" -- that's a phrase. Or "Amish dudes" -- like, you not going to believe this, but I walked in the place and it was full of these Amish dudes smoking weed. Some Hasidic cats were rolling dice... It was jumping.
Anyway, I thought maybe the Amish-Jack Russell thing had something to do with horses. Like maybe, a little speedy Jack Russell running around the place helps the horse get used to little critters jumping out and the horse settles down, not so skittery, so they don't panic when a pheasant jumps out of a bush or something.
I know this is kind of a cocky-mammy theory (Jack Russell-horse psychology-phesant-Amish horse training procedures. But even relativity sounds idiotic -- flying at the near speed of light and come back in the next millennium and as some kind of moronic Neanderthal. My theory isn't as cooky as that. That's light speed stuff, got to be bull. That was Einstein's real genius: he was bullshitting.
But my theory is even more wrong. Amish have Jack Russells because Jacks like to eat rats and mice. They can be better than cats. Cats get lazy, killed 3 mice, that's enough for now. Cat will sit there and let a mouse eat it's food if it's not in the hunting mood. Some cats anyway.
Oh, I know, the barn, the crawl space, the foundation, Park Avenue... I will explain... But wait: I also thought that if you had mice, you didn't have rats and vice versa, that they don't coexist in the same structure. I think I might have been wrong about that one too. I've seem both in the barn -- never a live mouse actually. But for where they were, I don't think the cat could have killed it outside and dragged it in...
I've got one cat who eats the heads and leaves the tails and one that eats the tails and leaves the heads but neither will eat the head or the tail of the other's mouse. It's almost like a union contract.
One time I cut a worm in two to show my son that both sides can live, cut a worm and you get two. He said that if you cut a mouse in two, you also get two mouses, Daddy. I said, no, that won't work. He insisted it did work.
I said, you're only four and you have no idea what you're talking about. It ain't no cut a mouse in two and get two mice. And it's "mice" not "mouses."
Many months later, winter now, Ollie (who never forgets any goddamn stupid conversation) gathered up a couple of mouse parts -- heads and tails -- and cobbled together two whole mice on the floor of the barn -- very dead mice, frozen rock hard and they didn't really have four legs each but they more or less looked like mice.
"Look daddy, two mice. See, I told you if you cut a mouse in two, you get two mice."
Now, his cobbled mice were composed of up to three or four half-eaten corpses each, but I saw his point, some four months later. Still, I said:
"Yes, but the worms, the two halves of the worms, were still alive when I cut the worm in two last summer. These mice are dead."
"They're dead, but there are two of them, just like I said. I didn't say they would be alive if you cut the mouse in half. If you cut a mouse in half, you get two mouses. Two, dead mouses."
Anyway, as you see I have some pretty good cats working for me but I still have critters in the barn. I would say the rat/mouse problem is under control but I also had a rat in the dog treat bucket when I reached in there one time. Don't worry -- I was wearing leather gloves. I threw one cat in the can and she just jumped out. So I threw the other one it, letting her see the rat first, and she ate the whole thing, except the tail, as per previous agreement, see contract for details.
Then the first one was looking at me, meowing, like where's breakfast, and I'm like, you missed your chance-- better luck tomorrow. Ain't no one sharing their catch today. Except the tail, which you can't eat by union rules.
Alright, so the Jack Russell was gone. One was still there, the other one just disappeared when I went on my lovely birthday pony ride. My fat, fjord did great, listening like an angel, we had a great, cold ride to the neighbors, man, was my birthday nice.
Until the millionaire Jack Russell disappeared. I looked all over. Check the yard. Checked all the rooms in the barn. No hole in the fence. No prints in the snow. The other one seemed fine, quite friendly, and neither of them seemed like the types to just run away.
Had to be under the barn. There is a hole in the foundation where a couple of stones are missing, on the east side. I looked in there, "Come little one, Come here." Nothing.
I opened the hatch, got a spot light and extension chord, some hot dogs, and crawled under the barn. There is another stone wall under there -- the barn has an extension in the back and the original foundation stones are there where the original barn ended. There was a small hole in that wall too.
I crawled though the dust to the hole, shined the spot in. There was the Jack Russell, with a bloody face, digging a hole where, it seems, some rats formerly had their nest.
When the millionaire sent the chauffeur to bring the Jack Russells to the farm, I guess they he or she thought that it would be a nice break for the dogs, some outside time, to socialize with other dogs. (I run a dog boarding facility, a dog camp in the country, for New York City dogs (http://glencadia.com).
He or she was right. That dog was having the time of it's life. Until that Jack Russell come to my farm, it wasn't really alive. She didn't know what she was put on this earth for. She had extentensial Angst Then she got hold of a rat. A light went on in her head.
"This is the meaning of life!"
For a Park Avenue Jack Russell, biting into a helpless baby rat under an old barn is like Paul on the road to Damascus: the light, the vision, the truth. All in the dark crawl space.
Now, I'm not saying there are no rats in Park Avenue apartments, but I'm not guessing there are too many either. Seemed like she was having an out-of-body experience. Do you think she would voluntarily crawl back through the hole after that? Why would she, because it was my birthday?
Now, if I say, crawl space, dust, 40th birthday, rat nest, hole, dark, winter, mother calling on cell phone-- it doesn't sound that good. Now re-read that list of things and imagine you are a Jack Russell. All of a sudden, it's paradise.
Well, almost paradise. It was close to paradise until I showed up with the spot light. Now little Jacky had everything: rats, holes, dirt, a small confined space AND light. Wait, one more thing was missing to make this experience completely perfect: hot dogs. Just so happened, I had some with me.
She was having so much fun in her rat nest and digging her holes under the foundation of my barn, there was no way she was going to come just because I said, "Come!" in my sweetest, high-pitched voice. And I brought her little friend under there with me, who seemed to want to join in the rat-feast (I held onto the leash, don't worry) but did not seem to have any sway over the other one running around on the other side of the stone wall.
So I threw her a piece of hot dog. She didn't see it. The second piece I broke off, she saw and ate, then she took a little interest in me. She came over to look into the hole. Well, that something. I held out the hot dog. She wasn't going for it, so close to the hole. She didn't take. I extended my hand a little bit. Now she could grab it and run off. Me, limited mobility in that little cramped crawl space: I was completely incapacitated.
So now it was perfect: holes, rats, light, hot dogs, cramped crawl space. Wait no, not quite perfect. That little hole Jacky started over by the corner of the foundation of the older and newer parts of the barn, that hole was still a little too small. If only that hole was big enough to undermine the structural stability of the barn, then this experience would be completely perfect.
So Jacky was busy digging away. I could shine the spot on her, so she could work more efficiently, but I couldn't really stop her. So I was thinking: how ironic it would be that this ancient barn, so solid and straight after 150 years, built with nothing but wood on a pile of stones, what incredible craftsmanship, that must have withstood 2000 thunderstorms, 3000 wind storms, 1000 heavy snow falls, ice, hail, the dust bowl (okay, that was out west and not in upstate New York but I still think my barn withstood it in a kind of symbolic way), the great depression, the Spanish-American war, the San Francisco earthquake of 1906, the tsunami, hurricane Katrina, mount St. Helen's volcano, the arrival of electricity, the advent of the internal combustion engine, nuclear power, the UN charter, the Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua, global warming, hanging chads, the cold war, red tide, Fox news, DOS, Microsoft windows, the edsel, Halliburton, Enron -- enduring all this over three centuries -- just to be finally laid low in the 21st century by a Park Avenue Jack Russell digging a hole in the worst possible spot.
I know it doesn't seem likely, but when you are lying under a massive, 100 ft tall post and beam barn on your birthday the remote possibility of this little dog digging a big enough hole to bring the whole thing crashing down on you is theoretically unlikely but definitely still worth considering. No likely, not impossible.
How's this headline: "MAN SQUISHED UNDER HUGE HAY BARN ON HIS BIRTHDAY: JACK RUSSELL MIRACULOUSLY SURVIVES AND RETURNS TO PARK AVENUE BY LIMO." What a legacy to leave to posterity.
(Or he would return to Park Avenue as soon as the driver finds the place. "I'm somewhere with an animal hospital on the left and a dairy farm on the right, at the top of a hill, and there is a billboard with nothing on it at the bottom." Oh, I know where that is...)
Luckily, I still had one hot dog. She wasn't going to steal it from me this time. I would yet survive.
Yes, I got her. No, she didn't bring the barn down. And I guess I could have left her there, except I really didn't like where she was digging. The two of them are curled up together by the fire right now, dreaming of rats.
Well, this was a happy birthday for me. I didn't get squished. I didn't loose a dog. The horse didn't throw me for a change. Mazel tov!
"Okay, then I won't try. Where are you?"
"I'm in the crawl space under the barn trying to get a multi-millionaire Park Avenue Jack Russell to quit eating rats and digging holes. Little bastard is going to undermine the structural foundation of this thing if she keeps it up."
"You're right. I never would have guessed that."
Why was a Park Avenue Jack Russell -- delivered by Limousine, chauffeur with, yes, patten leather shoes with little bangly things on them -- eating rats in the crawl space of my barn on my 40th birthday? Why rats under the barn? Why a Jack Russell? Why from Park Avenue? Why on my birthday? Why You'll have to keep reading to find out.
willep's diary :: ::
But before you find out why this Park Avenue Jack Russell was eating rats under my barn-- and there is a very good explanation, I'm sure -- let me describe the chauffeur that brought her and her little Jack Russell boyfriend to the house. His accent was thick and he was difficult to communicate with by phone. His cell phone had a Long Island area code. His car was a Mercedes. His suit was green. His shoes, well, his shoes were spectacular.
Driving around on these upstate roads, seems like with no GPS, wasn't working for him. Sounds like a nice gig in theory, but I think he was loosing it. He called to get directions, but since he didn't really speak English that well and had no idea where he was, it was kind of hard to send him the right way, which was frustrating him. I wasn't all that enthusiastic about the process myself. Like all those calls, that wasn't so great. And, being winter in the country, there weren't a lot of people to ask for directions. Finally, he did get someone on the phone and he put her on the phone. That was a step forward.
And he's afraid of dogs. Clearly, he hated dogs.
I think he had a bad day. I don't think it was his 40th birthday, but, still, if you are a city boy, and can't read a map and hate dogs, well, you better hope you're boss doesn't send you upstate with a couple of snappy, snarly Jack Russells. I was hoping I could get him to step in some manure on his shoes just to see the look on his face. That's a little mean, but hell, it was my birthday and I could use some entertainment. Would you like to take a look in the barn before you go? He didn't.
You see a lot of Jack Russells in and around Amish farms. I mean, Amish cats have Jack Russells, I mean no, the cat doesn't have anything to do with the Jack Russell most likely, they don't seem to take a real clear shine to cats. "Amish cats" -- that's a phrase. Or "Amish dudes" -- like, you not going to believe this, but I walked in the place and it was full of these Amish dudes smoking weed. Some Hasidic cats were rolling dice... It was jumping.
Anyway, I thought maybe the Amish-Jack Russell thing had something to do with horses. Like maybe, a little speedy Jack Russell running around the place helps the horse get used to little critters jumping out and the horse settles down, not so skittery, so they don't panic when a pheasant jumps out of a bush or something.
I know this is kind of a cocky-mammy theory (Jack Russell-horse psychology-phesant-Amish horse training procedures. But even relativity sounds idiotic -- flying at the near speed of light and come back in the next millennium and as some kind of moronic Neanderthal. My theory isn't as cooky as that. That's light speed stuff, got to be bull. That was Einstein's real genius: he was bullshitting.
But my theory is even more wrong. Amish have Jack Russells because Jacks like to eat rats and mice. They can be better than cats. Cats get lazy, killed 3 mice, that's enough for now. Cat will sit there and let a mouse eat it's food if it's not in the hunting mood. Some cats anyway.
Oh, I know, the barn, the crawl space, the foundation, Park Avenue... I will explain... But wait: I also thought that if you had mice, you didn't have rats and vice versa, that they don't coexist in the same structure. I think I might have been wrong about that one too. I've seem both in the barn -- never a live mouse actually. But for where they were, I don't think the cat could have killed it outside and dragged it in...
I've got one cat who eats the heads and leaves the tails and one that eats the tails and leaves the heads but neither will eat the head or the tail of the other's mouse. It's almost like a union contract.
One time I cut a worm in two to show my son that both sides can live, cut a worm and you get two. He said that if you cut a mouse in two, you also get two mouses, Daddy. I said, no, that won't work. He insisted it did work.
I said, you're only four and you have no idea what you're talking about. It ain't no cut a mouse in two and get two mice. And it's "mice" not "mouses."
Many months later, winter now, Ollie (who never forgets any goddamn stupid conversation) gathered up a couple of mouse parts -- heads and tails -- and cobbled together two whole mice on the floor of the barn -- very dead mice, frozen rock hard and they didn't really have four legs each but they more or less looked like mice.
"Look daddy, two mice. See, I told you if you cut a mouse in two, you get two mice."
Now, his cobbled mice were composed of up to three or four half-eaten corpses each, but I saw his point, some four months later. Still, I said:
"Yes, but the worms, the two halves of the worms, were still alive when I cut the worm in two last summer. These mice are dead."
"They're dead, but there are two of them, just like I said. I didn't say they would be alive if you cut the mouse in half. If you cut a mouse in half, you get two mouses. Two, dead mouses."
Anyway, as you see I have some pretty good cats working for me but I still have critters in the barn. I would say the rat/mouse problem is under control but I also had a rat in the dog treat bucket when I reached in there one time. Don't worry -- I was wearing leather gloves. I threw one cat in the can and she just jumped out. So I threw the other one it, letting her see the rat first, and she ate the whole thing, except the tail, as per previous agreement, see contract for details.
Then the first one was looking at me, meowing, like where's breakfast, and I'm like, you missed your chance-- better luck tomorrow. Ain't no one sharing their catch today. Except the tail, which you can't eat by union rules.
Alright, so the Jack Russell was gone. One was still there, the other one just disappeared when I went on my lovely birthday pony ride. My fat, fjord did great, listening like an angel, we had a great, cold ride to the neighbors, man, was my birthday nice.
Until the millionaire Jack Russell disappeared. I looked all over. Check the yard. Checked all the rooms in the barn. No hole in the fence. No prints in the snow. The other one seemed fine, quite friendly, and neither of them seemed like the types to just run away.
Had to be under the barn. There is a hole in the foundation where a couple of stones are missing, on the east side. I looked in there, "Come little one, Come here." Nothing.
I opened the hatch, got a spot light and extension chord, some hot dogs, and crawled under the barn. There is another stone wall under there -- the barn has an extension in the back and the original foundation stones are there where the original barn ended. There was a small hole in that wall too.
I crawled though the dust to the hole, shined the spot in. There was the Jack Russell, with a bloody face, digging a hole where, it seems, some rats formerly had their nest.
When the millionaire sent the chauffeur to bring the Jack Russells to the farm, I guess they he or she thought that it would be a nice break for the dogs, some outside time, to socialize with other dogs. (I run a dog boarding facility, a dog camp in the country, for New York City dogs (http://glencadia.com).
He or she was right. That dog was having the time of it's life. Until that Jack Russell come to my farm, it wasn't really alive. She didn't know what she was put on this earth for. She had extentensial Angst Then she got hold of a rat. A light went on in her head.
"This is the meaning of life!"
For a Park Avenue Jack Russell, biting into a helpless baby rat under an old barn is like Paul on the road to Damascus: the light, the vision, the truth. All in the dark crawl space.
Now, I'm not saying there are no rats in Park Avenue apartments, but I'm not guessing there are too many either. Seemed like she was having an out-of-body experience. Do you think she would voluntarily crawl back through the hole after that? Why would she, because it was my birthday?
Now, if I say, crawl space, dust, 40th birthday, rat nest, hole, dark, winter, mother calling on cell phone-- it doesn't sound that good. Now re-read that list of things and imagine you are a Jack Russell. All of a sudden, it's paradise.
Well, almost paradise. It was close to paradise until I showed up with the spot light. Now little Jacky had everything: rats, holes, dirt, a small confined space AND light. Wait, one more thing was missing to make this experience completely perfect: hot dogs. Just so happened, I had some with me.
She was having so much fun in her rat nest and digging her holes under the foundation of my barn, there was no way she was going to come just because I said, "Come!" in my sweetest, high-pitched voice. And I brought her little friend under there with me, who seemed to want to join in the rat-feast (I held onto the leash, don't worry) but did not seem to have any sway over the other one running around on the other side of the stone wall.
So I threw her a piece of hot dog. She didn't see it. The second piece I broke off, she saw and ate, then she took a little interest in me. She came over to look into the hole. Well, that something. I held out the hot dog. She wasn't going for it, so close to the hole. She didn't take. I extended my hand a little bit. Now she could grab it and run off. Me, limited mobility in that little cramped crawl space: I was completely incapacitated.
So now it was perfect: holes, rats, light, hot dogs, cramped crawl space. Wait no, not quite perfect. That little hole Jacky started over by the corner of the foundation of the older and newer parts of the barn, that hole was still a little too small. If only that hole was big enough to undermine the structural stability of the barn, then this experience would be completely perfect.
So Jacky was busy digging away. I could shine the spot on her, so she could work more efficiently, but I couldn't really stop her. So I was thinking: how ironic it would be that this ancient barn, so solid and straight after 150 years, built with nothing but wood on a pile of stones, what incredible craftsmanship, that must have withstood 2000 thunderstorms, 3000 wind storms, 1000 heavy snow falls, ice, hail, the dust bowl (okay, that was out west and not in upstate New York but I still think my barn withstood it in a kind of symbolic way), the great depression, the Spanish-American war, the San Francisco earthquake of 1906, the tsunami, hurricane Katrina, mount St. Helen's volcano, the arrival of electricity, the advent of the internal combustion engine, nuclear power, the UN charter, the Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua, global warming, hanging chads, the cold war, red tide, Fox news, DOS, Microsoft windows, the edsel, Halliburton, Enron -- enduring all this over three centuries -- just to be finally laid low in the 21st century by a Park Avenue Jack Russell digging a hole in the worst possible spot.
I know it doesn't seem likely, but when you are lying under a massive, 100 ft tall post and beam barn on your birthday the remote possibility of this little dog digging a big enough hole to bring the whole thing crashing down on you is theoretically unlikely but definitely still worth considering. No likely, not impossible.
How's this headline: "MAN SQUISHED UNDER HUGE HAY BARN ON HIS BIRTHDAY: JACK RUSSELL MIRACULOUSLY SURVIVES AND RETURNS TO PARK AVENUE BY LIMO." What a legacy to leave to posterity.
(Or he would return to Park Avenue as soon as the driver finds the place. "I'm somewhere with an animal hospital on the left and a dairy farm on the right, at the top of a hill, and there is a billboard with nothing on it at the bottom." Oh, I know where that is...)
Luckily, I still had one hot dog. She wasn't going to steal it from me this time. I would yet survive.
Yes, I got her. No, she didn't bring the barn down. And I guess I could have left her there, except I really didn't like where she was digging. The two of them are curled up together by the fire right now, dreaming of rats.
Well, this was a happy birthday for me. I didn't get squished. I didn't loose a dog. The horse didn't throw me for a change. Mazel tov!
Sunday, April 22, 2007
what I want for christmas, man, it'll blow me away
Nothing I want is actually possible. At least not yet. Let's start with a way to track everyone's movements by satellite. I need that ASAP.
willep's diary :: ::
ONE:
I want whatever it is inside the portable house phone that beeps when I press "find headset" on the base on everything I own. I want to got to my computer or have a voice operated computer buried in my walls so that when I say "keys" my keys beep, when I say "gloves" my gloves beep. And I want a DNA-reader on the chip attached to all my possessions that will identify the last person to touch that item. So I know who put whatever it is whereever it was.
TWO:
I want an ugly, foul-mouthed robot to follow me around and act like an ass whereever I go so I can look at the faces of the people I meet as they try to figure out what they are supposed to do -- laugh, get mad, run away...
THREE:
I want biologically engineered bacteria that can dig through rock and make tunnels, following a plan, so that I can install high speed trains underground at little cost. Then I will go to each town and tell them what they have to do to get a train station on my secret train line-- you know, save their open space. Then I'll make a tunnel under the Atlantic ocean for shipping and passenger travel and corner the trans-atlantic transport market to reduce air travel and global warming. And another tunnel under the oil fields in the middle east and steal all the oil and hide it in Greenland and use the oil profits to re-tool the economy not to burn oil. And get rich too. And no one will know where I am because I'll be in a tunnel. And I'll dig a big room under the Pacific Ocean, dig a tunnel right up into the prision in Iraq, steal Saddam, another in the white house, another in cave in Wafiristan and lock those bastards together for the rest of their lives. Man would I be macking out in my bacteria-tunnel. No one would want to mess with me. I'd steal their oil.
FOUR:
I want to idendify a high number of isotopes of some harmless element that can be tracked by satellite. Then everyone who wants one can have this button. When a crime occurrs, a bystander can press the button and the unique isotope will be released from a street light or something. Then a satellite will track the movements of every person who was within 100 feet of the button when pressed so the police can interview everyone at the scene. No more street crime. Or I can squirt the isotope on someone, go home and track their movements by satellite. Then when I see them again, I can tell them what they did and where they went and freak them the fuck out.
FIVE:
I want another genetically engineer bacteria that will only enter and breed inside of a specific individual, in other words, a customized bacteria. After sampling the target's DNA, the bacteria will be released in the area where the individual is likely to be. When the bacteria, harmless, begins to breed, indicating that the individual has been found, the concentration of bacteria will be evident by satellite. How that will happen I don't know. Then I'll knock on his fucking door and ask for that $250 he owes me.
SIX:
I want an ugly, foul-mouthed, genetically engineered robot with satellite reading isotope to kick his has and get me my $250.
SEVEN:
I want a woodstove that is no bigger than a bread box, with a little gnome sized chimney and a little nonflamable portable surface that I can install in my car to burn sticks and heat the small area that is my car.
And a solar powered laptop charger and a bow and arrow with signals on the arrows that are battery powered and the batteries are recharged as the arrows shoot through the air so I never loose an arrow. And I'll need an ax and hack saw. And one of those shake flashlights. Better get some snow shoes. Knife of course. Couple of pots and cans. Then when they find me after I was stuck in a snow storm for 10 days, I'll be like, Nice to see you guys cause I got things to do. Thanks a lot. I was just writing some music on my laptop and doing a little cooking. Want some venison soup? Come on in, it's nice and warm in here. I would have been good until spring, but I'm still happy to see you guys.
EIGHT:
I want to have sex with two women at the same time without my wife divorcing me. Wait -- that isn't even something I can bring myself to even dream about, that is so unlikely. I mean, both sides of that equation are so unlikely, the two woman and the no divorce. The foul mouthed robot might get two women. More likely I get those bacteria to dig me a tunnel to london then I get away with that. Then my wife would get the foul mouthed robot and drop my ass in a snowstorm with my bread box woodstove and see if it really works like that. She would track my frozen ass by satellite.
NINE:
A tie. I could wear a tie. I hate fucking ties. I never weat a tie. Can you picture me in a tie? Man, more likely I have sex with two women, not get murdered, dig a tunnel to London, a live in my car in a snowstorm and track everyone by satellite. No fucking tie.
TEN:
Honestly, I just want three days to sit here at my laptop and do my thing without having to work or fix all the shit that's broken in my house and all the crap that needs doing out in the yard.
Poll
what would you like for christmas? be honest
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/12/15/1240/7789
willep's diary :: ::
ONE:
I want whatever it is inside the portable house phone that beeps when I press "find headset" on the base on everything I own. I want to got to my computer or have a voice operated computer buried in my walls so that when I say "keys" my keys beep, when I say "gloves" my gloves beep. And I want a DNA-reader on the chip attached to all my possessions that will identify the last person to touch that item. So I know who put whatever it is whereever it was.
TWO:
I want an ugly, foul-mouthed robot to follow me around and act like an ass whereever I go so I can look at the faces of the people I meet as they try to figure out what they are supposed to do -- laugh, get mad, run away...
THREE:
I want biologically engineered bacteria that can dig through rock and make tunnels, following a plan, so that I can install high speed trains underground at little cost. Then I will go to each town and tell them what they have to do to get a train station on my secret train line-- you know, save their open space. Then I'll make a tunnel under the Atlantic ocean for shipping and passenger travel and corner the trans-atlantic transport market to reduce air travel and global warming. And another tunnel under the oil fields in the middle east and steal all the oil and hide it in Greenland and use the oil profits to re-tool the economy not to burn oil. And get rich too. And no one will know where I am because I'll be in a tunnel. And I'll dig a big room under the Pacific Ocean, dig a tunnel right up into the prision in Iraq, steal Saddam, another in the white house, another in cave in Wafiristan and lock those bastards together for the rest of their lives. Man would I be macking out in my bacteria-tunnel. No one would want to mess with me. I'd steal their oil.
FOUR:
I want to idendify a high number of isotopes of some harmless element that can be tracked by satellite. Then everyone who wants one can have this button. When a crime occurrs, a bystander can press the button and the unique isotope will be released from a street light or something. Then a satellite will track the movements of every person who was within 100 feet of the button when pressed so the police can interview everyone at the scene. No more street crime. Or I can squirt the isotope on someone, go home and track their movements by satellite. Then when I see them again, I can tell them what they did and where they went and freak them the fuck out.
FIVE:
I want another genetically engineer bacteria that will only enter and breed inside of a specific individual, in other words, a customized bacteria. After sampling the target's DNA, the bacteria will be released in the area where the individual is likely to be. When the bacteria, harmless, begins to breed, indicating that the individual has been found, the concentration of bacteria will be evident by satellite. How that will happen I don't know. Then I'll knock on his fucking door and ask for that $250 he owes me.
SIX:
I want an ugly, foul-mouthed, genetically engineered robot with satellite reading isotope to kick his has and get me my $250.
SEVEN:
I want a woodstove that is no bigger than a bread box, with a little gnome sized chimney and a little nonflamable portable surface that I can install in my car to burn sticks and heat the small area that is my car.
And a solar powered laptop charger and a bow and arrow with signals on the arrows that are battery powered and the batteries are recharged as the arrows shoot through the air so I never loose an arrow. And I'll need an ax and hack saw. And one of those shake flashlights. Better get some snow shoes. Knife of course. Couple of pots and cans. Then when they find me after I was stuck in a snow storm for 10 days, I'll be like, Nice to see you guys cause I got things to do. Thanks a lot. I was just writing some music on my laptop and doing a little cooking. Want some venison soup? Come on in, it's nice and warm in here. I would have been good until spring, but I'm still happy to see you guys.
EIGHT:
I want to have sex with two women at the same time without my wife divorcing me. Wait -- that isn't even something I can bring myself to even dream about, that is so unlikely. I mean, both sides of that equation are so unlikely, the two woman and the no divorce. The foul mouthed robot might get two women. More likely I get those bacteria to dig me a tunnel to london then I get away with that. Then my wife would get the foul mouthed robot and drop my ass in a snowstorm with my bread box woodstove and see if it really works like that. She would track my frozen ass by satellite.
NINE:
A tie. I could wear a tie. I hate fucking ties. I never weat a tie. Can you picture me in a tie? Man, more likely I have sex with two women, not get murdered, dig a tunnel to London, a live in my car in a snowstorm and track everyone by satellite. No fucking tie.
TEN:
Honestly, I just want three days to sit here at my laptop and do my thing without having to work or fix all the shit that's broken in my house and all the crap that needs doing out in the yard.
Poll
what would you like for christmas? be honest
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/12/15/1240/7789
why does my dumb self have a damn horse?
Look, I said, I'm moving to the country. I can get a horse. Then I can build some fences. Then they can break out of the fences. Then it can be winter and they can sit there are watch the water freeze, the water I just brought them from the house because the hose is off. Then I can bring them some more.
Don't get a horse.
Then it can be a full-moon on a cold winter night and one of them can smell that the neighbor's horse is in heat. He can go crazy and try to kick me. I can grab his halter and hold on for dear life and try to snap his neck off before he breaks loose because as long as I hold on, he can't get me. If I bend his neck all the way back and stick my fingers down his nose so he thinks he can't breath BEFORE he gets into buck mode, I can hold him. I can wrestle his neck -- it's me against his neck muscles, not his full strength. If he gets out of my grasp-- I'm in trouble. My sweet, gentle baby wants to kill me even though I didn't do anything to him. Then, after struggling to get him back in the stable, he can turn on me quick and I'm cornered in the back of the stable with a wild animal blocking the exit. Only choice: scream like a maniac and attack before he kills me. Punch, bite and run. Then the next day he will be lovey-dovey again and nuzzle me and be as gentle as a baby, asking me to scratch his neck, take him for a ride, gentle, responsive, no need to do more then give him the lightest command and he obeys in a second. Until he gets another wiff of the neighbor.
And horses are poorly designed. They are supposed to eat grass but if they eat too much fresh grass too quickly, they can die. That is bad design. Whatever little gas problem they get comes out in their ankles. They're ankles are totally vulnerable and delicate.
Humans are poorly designed too. Child birth is almost impossible, everyone gets knee and back trouble. I mean, opposible thumbs are great but we pay a high price for bipetalism.
Now dogs and goats are almost indestructible. Excellent designs on those two.
I mean intelligent design, you know, the theory that God must exist because such great excellence as a human being could not arise from chance, that's baloney. Intelligent design would have a check engine light included in the system. My 1991 Honda I bought for $700 has a check engine light. I could be about to drop dead from hard arteries and I wouldn't know until I collapse on the floor.
Now a goat may suggest intelligent design. You cannot mess with a goat.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/12/12/02153/843
Don't get a horse.
Then it can be a full-moon on a cold winter night and one of them can smell that the neighbor's horse is in heat. He can go crazy and try to kick me. I can grab his halter and hold on for dear life and try to snap his neck off before he breaks loose because as long as I hold on, he can't get me. If I bend his neck all the way back and stick my fingers down his nose so he thinks he can't breath BEFORE he gets into buck mode, I can hold him. I can wrestle his neck -- it's me against his neck muscles, not his full strength. If he gets out of my grasp-- I'm in trouble. My sweet, gentle baby wants to kill me even though I didn't do anything to him. Then, after struggling to get him back in the stable, he can turn on me quick and I'm cornered in the back of the stable with a wild animal blocking the exit. Only choice: scream like a maniac and attack before he kills me. Punch, bite and run. Then the next day he will be lovey-dovey again and nuzzle me and be as gentle as a baby, asking me to scratch his neck, take him for a ride, gentle, responsive, no need to do more then give him the lightest command and he obeys in a second. Until he gets another wiff of the neighbor.
And horses are poorly designed. They are supposed to eat grass but if they eat too much fresh grass too quickly, they can die. That is bad design. Whatever little gas problem they get comes out in their ankles. They're ankles are totally vulnerable and delicate.
Humans are poorly designed too. Child birth is almost impossible, everyone gets knee and back trouble. I mean, opposible thumbs are great but we pay a high price for bipetalism.
Now dogs and goats are almost indestructible. Excellent designs on those two.
I mean intelligent design, you know, the theory that God must exist because such great excellence as a human being could not arise from chance, that's baloney. Intelligent design would have a check engine light included in the system. My 1991 Honda I bought for $700 has a check engine light. I could be about to drop dead from hard arteries and I wouldn't know until I collapse on the floor.
Now a goat may suggest intelligent design. You cannot mess with a goat.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/12/12/02153/843
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