The Lost Cub Scout Ordeal

Who else is getting sick of hearing about Brennan Hawkins? Anyone?

Go on! You can admit it.

Brennan Hawkins, of course, was the 11-year-old Cub Scout who managed to get his ass lost in the rugged wilderness around Lily Lake, Utah for an four entire days – just disappeared without a trace. Summit County Sheriff’s Department, as well as thousands of volunteers and emergency organizers, combed the area repeatedly without turning up any significant clues to the poor missing boy’s whereabouts or well being...blah, blah, fucking blah.

Who else is ready to puncture their eardrums with a sharp implement?

For all the relentless focus that this story has been receiving on Prime Time CNN lately, I’m ready to feed this fucking idiot child to the mountain lions myself! Between the chilling tales of survival at 8,500ft and the first hand accounts of rescuers whose fruitless searchers had continuously turned up a total of jack shit with each new late breaking CNN Update, the portrait of some goofy kid who probably wears his underpants in the shower has been forever burned into my brain.

I mean, isn’t there enough loose terrorist insurgents and car bomb explosions going on in Iraq still that Anderson Cooper hasn’t got enough to report on already?

As it turns out, it’s not that Brennan had really fallen victim to any serious life threatening accidents, or even simply fallen where he couldn’t get up. Nooooooooo! Not Brennan.

Brennan instead just avoided rescuers and searching volunteers altogether by hiding just off the main trails when they happened to come by looking for him. So he wasn’t even lost so much as he was just….hiding?

Evidently, Brennan hasn’t successfully finished his ‘Common Sense’ merit badge any more than he has his ‘Orientation’ badge, and he has the accumalated survival skills of a chestnut. And this kid is a Cub Scout?

But as his family points out in his defense, he was born prematurely and is therefore socially immature as a result. “Socially immature” - WTF? Is this what they’re calling “stupid” these days?

His father, Tony Hawkins, goes even further to state that “he hasn’t got any disabilities; he’s just immature.” Hey, thanks for the repressed memory Pops! Besides, I’d consider the fact that this kid obviously couldn’t beat a box of rocks at a simple game of checkers would automatically classify him as being “disabled” - wouldn't you?

Face it: your son is S-T-U-P-I-D! If it walks likes a duck, and eats paste like a duck – it’s a stupid fucking duck.

Brennan was apparently afraid to contact potential rescuers that he may have encountered along the hiking trails because he feared they might be trying to steal him. After all, the searchers weren’t using the pre-established “safe word” that the family had adopted with him.

I would think that “Breeeeeeennan! Come out before you die of exposure!” would have been safe word enough – but hey, that’s just me.

I thought common sense would prevail in these situations and indicate to someone in trouble, even a “socially immature” 11-year-old dimwit, that the gravity of being bear bait in the harsh Utah wilderness would take precedent over not talking to strangers. Perhaps ‘Sesame Street’ should make an amendment to their child safety tip: “Never talk to strangers…UNLESS, you’re lost in the deep woods, starving, and have a rabid bobcat chewing on your leg.”

Brennan was finally rescued by a rescue searcher driving around on an all-terrain vehicle. His only concern: “Has my Pokemon cards come yet?” He was taken to Primary Children’s Medical Center in Salt Lake City, where doctors diagnosed him with sunburn, scrapes, bruises, minor dehydration…and being stupid, of course.

Shit, forget the band-aids…lets get this kid on some serious flash cards, STAT!

Land of a Thousand Dances

I love going to concerts. They’re a literal breeding ground of unique individual expression; somewhere where a people-watching aficionado like myself can become completely absorbed in the surreal surroundings and have more subtle private guffaws at the expense of others than you would at any cross-dressing ‘Trekkie’ convention.

C’mon, everybody does it!

Since man has learned to express himself through dance, others have gathered around to silently mock and revel in their flippant motions. And nowhere is there a better place to do such prime people watching than at a good ‘ol fashioned stripped down “Flower Power” hippie festival or live concert where all the show participants tend to get lost in their own outward expressions of rapture - either that, or it’s that everybody suddenly becomes possessed by the spirit of Mikhail Baryshnikov after one too many Vodka Mule's.

Personally, I don’t dance. My hands stay in my pockets, and my eyes are instead well fixed on the goings on around me with all the astute attention of a seasoned ‘Trading Places’ decorator.

Below, I have compiled a people-watching beginner’s guide to the “Ten Most Common Dances” seen at live concerts nowadays, as well as on the grounds at any popular music festival.

1) “The Bobbing for Apples”

Primarily a white man’s dance, this dance is the most common among concertgoers. The dance itself is a simple steady bodily movement involving the continuous bobbing of the head at the neck while maintaining a hunched over posture. This dance makes the dancer remotely look like they’re a gigantic chicken pecking for seed in midair.

2) “The Bladder Shuffle”

This dance is a simple one for beginners. The dancer only needs to delicately shift his/her weight from one side to the other on the balls of their feet so that it gives the impression that the dancer is doing that uncomfortable shuffle that one does when ones bladder is about to explode.

3) “The Bobbing for Apples Bladder Shuffle”

A combination of the first two listed dances, only at a rapidly accelerated pace that could only be employed by someone who really has to piss yet loves their bobbing for apples at the same time so that they can’t bare to tear themselves away.

4) “The Vibrator”

This dance is not for the unathletic or the cardiac challenged. It involves a bouncing and vibrating of the body at such a steady fixed rate that it seems as if it would be possible to pass their atomic particles through solid objects. Staring directly at these dancers in progress for prolonged periods of time could trigger seizures.

5) “The Twirler”

There is the classic “Flower Power” pirouette that is most commonly recognized and active among hippie dancers. Stereotypically, it’s the girls (usually clad in long flowing patchy skirts) spinning endlessly and fluidly as if they were trying to open a small vortex on the spot to travel through time. Whether it’s by design or by naturally occurring phenomena, twirlers tend to gravitate towards one another in close proximity. This can give the impression of numerous individual twirling tie-dyed twisters tornados working their way through the crowd.

6) “The Stumble”

The verdict is still out on whether the Stumble can truly be considered an accepted style of dance, or just someone whose equilibrium is so disturbed with alcoholic and herbal excesses, that they are just stumblefucking ass over teakettle in an effort to keep upright. But irregardless, there’s significantly enough of these pathetic, sloppy, gravity challenged schleps lurching around like the seventh inning at the Alzheimer’s annual slow-pitch tournament, so I’ve included it here as a legitimate dance type. Basically, just picture Charlie Sheen trying to make it back to his hotel room after an open bar after party at the porno ‘Hot d’Ors’ Awards. Personally, as entertaining as they are to watch in action, I still like to keep my distance just in case one of these stumbler’s should actually lurch forward to hurl on me.

7) “Putting Away the Dishes”

This is one is one of my favorite dance styles to watch. This dance requires that the dancers hands cut the air in front of them at odd angles and intervals giving the impression that they are putting away imaginary dishes in the cupboard after washing them. There is a lesser variation of this dance style for the more reserved dancer known as “Sorting the Silverware” which requires less hand movements at closer proximity to the body.

8) “Walking on Hot Coals”

This fast-paced jig literally gives the impression that the dancer is stepping on hot coals and trying to prevent their feet from getting burned. This dance technique incorporates one part Michael Flatley, one part Maoli tribesman, and one part John Travolta a la ‘Saturday Night Fever’.

9) “The Funky Sasquatch”

This is another popular people-watchers favorite. The dancer poses themselves in the posture of a fleeting Bigfoot from one of those ‘Unexplained Mysteries’ picture books, and then proceeds to shake their arms and legs in a rhythmic manner not unlike that of a dancing bear on a Moroccan street corner. At first glance, it may appear that the Funky Sasquatch dancer is merely trying to scare off small animals, yet the blissful smile and glazed eyes immediately suggest that the only thing actually intimidating about them is the body funk emanating from under their armpits.

10) “The Check Please!”

This obscure and seldom noticed dance is so slight in it’s delivery that is often overlooked as a random spontaneous gesture as opposed to any actual dance style in itself. In this particular dance, the person merely raises their one hand over their head and makes a simple hand sign in the air as if they were trying to get their waiter’s attention to bring the check to their table. It’s the same universally recognized ‘signing your signature’ motion, known by waiters and waitresses the world over - except that it’s dragged on for more lengthy periods and with less urgency.

No Sugar Tonight

It’s been said before that Mother Nature is a mad scientist. Burton Cummings translated it best:


“'Cause it's the new Mother Nature taking over
It's the new splendid lady come to call
It's the new Mother Nature taking over
She's getting us all, she's getting us all”

After the latest week’s worth of news clips and reels, it is now my position that mankind is heading directly into an impending shit storm from which he will not walk away unscathed. All good things must come to an end, I’m afraid – and so shall we.

The signs of the apocalypse are all around us as Mother Nature is rising up against us, and soon we’ll be reduced to being her bitches. And if you think times are tough for prisoners at Gitmo, just wait until Mother Nature is wielding the authority. She’ll reduce back to mere single celled amoebas and flush our asses back to the Cambrian period.

There’s two-faced kittens being born in Oregon, crazed deer running amuck on Midwest college campuses, catfish are taking to land after rainstorms, super raccoons are prowling the streets of Toronto by night, and giant panda bears are finally being successfully impregnated in captivity thanks to artificial insemination (okay, we lent a hand on that one – literally. Somebody had to stroke off the male panda, right?). It would seem as if nature was preparing herself for some ultimate final battle with mankind. And what are we doing to safe protect ourselves from this impending Jumanji-style Jihad?

We’re becoming even stupider.

Instead of learning how to appease the angry forces around us, we’re glued to the television set absorbing the stunted philosophical ranting of Tom Cruise on the subject of drugs, depression and Brooke Shields. Who gives a shit what Tom Cruise thinks about anything? Sure he’s banging Katie Holmes, but this doesn’t give him the right to get all preachy and offer commentary on society and the greater good of humankind! He’s just a fucking actor – and an overpriced shitty one at that! I wish we would just jettison his ass into deep outer space; never to be seen again. However, with my luck, his DNA would survive somewhere beyond the outer reaches of the galaxy and spawn a whole new race of alien Scientologists that will one day return to Earth and enslave the entire planet.

It’ll be 24hr ‘Days of Thunder’ marathons for everybody. Now there’s a fate worse than death!

Likewise, we focus our energies on ridiculous, meaningless, ill-fated PR stunts like trying to erect the worlds largest popsicle in Manhattan’s Union Square. Why the fuck would we ever need a 16-tonne frozen treat in the first fucking place? When the war of all wars is upon us, what are we going to do – drown our enemies in a sticky tide of kiwi-strawberry-flavored juice? This is quite possibly the stupidest thing I have ever heard!

I just don’t understand how we’re managed to survive this long as it is. But you can roll down the windows of your parked cars and stop sucking carbon monoxide through a garden hose – we still have a chance!

I’m not about to start playing Greensleeves on the bagpipe yet!

I say we put Jack LaLanne in charge of the Earth’s defenses before it’s too late! Not only will he live forever, but he’ll juice our lazy asses back to maximum efficiency before we’re completely eviscerated into mere meat molecules for good at the hands of a killer mutant aardvark.

The Godfather of Fitness at almost 90 years old, can tow a huge oceangoing freighter with his teeth, and word has it that he has fully functional lightsaber for a penis. LaLanne fought in the Battle of Thermopylae in the year 480 BC. Three hundred Spartans assisted him by holding his incredibly massive testicles while he single-handedly routed the Persian army.

LaLanne is not only a man, but also a state of mind and being, only attainable through the consumption of a specific combination of precisely incremented narcotics, transmission fluid, and mango fruit. He is the only man who knows the correct combination, and he'd rather impale himself on a rusty pole than tell you. He is the cause of gravity. He picked 9.8 m/s for the gravitational constant because he deemed it to be "a fucking awesome number." And that was that!

Jack once gave a woman an orgasm so intense she invented three new branches of mathematics, discovered the first half of the true name of god and now only needs two and half hours of sleep a week. She can also now cook a damn good English Breakfast that will immediately take seven pounds off your ass, and never breaks an eggs yolk.

This is the guidance we need to continue our higher existence, and remain just one rung above all the other species on the planet's evolutionary ladder!

I know right now, I’m in no shape fend off attacking natural forces. I have the body of a sack of walnuts, and I couldn’t outrun a pregnant beaver in a 100m wind sprint – I need reconditioning.


I, like the rest of mankind, have become weak and vulnerable. We no longer have the good street smarts in this life to boil an egg. We need to go back to our roots, destroy all our ‘Darkness’ albums and do away with our boxed hams, and once again embrace life as we used to – as the temperamental shebeast that she is!

Letter to the Editor

(The following was written to the editor of the 'Toronto Star' newspaper. I have little faith that this will ever be seriously considered or responded to – much less ever actually printed.)

Dear Editor:

Look douchebag, let me put it to you as simply as I can...

I DON’T WANT TO SUBSCRIBE TO YOUR FUCKING NEWSPAPER – PERIOD!

End of fucking story!

For the past two months, I have been receiving telemarketing calls from your newspapers marketing department to my home, always at inconvenient times such as dinnertime, early mornings, and even at inappropriate times in the evening as late as 9:45PM on a Wednesday.

Hey, here’s food for thought asshat: if all your offices and customer services numbers are unavailable to be reached at 9:46PM because they’ve all gone home at a respectable time to be with their families, why do you feel it’s perfectly acceptable for ME to be called at home at the same time, at 9-fucking-45 the same evening? Even my own mother wouldn’t dream of calling me at that time of night!

Each time I answer one of these excruciatingly frustrating sales calls from you, I just want to reach through the phone line and stab the sales representative in the throat with my dinner fork. Instead, since basic physics won’t comply with me to reach through the phone line, I respectfully decline their sales advances and adamantly state that I would NOT like to be called any further. Is this so hard to comprehend?

Do you listen? Do you take heed? Do you even give a shit?

Because the more I insist to be taken off your calling list, the more calls I seem to be getting. Obviously, you are not getting the message, nor are your scruple less promotional employees able to perform the simple tasks requested of them. Over this, I am not totally surprised considering the complete indifference that they display with me over the phone.

So, let me put it to you here clearly:

I do NOT live in Toronto; I DON’T ever go into Toronto, nor do I give a shit what happens in Toronto! I live in ST. CATHARINES! That's a whole 130 km's away! Your whole stinking city could be laid to waste by a falling meteor and reduced to a smoldering pile of ash and rubble inside an enormous crater molded into the earth, and I STILL wouldn’t give a shit about Toronto! And even THEN, I would still read about it gleefully in somebody else’s newspaper that I buy from the news stand!

I wouldn’t wipe my ass with your rag paper – Dig?

I would rather pay for the priviledge of having Rosie O'Donnell piss on me than ever consent to subscribing to your newspaper!

So given your current aggressive marketing and promoting strategies of literally bullying your potential customers into subscriptions at home with incessant phone calls from nasal, incompetent retards – I wouldn’t give your company two cents of my hard earned money, now or ever...that's EVER!

So in summation, dear sir: fuck you and anyone who may have the misfortune of looking like you, you unethical piece of shit.

From now on, whenever one of your sales representatives call me at home and disturbs my sacred feeding time and/or distrupts my favorite television show, I’ll just dangle the phone into my cats kitty litter so that you can hear him shitting and know that I’m thinking of you.

Sincerely,

- CTRM

Six Million Dollar Sham

Remember when as a kid, you had your favorite TV show that your whole world revolved around; you just couldn’t sleep unless you knew that your television hero (or heroin) had once again kicked some bad guys ass, saved the earth and restored order to mankind? Then at some point later on, you happen to view this same TV show later in your adult life and you sadly realize in actuality, what a shitty show it really was?

For me, this particular show was the ‘Six Million Dollar Man’. The 'Six Million Dollar Man' could kick the living bejesus outta the Hulk, bowl the A-Team over with a single bionic fart, snap MacGyver's neck like a dry chicken bone, bitch-slap Wonder Woman back to a Stone Age kitchen, and then used Superman to pick his teeth. Even now, the opening credits give me the chills.

And now this childhood favorite of mine has just recently been rebroadcasted in syndication on the Prime Time channel - *pause here for random giggling and jiggling in joyful celebration* - causing my world to come crashing down around me with the realization that this once revered show is about as cheesy as the showroom at the Baby Bell cheese factory. I guess that my expectations were much lower at eight years old than they are now.

As a child, I was all over this show:

“Steve Austin, astronaught – a man barely alive…Gentlemen, we can rebuild him…we have the technology. We have the capability to make the world’s first bionic man. Steve Austin will be that man. Better than he was before, stronger, faster…”

How fucking cool was that? What kid wouldn’t be automatically sucked in?

Lee Majors played Col. Steve Austin, a NASA test pilot who had the good fortune to survive a near fatal crash and was reconstructed and refurbished by Dr. Rudy Wells at a cost of $6,000,000. Sure amount this may be mere chump change by today’s standards (in fact, Donald Trump probably spends more than this on each of his ridiculous toupees), but back in the 70’s, a cool six mil was a nice substantial amount of cash to spend!

Personally, if I was spending six million dollars in physical reconstruction, I know where $5,999,9990 worth of reconstruction would have been invested. Basically, I would have been a walking high-priced super mechanical cock.

Our hero Steve however was fitted with atomic-powered legs, arms and left eye. I’ll never know why they just didn’t rip out his other eye and give him two atomic-powered eyes; wouldn’t that have been more prudent, or was the bionic budget already too stretched to the max at the six million dollar mark? But, ‘c’est la vie’ I suppose.

And while we’re on the subject, why were all these superhuman bionic parts nuclear-powered? It may be that ‘ol Steve Austin was a force to be reckoned with, but as it turns out, he was a walking environmental disaster waiting to happen!

I always thought that it was extremely convenient that Steve Austin damaged both his legs and only one arm in his crash. Had it been the other way around (two arms and one leg) we would have had a bionic man who ran around in circles really, REALLY fast!

So, now bionically equipped, the ‘Six Million Dollar Man’ could perform incredible feats of strength and speed * in his battles with evildoers everywhere. Unfortunately, what I didn’t understand as a kid was that since the Bionic Man’s arm was attached to the rest of his body (instead of a continuous metal structure), whenever he lifted something that weighed as much as him or more, the leverage would mean that, as the arm flexed, his body would left up, leaving the heavier item unbudged. Likewise, if an item, like the ass end of a Sherman tank as in one episode, was heavier than the tensile strength of his organic components, ‘ol Steve’s spine would fold up like an accordion until he was reduced to that of a ‘Six Million Dollar Cripple’…and that show wouldn’t have been nearly as cool!

Thank you basic high school physics!

Also, when Austin used his bionic eye to see great distances without any extension of the lens – in real life, his eye would have stuck out of his head like Pinocchio’s nose after a police interrogation with the magnification he was getting out of that eye!

Another thing that bothers me now is that even though the Bionic Man could achieve incredible land speeds with his nuclear-powered legs, are we then to also assume that he was also equipped with super bionic brakes since he seemed to be able to stop on a dime? Didn’t anybody ever look in their rearview mirror to see some guy in an orange jumpsuit running behind them at 60 mph and slam on the brakes making Austin plow into the back of their getaway vehicle face-first? By all rights, the ‘Six Million Dollar Man’ must have had a face that you could level crossbeams with.

And while we’re on the subject, how is it that the Bionic Man was able to sneak into all those enemy components by leaping over 8ft fences and walls? Couldn’t the bad guys ever hear those bionic parts working like a rusty pogo stick? What a giveaway!

But all these misgivings aside, I didn’t really care back then just as long as Steve baby was kicking the bionic ass of any evil foreigner, spy, villain, extra-terrestrial, killer robots (“Maskatron”), and even Bionic Bigfoot. Steve Austin would also lock horns with another bionic ‘Seven Million Dollar Man’. This ultimately led to an inevitable clash of the titans, which Steve naturally won despite being a million dollars cheaper. I just wanted to see him doing impossibly cool bionic stuff – like Luke Skywalker, or Superman!

But, even then, I realized that my beloved TV show was a steady decline towards the end with the introduction of an entire bionic family including a Bionic Woman injured in a freak parachuting accident**, a Bionic Boy, and even a fucking Bionic Dog.

How retarded is that?

Even at the ripe old age of eight I realized that the idea of a bionic girlfriend with the usual gamut of powerful bionic limbs was not an ideal situation. Who wants to date a woman with super sensitive hearing? You don’t have to be a genius to figure out that that’s not a particularly good idea. Now that I’m a mature adult, the thought of a woman with a bionic grip that can burst tennis balls is extremely intimidating, if not terrifying. She could pussy-whip Darth-fucking-Vader!

But I could deal with it then because she was hot.

When they gave some kid bionic legs and some dog bionic jaws, along with Steve Austin’s decision to grow a mustache, the show not only “jumped the shark”, it dove headlong into the tank.

Now I’d rather watch senior citizens schiesse videos.

* Usually filmed in slow motion. Wow – what amazing special effects! Why couldn’t they just show him running fast?

** What constitutes a “freak parachuting accident” exactly? You’re jumping out of a plane at 60,000 feet! Is it so incomprehensible to have an equipment failure and plummet to the ground like a falling rock? How many other kinds of accidents CAN occur while parachuting?

"Don't Bogart That Cows Asshole, Dude!"

I have been reading a book lately about unexplained phenomenon (Unexplained! by Jerome Clark; 1993). You know, one of those spooky books with grainy photographs of hairy ape-like bipeds and sketch drawings of large-headed, bug-eyed alien creatures that kind of look like Herve Villechaize all strung out on PCP. It’s not exactly intelligent literature, but it’s this kind of fluff that sure passes the time at work.

The chapter I am currently working through is dealing with the phenomenon of widespread cattle mutilations. Apart from instantly lighting a fire in my belly and a jonsing for good BBQ, it has left me with some particularly weird impressions on the subject.

This mysterious phenomenon as detailed in this book began primarily in the fall of 1973 by farmers in Minnesota and Kansas, who reported then that their cattle were dying under mysterious circumstances. Later, these mutilations would spread like wildfire throughout the west, mid-west, and Canada. To all appearances persons or forces unknown had killed the animals, though apparently without knife or bullet, and with surgical precision had removed various parts of the animal – usually eyes, ears, lips, sex organs, rectum, tail, or combinations thereof. Farmers also frequently claimed that the animal’s blood had been drained. Strangest of all, the enigmatic killers accomplished all this without leaving footprints or other evidence of their presence.

To date, no likely or plausible explanations for these mutilations have been found. The most commonly given rationalizations to explain away these strange occurrences are Satanists, secret services, or flying saucers *.

Now, all this creepy hocus-pocus horseshit (or cow shit, as it were) aside – who the fuck would ever want to remove a cows rectum, or sex organs for that matter anyways?

How fucking gross is that?

Personally, I can’t see any depraved raving lunatic, whether it be from this planet or otherwise, being twisted enough to actually want a nasty dead cows rectum that they would defy logic and explaination just to obtain them – Satanists, perverted veterinary pathologists, or evil aliens (as is the most popular theory). It’s simply not something that’s commonly included on someone’s Christmas wish list.

I just can’t wrap my head around why any alien beings would want to remove a cows rectum unless it was part of some alien scavenger hunt during some alien hazing week at ETU, or they were just looking to make some morose intergalactic bong or something. Even still, that’s some pretty fucked up alien that would want to ever shotgun a hit of space marijuana through a cow’s asshole.

“Hey Mork, you want another hit off this cows rectum?”

And as for the sinister Satanists or subvert rogue governmental agencies, a cows rectum wouldn’t exactly make for a nice mantelpiece trophy either, would it? Imagine going on a house tour of that particular abode: “…and over here next to my autographed picture of Anton LaVey, is my prized cows asshole. Boy, was that hard to acquire!” That’s some pretty fucked up feng shui going on in there!

Likewise, if it is some underground branch of the government or some other secret service involved in connection with these cattle mutilations - that's a pretty shitty job**! Image going into work one morning only to be informed by your boss that on that day you had to surgically remove some cows cooch and asshole, WITHOUT leaving any footprints, fingerprints, or otherwise traceable evidence of even being there in the first place. I'd be in the unemployment line the very next day, that's for fucking sure!

And I thought my job sucked the balls!

My best guess is that the most likely scenario is that these less-than-tantalizing cow morsels are being secretly removed and collected by the producers of ‘Fear Factor’ in order to be served to groups of unlucky contestants as a variable Devil’s Pu-Pu Platter in their bid to win $50,000 dollars.

* If you were to travel billions of light years across the galaxy, you’d think that you’d be interested in something a little more substantial than a cows rectum to return with as a souvenir, wouldn’t you? That’d make a great novelty t-shirt: “My parents crossed the universe and all I got was this lousy cows ass!”

** Pun intended

The Final Chapter for Michael "Freakshow" Jackson

What the fuck is going on in California – has the sun finally fried everyone’s brains through the thinning ozone or something?

Not since OJ’s white Ford Bronco cross-country flee from justice, or even the recent election of Conan the Barbarian as the official state governor has there been a greater travesty of justice.

Michael “Freakshow” Jackson has finally been acquitted on all counts in his ongoing child molestation case – a total legal victory sweep for the Defense, ending Santa Barbara County District Attorney Tom Sneddon’s decade long crusade to expose the Jackson as the dangerous pre-pubescent pee-pee diddler that he is. Jackson will not even so much as have to attend any "Pee-Pee Diddler's Anonymous" meetings or anything - he's off scott free!

Am I surprised? Of course not!

The ‘King of Pop’ was found innocent on all 10 charges brought up against him. I simply can’t believe it! Didn’t anybody else see those scathing photographs of Jackson’s diamond-studded mitts all over little Webster’s Hottentots while they played video games together? Sure, Macaulay Culkin said that he was never molested during his stayover’s at Neverland Ranch, but didn’t anyone else see the pain and shame behind his eyes as he bravely hid those forced naked games of oiled-up Twister with Bubbles? Am I the only fucking one who noticed these things?

Surely with so many devilishly outlandish accusations on the prosecutors hit list, such as plying boys with booze and porn, licking their heads, simulating sex acts with mannequins, as well as keeping dolls in bondage wear on his desk, and lets not forget the Neverland Ranch shower orgies, that they would eventually find him guilty of some-fucking-thing, right?

I guess not.

The real disturbing thing about the jury’s verdict is that they also admitted that they are not convinced he has never molested a child, and that the Freakshow’s regular willingness to invite small boys into his bed during sleepovers was indeed unsettling to say the least! Well, DUH! Instead they just claimed that he was not guilty of these particular crimes that he had been charged with.

Oh, not THEEEEEEEEEEEESE crimes. I see!

WTF? What DO you have to do to get convicted in a California courtroom exactly?

Shit, just up until late last year, you couldn’t even get successfully prosecuted for drunkenly banging dead corpses in a funeral home! Now apparently, if you’re a noted celebrity icon, you can host naked all-night swing parties with the entire Vienna Boys Choir and not have to worry about any legal repercussions whatsoever!

Michael Jackson’s defense claimed that the accusers exploited their boy’s illness to shake down celebrities then concocted the charges after realizing that the gloved one was cutting them off the jet-set lifestyle with the extravagant hotel rooms and lama rides and what-have-you. Well, yeah. So? Isn’t the odd lama ride around Neverland Ranch worth the odd diddling during an innocent tickle fight in the master bedroom later on? It’s a perverted pop star pedophile’s version of a “Quid Pro Quo”.

Of course, this verdict does mean that Jackson will be free to try to rebuild his blighted musical career, but his legal victory came a terrible price to his image.

Pardon me while I yack.

When was Michael Jackson’s image EVER really, shall we say, normal? If the black surgical mask didn’t spark any concern or suspect into people, then obviously nothing fucking will! He looked like a gay bandit, not someone you’d want to trust your children with. Honestly, he could be dressed up in leather chaps and a ruby-encrusted Speedo and blowing a monkey and parents would STILL willingly ship their kids off to Camp Neverland with this fruit bar!

I’d say that now that the whole train wreck of a court case is finally over, things at Neverland will just slip back into whatever realm of normal that is actually capable by ‘ol MJ, and it’ll be back to Weirdness-As-Usual until his unholy urges once again get the better of him while watching the latest installments of Harry Potter movies.

Mark my words.

"First, poke out eyes..."

(Inspired by an article in Mojo Magazine; September, 1999)

Despite the bright, sunshiny, zipadee-fucking-doodah day that is it outside at the moment, I am still in a blues kind of mood - and I’m not just talking about being merely moody, I’m talking about the real gritty worn out shoes kind of blues.

Charlie Patton, Lead Belly, Son House, Muddy Waters, Sleepy John Estes, Lightning Hopkins, Sonny Boy Williamson, Howlin’ Wolf, Albert King, John Mayall, Robert Johnson, “Mississippi” John Hurt, “Blind” Lemon Jefferson, and anyone else who sounds like they might be found sitting around in a boxcar betting on the hobo fights.

Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I’ve been tripping out on Tylenol 3’s and Crown Royal for the past 48 hours while laid up with a bad foot…maybe, it’s the fact that’s so hot outside right now that you could fry an egg on your forehead. Regardless, today I just feel this incessant need to hear the soulful twang of plucked guitars and a guttural moan that sounds like the vibrations being emitted from a sighing dog laying in the shade.

I always crave the blues when the weather is sticky. What better to listen to when you’re hot and irritable?

However, I have decided that no everybody can sing or play the blues. You’d think it would be pretty simple; find something to gripe about, strum a guitar out of key, stomp your foot, and moan like a wounded wildebeest. Simple, huh?

Not so.

I have compiled for the curious blues beginner, a set guide of “20 Rules For the Blues” that can be referred to by any aspiring firebrands who think that they can sing and play the blues, and determine whether in fact they have what it takes, or if they’re just experiencing a pre-midlife crisis.

1) Every good blues song starts with “woke up this morning”. Just accept it, deal with it, and don’t fuck with the formula. Nobody will care when you start a song with “brushed my teeth after dinner”.

2) “I got a good woman” is a bad way to begin the blues, unless you stick something nasty in the next line. Such as, “I got a good woman…if you don’t pay her she’ll bite your leg.”

3) The blues are not about limitless choice. Nobody will identify with someone singing the blues about being served chilled grapes on the poolside deck by a topless handmaiden. I suggest burning everything you own, quit your job, shoot your dog, take to living under bridges. THEN, you’ll have something to sing about.

4) Blues cars are rusted Chevies, Cadillacs, Jalopies, as well as old tractors and farming equipment. Other acceptable blues modes of transport include a Greyhound bus, the back of a flatbed truck, or a southbound train. Walkin’ also plays an integral part in transportation in the blues. Who doesn’t get cranky after getting blisters in old uncomfortable blues?

5) Teenagers and really young men usually can’t sing the blues. They haven’t been beaten down enough by life in order to be completely blues-worthy. Blues adulthood means old enough to get the electric chair for stealing an apple. Teenagers can only sing the blues in those states whose laws allow execution of people under the age of 18. Or in those states where one’s sister might have been one’s wife, etc.

6) You can have the blues in New York City, or Los Angeles, but not in Aspen or Beverly Hills. Likewise, hard times in places such as Vermont, North Dakota are merely just a temporary recession. Chicago, St. Louis and Kansas City are still the best places to have the blues.

7) The following colors have NO place in the blues: violet, mauve, ochre, chartreuse, puce.

8) You can’t have the blues in an office place, shopping center or public mall. The lighting is all wrong.

9) Good places for the blues: a highway, the jailhouse, a smoky bar or pool hall, an empty bed, on a bus or southbound train.

10) Bad places to have the blues: gallery openings, ribbon cutting ceremonies, baby showers, the Hamptons, and Bar Mitzvahs.

11) No one will believe it’s the blues if you wear a suit, unless you’re an old black man.

12) Do you have a right to sing the blues? YES, if: your first name is a Southern state – like Mississippi or Alabama, you’re blind or in some other way disabled or impaired, you have ever shot anybody in Memphis, or you can’t be satisfied. NO, if: you once were blind but now can see, you’re only impairment is that you’re tone deaf, you have a trust fund, or you have a Lapso Apso for a dog.

13) Julio Iglesias, Barbara Streisand, and Yanni DO NOT have the right to sing the blues!

14) If you ask for water and your baby gives you gasoline, it’s the blues. Other acceptable blues beverages: wine, moonshine, shoe polish, cheap-ass whiskey, and muddy pond water.

15) Blues beverages are NOT: any mixed drink (particularly those including fruit), kosher wine, herbal tea, or fashionable small micro-brews.

16) If it occurs in a cheap motel or a shotgun shack, it’s a blues death. Stabbed in the back by a jealous whore is a blues way to die. So is the electric chair, a drug overdose, or being denied treatment in an emergency room.

17) It’s not a blues death if you die during liposuction or while Alpine skiing in Gstaad, Switzerland.

18) Acceptable blues names. For women: Sadie, Big Mama, Bessie, Lucille, and Earlene. For men: Joe, Willie, Big Willie, Little Willie, Blind Willie, and Lightnin’.

19) Persons with names like sierra, Sequoia, or Muffy will NOT be permitted to sing the blues no matter how many men they shoot in Memphis.

20) Other acceptable blues names can be determined by following the accepted blues name formula: a. name of a physical infirmity (blind, crippled, one-eyed, snaggle-toothed) b. first name (see above) or name of favorite breakfast fruit (lemon, kiwi, mango) c. last name of a dead president (Jefferson, Johnson, Fillmore, Polk).

The Haymaker Memoirs (Part II)

(con'd...)

May 20th; Oakley Farm (Haybarn Stage), Spotsylvania, VA

(1:30PM)

We have arrived safely in Spotsylvania just as the rain is turning into a fine mist and I am finally beginning to get into the spirit of what I had preconceived in my mind as being typically Virginia; the smell of lilacs blooming, the soft drawl, the intensive presence of security and drug-sniffing dogs, and red mud – lots and lots of red fucking mud.

Let me backtrack a little…

To merely say that it “rained” last night shortly after we had arrived in Virginia would be paying a great diservice to moisture as a whole. The sky literally opened up shortly after 10:00PM last night and what fell down to earth from within would have made the deep end at the Banda Ache public swimming pool seem like the Sahara Desert by comparison.

As I passed out on my blow-up mattress in Alexandria, I listened to a steady Niagara Falls of water crashing down on the concrete porch below from a plugged up eaves trough just on the opposite side of the home's wall from which I was trying to sleep. It made me have to pee constantly. I must have passed an entire Mississippi River * of urine by the time I managed to successfully fall asleep. Even then, I was still waking up unconsciously every so often to go some more. I’d be surprised if any of the other party-goers were able to sleep that night, what with all the driving rain, plunging eaves trough cascades, and the flushing of toilets every 15 minutes.

Oakley Farm; Campsite - (3:00PM)

The tents are pitched, the beer is chilled, and we're ready to party hearty.

The sun is now beginning to peek from behind the dissipating clouds and the day is now shaping up to be a grand one. The mud on the concert ground is molded with thousands of feet prints, as if a herd of Sasquatch has just earlier stampeded across the field; which in a way is exactly what happened.

After that last thought just crossed my mind, the incessant drumming in the campground around us seems a little more anxious and foreboding. If these festival-goers did decide to go all ‘Lord of the Flies’ and suddenly turn into a tribe of carnivorous marauding Yeti, I figure that in the state my body is now after last nights rest stop session of beer and bong hits, I’d probably represent one delectable morsel of marinated hippy steak. The best I could do to defend myself would be to go all limp and pretend to be a leaf of lettuce.

Inevitably, this will probably be my last journal entry for the day since from this point forward, and tribes of cannibalistic hippies permitting, I plan on putting back as many beers as I can and take in as much musical flavor as possible.

Adieu.

May 21st; Oakley Farm (Haybarn Stage) – (2:00PM)

In true Crazytigerrabbit fashion, I have managed to procure a nice little sunburn that makes me look like a boiled lobster on a bed of greens while sitting here in my green lawn chair. All the weekend’s prime directives have now been successfully accomplished in fine fashion.

Judging by the toxic lamb gyro farts that I’m already emitting this afternoon through the strata of my underwear that I’ve been wearing for the past 48-hours, I do believe it’s time for a little dose of my festival camping staple – Immodium.

The Lord has no mercy when it comes to festival porto-potties. By high noon, when that sun is beaming down harshly on those small plastic shithouses, the stench alone could make you sterile. Therefore, the ever-prepared camper, like myself, will come to rely on these little white miracle pills that literally suck the moisture out of my bowels like an industrial wet-vac. The only way to really handle the porto-potties; is to avoid the porto-potties altogether!

After only a few hours into the weekend, I begin to feel like Alice in Wonderland when my stomach goes a little wheezy and my head begins to race with psychedelic delusions. Before you know it, I’m rummaging around my tent frantically looking for my little pill underneath a business card with “Eat Me!” embossed across the front.

The Hackensack Boys; Haybarn Stage - (4:00PM)

I’m basking in the cool shade of the barn like a dehydrated walrus. Bubbles are floating across the stage in front of me like little crystal balls into another miniature universe. Sunlight reflects on the opaque surfaces of these weightless orbs giving the impression that they are floating portals into another realm, separate and undisturbed from that on which we are floating in now. Each bubble microcosm hangs suspended lazily in a faint cloud of dust being kicked up from the ground by the feet of the many dancing freaks below…

(4:10PM)

…WOW! I’m high.

Steve Kimock; Main Stage – (6:00PM)

Hippies have a very odd sense of “festival fashion”. Most of them look like a cross between Wavy Gravy and those creepy children from ‘The Village of the Damned’ with their gaping lifeless eyes.

I have observed this weekend that there is a distinct correlation between the earthy cuteness of some of these girls and degree of rank emanating from her armpits. Quite frankly, the prettier the girl, the more potent the body funk. The prettiest of the twirling mamas on the concert field you probably wouldn’t be able to get within 15 ft of her for the toxic cloud wafting out from under her patchy skirt. Some of these “flower girls” could stop a charging rhino! Mind you, in their defense, there is nothing “flowery” about spending days on end in a tent wearing the same clothes - not unless you were thinking of stinkweed, or the less common blossoms of Wildebeast Fart or something that is.

Robert Earl Keen; Haybarn Stage – (7:00PM)

Another odd festival fashion faux pas is that the native hippie men tend to wear their baggy pants or shorts so that the waistband is down at their knees. How on earth do they keep their pants from falling off altogether and tripping ass over teakettle? To me, every male under the age of eighteen looks like some penguin waddling across an Antarctic ice field. Christ, the by the looks of it, the only thing keeping their pants, heavily laden with a weekends worth of mud, body funk, and crusty vomit, is the gravity generated from the enormous balls that it must take to walk around all weekend looking like a complete and utter moron!

Soulive; Haybarn Stage – (12:00PM)

I love watching people dance. I am particularly interested in some guy who dance resembles a chimpanzee having a seizure. Obviously all hepped on goof balls, or whatever it is that makes you bounce and vibrate on the spot like an excited proton, this guy is dancing so fast and hard that he could probably pass his molecular structure through solid objects. It was as if the Flash were auditioning for Saturday Night Fever.

May 22nd; Oakley Farm; Spotsylvania, VA

(10:30AM)

We are packed up and ready to hit the road home. After a brief scare last night at having lost the rest of our dry rolling papers, we have secured ourselves and our equipment away and already getting the itch to feel the pavement pass underneath our asses.

It looks like my sunburn has spread across my face, marked by a very prominent line across my forehead where my bandana has been previously. With my dark brown beard underneath the two bands of hot pink and white flesh, my face now looks like a big scoop of Neopolitan ice cream mounded on top of a chunky piece of apple pie.

Many of the campers have already rolled out, leaving little black and green dung piles of garbage and recycling. The bright festive grounds of the past two days now looks like a waste land of garbage bags and discarded broken camping equipment strewn around like skeletons. The odd forgotten flag, or torn shade tent flutters in the breeze as the remaining campers pack up their shit, cook the last of their food, and say their goodbyes.

I can't help but notice one poor guy with a black-markered handlebar mustache, as well as other random doodlings on his face, still soundly passed out in his lawn chair just in front of his tent, which had been gaping open the whole time just welcoming anyone to help themselves to it's contents.

Party on, Inspector Clouseau!

After a quick pulse check (his not ours), we got under way...

May 22nd; some unmarked dot in Pennsylvania

(7:00PM)

We are over half way home after our weekend’s adventure – and I have just committed the sin of the century. This is going to prevent my getting into heaven for sure. Unfortunately, the site of this unworldly abomination was the cute roadside “Patty T’s Country Restaurant”. This was the setting of impending disaster, complete with quaint pink and green painted walls, lacey napkins, tatted doilies, ceramic ducks and puppy motifs, and colorful cardboard menu boards on the wall. The place was about as innocent as a Catholic Bible Study classroom.

However, after three days of Immodium cocktails before bed and my bowels don’t care how cute or endearing the surrounding décor is, when it’s ready to release the full force of its pent-up fecal fury, nothing is sacred. And at Patty T’s, the cheeseburger and onion ring combo was all the lubrication necessary to pull the plug on my excretory system. All that was left of the country diner by the time we pulled out was a smoking crater along the side of Route 15N where Patty T’s once stood.

* Or would that be “MississipPEE River”?

Cooking Up a Reality Shitstorm!

I have finally, at long last, found my ideal reality show - beyond the original immaculate Survivor prototype for which I will forever base my faithful allegiance, of course. Quite possibly – this may be the best show in the world! Well, at least for what’s on TV right now anyways.

This particular formulated reality-based hokum evolves around another the two very things that I hold dear in this lifetime: good food, and a sarcastic, cranky-ass master chef, hard as his Teflon frying pan, dolling out the barbed sarcasms and thinly-veiled insults to whoever might happen to pass within a hot towel length of his foulness.

This show of which I speak is called “Hell’s Kitchen”, another restaurant-themed contestant elimination competition, is based around the world-renowned chef, and even more renowned ill-tempered twat, Gordon Ramsey.

For those of you not in the know, Gordon Ramsey is a cross between Julia Child and a velociraptor. The whole appeal of the entire program for me lies in watching the vicious Chef Ramsey verbally assault some poor, ill-equipped rhubarb with bitch tits named Dewberry*, who only yesterday was a mere pastry chef at some local bakery.

Welcome to the Big Time, fatboy.

This is PRIMO entertainment! It’s like watching a WWE wrestler debate a devout Mormon on the virtues of opening cans of whoop-ass. Who the fuck cares how the show is supposed to be played or who is winning over who – just line up a bunch of incompetent retards in white chef jackets, turn them loose in a kitchen, and let Gordon Ramsey hurl the insults at them, and maybe a few bricks for good measure, for the show’s entire hour of airtime each time they happen to displease him – which is often.

Not even the restaurant customers are safe from his aggressive mood swings. No one escapes Chef Ramsey’s wrath once he’s pissed – and he is seldom in a good mood. Restaurant patrons and dinners are also turned away from his domain with a tongue-lashing that could be more expected from a drunken merchant marine.

“Excuse me, matre’de. Could you please show these ladies back to the plastic surgery ward please? Thank you - fuck off.”

Now this is reality-fucking television!

Any show involving a cantankerous, Scottish taskmaster with a poison tongue ripping into overbearing, self-righteous, elitist snobs like a monkey ripping into a coconut, is okay in my books!

I like this for the same reason I enjoy my other guilty pleasure – Judge Judy. I couldn’t give two shits who wins and looses, just that everybody involved receives a liberal dosage of harsh “tell-it-like-it-is” reality mixed with a few well-timed insults and personal criticisms.

Basically, given the subservient nature of my own employ, I can revel fully in the living vicariously through someone in some form of authority or power who can speak freely, and critically, without due repercussion.

GOD, I’D LOVE THAT!

Of course, I wouldn’t have many friends and would live alone in a shack in the forest – but I’d sure be one happy motherfucker, let me tell you!

Likewise, I couldn’t give a damn what delectable dish the apprentice chefs are struggling to prepare or what culinary marvels Chef Ramsey is creating in Hell’s Kitchen, just as long as he continues to have free reign to rain down sweet holy terror on the shows participants.

I would order just a $20 glass of water, just as long as it got me a front row table to the kitchen onslaught, and see the very intergalactic culinary meltdowns explode from Chef Ramsey, as the episode progresses.

THAT’S ENTERTAINMENT!

* Honestly, who in their right fucking mind would EVER name their child “Dewberry”? They should be locked up and prevented from procreating for the remainder of their lives. To earn Ramsey’s distasteful wrath, his only failing (besides those enormous Meatloaf bitch tits) was having slightly burned the rice risotto.

Closed-Captioning for the Criminally Impaired

Over a hundred yearbooks at Mesa Ridge high School in Widefield, CO were recalled due to a poor-taste joke caption under one of students picture that reads: “Most Likely to Assassinate President Bush”, so that the words could be blacked out with a marker before being redistributed.

You mean the Secret Service is also keeping tabs on small town high school yearbooks as well? Holy shit!

Who knew that people really cared or paid attention to acne-marked high school graduates? I had the distinct impression back then at the time that nobody ever did. Perhaps the incidents at Columbine and Red Lake high schools have woken up teachers and parents to be more alert to their children’s behavior and outward responses; or maybe they were really watching us all long?!

Maybe my joke caption didn’t slip under the radar at all?

I wonder if that’s possibly one of the reasons why I’m 32 years old, slaving at a dead end job for 40 hours a week, existing on a strict diet of peanut butter, and living alone with a neutered cat? I mean, if word leaked out to the government, or worse yet, to potential future employers that my own high school yearbook caption read “Most Likely to Spit In the Eye of Authority”?

I’m doomed!

By now, 15 years after I was branded with that fateful yearbook caption, word of my legendary bristling in the face of superiors has probably gotten around to every major significant local employer that I could ever possibly submit a resume to. that's one hell of a yearbook yoke to have hanging around your neck after graduation for the the rest of your life!

Can I help it if Mr. Fast, the Grade 11 English teacher, was a total and complete dipshit? Somebody had to take that 6ft. fucking teddy bear and do SOMETHING!

Mr. Fast, you see, had this huge life-size teddy bear at the front of the class that proudly displayed the signs: WHO? WHAT? WHERE? WHEN? WHY? On a regular basis, we were encouraged to “ask the bear” when writing and editing our way through written essay assignments. If Mr. Fast were ever to question or see fit to criticize anything that had been turned in or was being delivered aloud, he would simply yell: “ask the bear!”

What did this fucking bear know anyways? WHO? WHAT? WHERE? WHEN? WHY? Why all the questions?

To make matters worse, this fucking bear would just stare at me for 90 minutes a day, five days a week, for 10 months of the year! Considering how I feel about normal sized teddy bears as it is, the fact that my desk was then located across from this enormous menacing inquisitive stuffed bear, his glass eyes boring holes into my head, did nothing to make that English class time fly by.

I’m sure Mr. Fast had a point in mind for continually demanding us to “ask the bear”, but I learned to hate that fucking bear. No teddy bear, or dipshit teacher for that matter, were ever going to intimidate me in front of an audience!

And that’s how the bear managed to end up under Mr. Fast’s desk one morning with a pool of melted whip cream around his huge stuffed teddy bear chops, and on Mr. Fast’s desk chair that stood in front of him. The whole twisted scene was something out of a Winnie-the-Pooh porno shoot.

And so this innocent adolescent high school prank had me instantly labeled as a troublemaker. I’m forever bound to a life of underpaid and underappreciated indentured servitude. I could have been “Most Likely to Make You Laugh Until Your Eyes Pop Out”, or “Most Likely to Give You A Spontaneous Orgasm”, and perhaps somehow increased my net stock value in this lifetime…

…but NO!

Fucking bear.

I hope that kid does go all ‘John Wilkes Booth’ on the President’s ass! There, I said it!

"Who's Your Daddy, Charlie Brown?"

Peanuts would never fly with today’s generation of children. Peanuts was barely cool back when I was a kid; much less three decades later with the tougher, wiser, less naïve youths of today. This particular breed of children was weened on Super Nintendo and ECW wrestling, they couldn’t give a shit about some bald loser and his pansy-ass pooch - they eat kids like Charlie Brown before Little League practice!

No longer is Charlie Brown seen as the affable, shy, hopeless dreamer. Now, he’s more identifiable as the guy whose ass you were most likely going to see get handed back to him by every bully, goon, hoodlum, punk, roughneck, ruffian, thug, tough, or felon* down at the at the railroad yard each day after school lets out.

In today’s more dramatic reality-based society, Charlie Brown and the gang wouldn’t more than a sparrow’s fart of an impact on today’s kids. Nobody remembers the Great Pumpkin, or the “Charlie Brown Thanksgiving!” television special. Now they don’t watch anything rated lower than an AA-14 rating.

But I say we give Charlie Brown a rebirth! Lets reintroduce the Peanuts gang back to this jaded world and proactively involve him in more realistic, “tell-it-like-it-is” situations that would more easily appeal to and positively inspire the misguided youths of today.

Why the fuck not? In the last decade alone, they’ve managed to reinvent just about every-fucking-thing else from my childhood! Nothing is sacred! Scooby Doo, Batman, Spiderman, Hulk, Starsky & Hutch, soon to be the Dukes of Hazard; the list just goes on and on!

So lets bring Charlie Brown back into this millennium once again! Of course, I have compiled a list of possible titles for recommended storylines, storyboards, and after school specials:

“That Practice Is Still Illegal in this State, Charlie Brown!”
“The Test Came Back Positive, Charlie Brown!”
“It’s Your First Prostitute, Charlie Brown.”
“It Burns When I Pee, Charlie Brown!”
“It’s Not THAT Kind of Party, Charlie Brown!”
“You’d Better Put Some Cream on That, Charlie Brown!”
A Very Special Charlie Brown Eviction
"Seatbelts Are For Pussies, Charlie Brown!"
“You’re My Forbidden Love, Charlie Brown.”
“It Feels Like Warm Apple Pie, Charlie Brown.”
“That Will Cost you Extra, Charlie Brown.”
“You’re My Bitch Now, Charlie Brown!”
Charlie Brown’s Holiday Intervention
"How About One More For the Road, Charlie Brown?"
“Don’t Get Any In My Hair, Charlie Brown.”
“Why Can’t We Just Cuddle, Charlie Brown?”
“Don’t Worry! Nobody Will Ever See These Photos, Charlie Brown!”
“It’ll Never Fit, Charlie Brown!”
“Have You Seen My Gerbil, Charlie Brown?”
“That’s Not Covered Under Health Care, Charlie Brown!”
“You’re a Junkie, Charlie Brown!”
“Is It Contagious, Charlie Brown?”
“That’s Not How We Do Things Around Here, Charlie Brown.”
“Pass the Lube, Charlie Brown.”
“$50 Now - $50 Later, Charlie Brown.”

WHO couldn’t warm up and look forward to those titles?

* Christ, even fucking Girl Guides beat the living shit out of guys like this!

Stupid Baby Stupid!

“Say I’m crying
I’m looking at what’s on T.V.
Pain and suffering
And the struggle to be free.”
- Disappear

Never were truer words spoken.

We didn’t know it at the time, but even back then, INXS was giving us their sinister omens as to what pop culture catastrophe was laying in wait for us in the near future. Now, years since they slipped back into the musical abyss following the demise of their band’s frontman Michael Hutchinson, who tragically hung himself in part of some weird auto-erotic asphyxiation fantasy, Australian rockers INXS will now be the focus for the newest rendition of reality television: “Rock Star: INXS”.

How shameless is that? If this is what we as a human race have reverted to, then I’m sure that God will surely strike us down for our sins. The mother thunderstorm of all time can only be just on the horizon.

Is that ozone I smell in the air? The rains can’t be far off…

So let me get this straight; their uber-kinky lead singer decides to go all “Suicide Blonde” while wacking off in a strange hotel room, and then years later, they use this as an opportunity as the grounds to launch off a planet-wide talent search to replace him.

I bet poor dirty l’il Michael is rolling over in his grave!

I think it’s safe to say that the only thing that I’m going to be “struggling to be free” from will be the “pain and suffering” that I will be experiencing when watching this fucking program!

The intent of the new television series is to hold auditions on six continents, in 22 cities, to find the top contestants to fly to Hollywood to live together in a mansion and sing each week in a live contest.

Just fucking great – another weekly contestant elimination show! Doesn’t that just make you want to mash your head in with a rubber mallet?

This whole routine reality formula is getting pretty fucking stale if you ask me. With other such mentally stimulating reality shows as The Batchelor (or Bachelorette), Outback Jack, Joe Average, Temptation Island, The Apprentice, etc, etc, etc*, Rock Star: INXS sounds about as delectable as skinless, boneless, unsalted, overboiled, chicken served with a side order of dust bunnies.

It seems like the market for lowbrow shit television is expanding like a newly formed solar system. So I suppose that I had better learn to accept it, get over it, lest I should get bowled over in its wake.

Reality television has become a runaway train – nothing is too sacred, too personal, or too insanely stupid to have an entire television series based around it. Soon, we’ll probably be broadcasting elimination contests about contestants all competing to be the next fluffer on the next U2 World Tour.

Where American Idol cornered the market on premiering bad karaoke to the plugged-in world audience, Rock Star: INXS ups the ante in spades.

Goodie! We get to watch as the same ‘ol talentless hacks, all looking to find their “New Sensation” by butchering classic INXS** hits in their quest to win the opportunity to record an album with INX and tour the world.

Egads! To me, that sounds like a real fucking nightmare!

Just imagine the pivotal episode where the lucky television audience are treated to a particularly rousing rendition of ‘Devil Inside”, by contestant hopeful Xiang Jang Ho from Hong Kong.

“Here come the world
With the look in it’s eye
Future uncertain but certainly slight
Look at the faces
Listen to the bells
It’s hard to believe we need a place called hell.”

And Hell truly will be where I’ll be.

Good God, shoot me now before the rains start!

* Yes, I have overlooked the obvious reality mogul ‘Survivor’. Hey, everybody is allowed to slip from time to time and have at least one guilty indulgence!

** For some reason, the two words “classic” and “INXS” go toether like ketchup and popcorn. I can’t say that I’m hugely partial to INXS's overall mark on the musical world in the late 80’s and early 90’s, but I won’t deny that they occasionally made me tap my foot and windmill the air in front of me at high school dances as well.