Saturday, October 27, 2007

No Title Fits....

This is more than just a cautionary tale, although on that level alone it should be required reading on all our campuses, cinema centers, malls and gallerias. This tale is also a road map to get you where you need to go. Amen.

Our story starts in a large, small or medium sized city or farm, much like where you live! And just like where you live, the sun comes up in the morning, sashays across the sky, and set in the evening, always at dusk. The sun is like a metronome that keeps time in the same arc. Arc-arc!

A boy was born to a man and a woman, just like where you live. His name was He Don’t Know Shit. Later, because we all somehow stupidly believe that the man in a relationship should be older, a girl was born. Her name was She Was Messed Up. And of course it’s so obvious: they met and married, just like kids do where you live. And because like some of the females you know, She Was Messed Up was messed up, she did the hyphenate thingy with her name and became She Was Messed Up-Don’t Know Shit.

Life lived itself, just like where you live, and when He Don’t Know Shit was 80 and She Was Messed Up-Don’t Know Shit was 79, some of their friends, two of whom had known them all their lives, got together to compile a list of accomplishments by the couple, He & She Don’t Know Shit. It turned out that all the couple had done, their entire lives, was live up to their names.

So there you go, and now you know: The rebels in our society, the ones who are for the most part completely happy, want the rest of us to come to the realization that society’s rules are meant to be twisted, bent, splayed, torn, mangled, gouged, shredded, chopped, basted, baked in a 300° oven and served over a bed of rice pilaf, but in a nice way, a way that promotes family values and good scouting, but no cheap wine, get the good stuff...

Here’s a clue: break all the speed limit laws you want, but do it sober. And if you’re pulled over, and the cop says you were doing 80, smile, and make it a genuinely happy smile, with a twinkle in your eyes (metaphorically speaking because we all know you can’t read a gall-darn thing in a human eye) and tell him his radar may need recalibrating because you had your cruise control pegged at 85. Hold the smile, hold the smile.... Sign the ticket, hold the smile...

Wrap your mind around this and pretty soon no one will think you're a Don’t Know Shit. And that’s a good thing.

You know what? I may be preaching to the choir... Carry on...

The Mother AND FATHER! of all Memes!!

If you've read this far, you're tagged! ha-HA!

Here's the meme: You must now live your life as if you had not been tagged. You must be your own ordinary, normal self, doing and saying all the things you would normally do and say; there must be no thoughts and no actions that would reveal to an unsuspecting world that you are no longer you, but that you've become Meme You.

If at any time you feel the urge to confess that it isn't you anymore, but Meme You, you will keep that urge bottled up inside. On pain of whatever you find painful, but not in a sexual way.

Even on your death bed, with your adoring loved ones and creditors gathered round, you must NOT confess that after reading this and being tagged, that the real you ceased to exist and it was the Meme You whose life and accounts payable they are there celebrating. You will take this tag to the grave, incinerator, New Jersey swamp or landfill of whomever's choice.

And the rest of you: no finking!

Now go out and take on the day...

Friday, October 26, 2007

Wherein I am Reminded of a Favorite Novella

Drudge had this link to an "article" in London's Daily Mail. I don't predict the future, I just live the future, and the future is... NOW! Oops, I mean it's NOW! Dang, it keeps becoming the present... Double dang, "now" it's the past! I don't want to scare you, but it's never NOW!!

Anyway, here's the first paragraph:

The human race will one day split into two separate species, an attractive, intelligent ruling elite and an underclass of dim-witted, ugly goblin-like creatures, according to a top scientist.

(What about the dim-witted, attractive offspring of the ruling elite? I have begun a screenplay: Paris Hilton meets superbly hung goblin who sprays Lemon Pledge in his armpits. They fall madly in love and run off to a Goblin-like cave in the Superstition Mountains and Mom & Dad Hilton send David Spade to retrieve her.)

There are already some very marked divisions within homo sapiens. I see it as very limiting to suggest that there will only be two separate species. I see clumpings of beings all along the continuum from the intelligent ruling elite at one end, to the dim-witted, ugly goblin-like creatures I used to date before I met my ruling class wife, at the other end.

An already existing postulation in this vein is Cyril M. Kornbluth's sci-fi novella, The Marching Morons. The basic premise of which was that people of 'lower' classes breed beyond their ability to 'provide' adequately for their offspring. So the numbers of these 'lower' classes grow much, much faster than the 'elite' classes, who start later and temper their productivity. By the time the book opens, a few hundred years in our future, there are billions of morons and only a few million elites, who are running themselves ragged trying to keep order in the world.

Sometimes when I read the Guv's stories about her life in the corporate world, I think about how she's an elite, trapped in a Marching Moron hell, trying to keep order. Guv, you'd love the solution that the elites are handed by a visitor from their past...

Thank you, Jana

Jana sent me this one-liner. I enjoyed the sentiment. But I felt as if I were reading over El Pistolero's shoulder as he penned a new screed. Doesn't this somehow make you think of him?

Speculative adaptation of situational ethics: Some people are like a slinkie: not really good for anything but they bring a smile to your face when you push them down a staircase.

But I can totally assure you that I would NEVER do such a thing if I thought someone was watching.

Thursday, October 25, 2007

Eat a gum drop, go to jail

There's a story on Drudge about a guy who was arrested for petty theft after being video taped "sampling" raspberry flavored jelly beans. (gum drops sounded more mellifluous than jelly beans for titling purposes...)

The arrestee said that he'd been shopping at Albertson's for 30 years and was just seeing if he liked the jelly beans.

I've watched mothers pluck grapes off a bunch and hand them to their kids. I've watched a bummish looking open a carton of orange juice, drink down a healthy gulp, fold up the spout and put it back. And the candy bins... People seem to totally thing they are part of a free candy buffet. People and their kids.

And then weirdly enough, kids can get a free cookie at the bakery. Can you say mixed message?

Anyway, I think people who 'sample' food at the grocery store should be sent to Singapore, whipped with a cane on their bare butts and then returned to America, with a stern warning that next time it will be their genitalia.

It surprised me greatly that all the comments to the story were totally negative towards Albertsons, as if THEY had done something wrong. One person said that he wasn't shopping at Albertson's ever again. I'd have him sent to Singapore just on general principles.

"Well eff me with a babed wire fence!'

I started a book yesterday when I stopped to gas up at a Costco. I like to eat at Costco because the quantities are more than adequate and the price is low. Where else can you drink all the soda in the world for 55 cents?

So I sat there with my combo slice and started the book. I just finished it. A murder mystery. I do love me some fine murder mystery. Good writing, about anything, is fun.

In the midst of the fine writing, the author threw in that phrase titling this blog: "Well eff me with a barbed wire fence." I'm not saying that it isn't fine writing. It was funny, in the context it was found. A major character is told something amazingly surprising and ejaculates that phrase. Because the major character lives in the Great Plains of America, where barbed wire fences are both plentiful and necessary, it is totally in character.

But how does one get effed by a barbed wire fence? Aye, there's the rub...

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Spidey, here I am!!

A fan of the show posted a comment, asking me where I am.

I'm right here, busier than I've ever been, burdened not only by my normal, and increasingly burgeoning activity, but saddled with the CHORE of teaching Big-T how to be a curb-painting wonder boy. Right now we're still hampered by the difficulty Big-T has remembering that a 3 & an E are entirely different things and not at all interchangeable. Damn California edumacational system...

I have not looked at a blog site in ten days. If it weren't for my Blackberry getting copies of the comments posted to my blog, I'd be totally out of the loop. I have some all your blogs (you know who you are) 'Fav-Placed' on my Blackberry, but I don't even have time to read them (in really tiny print...).

Two things are probably propelling the surge in business, the down turn in sales of new and existing housing, and the wild fires.

As part of the sprucing up new and existing housing, the address painted on the curb is getting much warranted attention; nothing says, "I care about my house" more than a spiffy looking curb painting of your street number. And now we're getting lots of orders for people who want fire-resistant paint! As they say in golf, every shot makes somebody happy.

I hope that by the end of this week I'll have some time to devote to reading the blogs of all my Blriends... Or should that be Frienogs? Would you be my Frienog?

Just to prove to you that I've been scurrying here and there, here's a photo of a very unusual vehicle. Which of you was aware that this year is the 15th anniversary of the Power Rangers? And if you knew, did you send a gift?


And yes, that pall in the background is from the Lake Arrowhead fire. But I can't say if it was the Slide Fire or the Grass Valley Fire.

Sunday, October 14, 2007

This Could be True!

Because I don't work in an office, or within a bureaucracy, I don't have a lot in common with a number of you. I did once work for two behemoth national corporations (three if you count the warehouse gig one Christmas at Montgomery-Ward... Do they still exist?); the first experience was bad, because of mediocre managers, but the other was very positive, because my manager was an exceptional human being. But it's not really the same, because I knew I was just passing through...

Anyway, I was trying to memorize the internet again, and came across a bon mot of wisdom for office workers, or cubical monkeys, if you want the truth. And while I recognize the advice is potentially very useful, I can only say this as a hopeful generalization; I will never need to practice this.

The tidbits of information implied that to enjoy being a cubical employee, you need to keep abreast of the latest gossip, and you have to be considered, to at least a slight extent, useful for something other than your job description. (I think this also works for being a kid living at home...)

So now here's the advice:

1. keep a supply of some kind of chocolate candy on your desk. It can be cheap as cheap can be, as long as it's real chocolate. But no nuts! People who don't feel threatened by you will stop by to visit and eat chocolate. In exchange for the chocolate, they will gossip. You will be the winner in this exchange of cheap chocolate for gossip. Knowledge is King.

2. find the owner's manual for the copy machine(s) near your office or on your floor. Get the model number and research it online, find a users forum. Learn that machine! Soon every time the something goes wrong, you'll be the first person called. Your reputation will grow, and soon coworkers and your bosses will assume you're just as good at your job as you are at getting that copier to work.

So there you go, practical advice from the Right Reverend Bertram Bananas, Lz.D. Now go out there and beat up the world and make it cry.

Some Day . . .

Some Day the lion and the lamb will lie down together. The lion will sleep like a baby. The lamb will remain wide-eyed the entire night.

Some Day there will rise to prominence in the field of national politics a man for the masses, who will sell himself to the highest bidder, but only to wear patches on his Brooks Brothers suits advertising the high bidders. Other than that he will vote his conscious and the people will love him so much that the constitution will be amended so that man can be President for life. And the Dow will rise to 3000 during his third administration, after he cancels the national debt and invites any non-citizen holding treasury bonds to kiss his fat brown ass.

Some Day polyandry will become fashionable and the hot, sexy Hollywood Star babes of that time will compete to accumulate gorgeous husbands. In Fly-Over country, the trend will be taken up, and the results will heal America's social ills as smart, tough, beautiful women marry up to five men, of diverse backgrounds. The multiple husbands and their one wife will raise children who will grow up to become leaders of business, education and politics, with resources behind them like nobody could have ever imagined. These women, and their children, will historically be known as the Saviors of Mankind.

Some Day your ability to attain a level of responsibility above "Jerk" will depend on how well you play the game of golf. This has nothing to do with how many strokes it takes for you to complete 18 holes, but rather on how well you relate to those in your group and to the good and bad bounces that flesh and Titleist are heir to. Every interview for a position of trust and responsibility will take place between the first tee and the 18th hole. Of course this means that true psychopaths will do very, very well, but hey, it'll be worth it, because true psychopaths are rare and will be bred out of the population by each mom and her husbands. These golf course interviews will weed out hot heads, whiners, excuse makers, fantasy-heads, goof-offs, braggarts, liars, cheaters. The input from the buxom cart girls will do in the losers who might have sneaked through otherwise.

Some Day governments will be replaced by Blog Sites.

Saturday, October 13, 2007

Impious, perhaps, but curiosity does that to a Man

The gjaudh I grew up with was of Flesh and Bone. There were differing opinions regarding what, if anything, coursed through his blood vessels, if he had blood vessels. I was of the opinion that each Perfect Cell of His Body drew energy from the Radiance that surrounded His Being. And there were no waste products. C'mon! A gjaudh whose Body produced waste products! Are you insane!

So He had a Skeleton, and Muscles, Tendons and Ligaments. And a Brain. I figured most of His Brain was scattered through out various dimensions because it had to be impossibly large! But He didn't need a stomach, or large and small intestines, or a liver, pancreas or spleen. No kidneys, either. And yes, I figured, He has a Belly Button. An Innie. There is a Vast Right Wing Mystery about how He got it. But that's for another day... And no, I was positive His mouth did NOT connect to an anus. Gjaudh has no asshole. Heathens for even thinking that were possible!

Yes, I thought back in my youth, we were made in His image, with some necessary jury-rigging because of our mortal condition. There was no way to get that perfect, because getting it perfect was our job.

As I say, that was then... Now my explanation for the existence of Mankind is Evolution and Practical Jokes. Some day the whole lame story of who did what to whom 7.2 billion years ago will be known to us. Kurt Vonnegut's theory about the Elders of Tralfamadore manipulated Mankind in order to get one of us to deliver a spare part to a space ship marooned on Titan only seems farfetched now. When the truth comes out, no one alive will be able comprehend, much less appreciate, the joke. But I say, let's start trying now.

Coincidence strikes again

It is totally a coincidence that I employ a young man named Ricardo Sanchez. We call him Rick, or Ricky.

Some of you may recognize his name. No, not because Ricky painted your street number on your curb. Although who knows? He's been around...

Nope, you may recognize his name because it is also the name of a former "supreme" commander in Iraq, who was the "supreme" military commander there from June of 2003 until June of 2004. Abu Ghraib happened on his watch.

Gen. Ricardo Sanchez retired last year. Now anti-war activists are in love with him because, to us his words, the conflict in Iraqistan has become a
"nightmare with no end in sight."

Tsk, tsk... such pessimism.

It's his opinion, but not mine. Personally, I don't know where it's promised that wars have to have ends in sight. Ever hear of the 100 Years War? You think people during that time were worried about not having an end in sight? Heck no! They soldiered on because they had no left wing liberal media (medium, probably... just town criers...) telling them they should be against war. I'm not saying Freedom of Speech shouldn't exist, but how often do you hear things worth remembering?

So for the record, I think Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, U.S. Army (ret.) is a pussy. I think he got his panties in a wad because of the criticism that landed on his door step because of Abu Ghraib and I think he's saying things now that he believes will make a significant number of people consider him an American Hero. Yep, he's a hero for speaking out against a war that is only popular with a minority of the American population. As if the majority should rule. Oh yeah, that would be Heaven on Earth.

But I do have to give him some credit: He's saying that the debacle that the war has become is due to the ineptness of the Bush administration. But who doesn't already know that? My world would be much more serene if Bush would announce that he's always been a Democrat at heart but he didn't want to disobey his daddy, who was also a freakin' closeted Democrat. At least our California Governor is finally coming out of the closet.

This is a trick question: Who should we follow?

If you offer no preface, no introductory exposition, the question, taken at face value, is mostly understood to be of a religious or political nature, and the person hearing the question may attempt an answer, naming a religion, a figure in history, a deity or a philosophy, a political party or a supposed way of life.

But back up a second: Remember the last time you looked in a mirror? If you're normal, you may not have been perfectly satisfied with what you saw, but you loved the big lug anyway. Okay, keeping that imperfect, but perfectly lovable big lug in mind, who, or what, should that big lug follow?

Here's my answer: The person who loves you the best. I can't answer that question for you when it comes to religion. Religion involves imaginary beings. Oh, sure, your Superior Being exists, which means you have to admit that upwards of 99% of the world believes in imaginary beings, depending on just how unpopular your Superior Being is.

But when it comes to politics, most humans end up following the person who is doing the best job of loving him or herself, and who has precious little love for his or her followers. Too bad we can't get people to see that. And what with the progress propaganda has made, it gets harder and harder to get this point across.

What I'm saying here is follow yourself. Scary, huh? But remember, most good people are willing to live and let live. All it takes is a recognition that each of us is the center of a vast and potentially very entertaining Universe. If you recognize that the "other guy" wants exactly what you want, and if he recognizes the same thing about you, then the two of you have a basis on which to strike a mutual non-aggression/mutual aid pact. Multiple that by six billion (which could never in a Millennium happen) and you would have paradise on Earth.

I'm just happy that I can golf with a bunch of guys who have made this deal.

Thursday, October 11, 2007

The Bell Shaped Curve... Or how coincidence explains Everything

Many of us have "Rules" we live by. One of my rules is to not be governed by superstition. It was actually painful at first, but now I step on side walk cracks with nary a twinge. I don't go out of my way to break my mother's back, but if it happens, it happens.

There is a fairly broad line between superstition and native caution. For instance, I do NOT believe it is bad luck to stand up in a roller coaster. The reason I won't stand up on a roller coaster is that I could fall out. Nothing good can come of falling out of a roller coaster.

When I hear the lament, "Why do these things always happen to me!?" I know I'm in the presence of either a mathematical anomaly or a person lacking some or all common sense. It's true, there are people who have nothing but bad things happen to them no matter how careful and prudent they are. Coincidence is the explanation. Just as it is possible to flip a coin and have it come up tails 50 times in a row, so it is possible to live a life where nothing ever works out. By the same token, the opposite is true. We all know, and grind our teeth, at people who fall into a pile of manure just as we're getting a cold...

Not that it matters, because life is a meaningless succession of days (and nights), from birth to death, with no point whatsoever, in a cold, heartless tick-tock Universe.

Sometimes I'll step outside of myself and make an impartial analysis of myself and then I'll ruthlessly tell myself, "No matter how much you practice, you're never going to beat Tiger Woods over the course of a four day tournament.

Nope, I'll have to be satisfied with beating him in one match play event.

You should try to be realistic... Have you made peace with your limitations?

Indignation

Indignation and Indigestion have a lot in common. Basically, what they have in common is that you can't tell what will set them off. The causes, for each, can be varied. I can eat tuna salad that's been sitting in the sun for two hours and be fine. People of more refinement could not do such a thing. I'd puke my guts out if I had to eat tofu burgers, people of more refinement would be in seventh heaven. I've pointed out the extremes of the continuum, but these differences exit all along the continuum.

With regard to indignation, I can watch happy Black people looting up a Korean liquor store and not be indignant. People with more refinement would frown heavily, being gravely indignant. If a person who weighed less than me and didn't have any big friends around tried to kick a stray dog, I'd express a good deal of hostile indignation towards that person. Someone of more refinement might simply look away, so as not to arose indignation in the dog kicker.

With regard to indigestion I don't tell people what to eat, but I do express opinions about things I wouldn't eat. They're just opinions...

I'm pretty much the same way with indignation. No one is going to talk me out of being indignant about the things that make me indignant, and I realize that it's pointless to tell an indignant individual, "Hey, don't be indignant..." So I don't, I won't.

I think there are times we express being alive by taking up a crusade of indignation. The Rev. Al Sharpton told me I was full of White Devil crap, but I think he's prejudiced.

What makes you indignant and is it a way of life or just a hobby?

Tuesday, October 09, 2007

An Alternative to the Truth

But first, what is "Truth?" Truth is a lot of things. Who can argue with that? And sometimes there are things you don't want other people to know. Which is why you end up suing the publishers and authors of unauthorized biographies. And you write your own life story, an oughter-biography, to tell the story of your life as is oughter be told.

Which is why I am so absolutely certain that non-fiction is an alternative to the truth.

Seriously, if answering a question truthfully requires more than "yes" or "no," you're not going to hear The Truth. 'Nano-fibs" always creep in. This is why God, in His/Her/Its infinite wisdom did NOT make lying, except in that one narrow category, a sin.

Yours in Truth,

Bert Bananas, tin horn deity


P.S.: Seriously, isn't the concept of a nano-fib a liberating concept? "Aw, Gladys, it was just a nano-fib!"

Falling in Love is like committing a Murder...

Oh, I think I may have gotten that wrong. Or maybe not...

Drudge has a headline: Russian Serial killer says murder is like love. (I changed the font to "Georgia" because that's the closest I could get to something Russian.)

I didn't read the article, except for this one sentence: "...when he first strangled a man it was like falling in love for the first time."


But here's the food for thought, the nugget of brainial energy that makes reading stuff like this worthwhile: How can a serial killer know what falling in love for the first time is like? It's extremely difficult to suppose that a serial killer can relate to another human being with "Love." Okay, John Cusack maybe in Grosse Pointe Blank... but he was just immoral when it came to the value of human life, and not actually a murderer for the pleasure of murder its ownself. And so falling in love with Minnie Driver wasn't a stretch?

But back to the issue of whether or not Falling in Love is like committing a Murder? Is the facto really the ipso?

Okay, this is a very difficult issue. It's easy to define murder, but not so easy to define falling in love. It was easy when I was in high school: Falling in love just meant finding a girl who would let me past first base. The innocence of youth. (everyone sigh, heavily)

Then when I was old enough to be tricked into getting married by any woman with an alleged positive pregnancy test, falling in love became a much more tricky proposition. (If you diagram 'tricky proposition' it ends up meaning sex with a hooker...)

Which makes me wonder if hookers fall in love or commit murder? Why not, they're human.

So to sum up, falling in murder is like committing a love. I think the Russian guy would agree.

So here's the deal...

I've been busy. Because my little curb address business is going nuts. We've getting some nice "assignments" lately, which take a lot of time, but pay a lot of money. And then the second supervisor I hired and trained quit. So I'm two for two in training and then losing good people. But I can't blame them. Like the first one, the second one took a job with 'benefits.' Geez! It's like they planned on getting sick and aging and then retiring! What pessimists!!

I still have an office lady, and she has stepped up to the plate and taken on new responsibilities. A very nice, and unexpected, bonus. Also, I hired a replacement supervisor. And when I put in my order, with the LDS Employment Agency of course, it was for a 'stay at home' mom who could work from home using the hours available to her. (The thing about Mormons who use the LDS employment agency, you can TRUST them!) But I have to train her from scratch. She knows NOTHING about painting addresses on curbs!

But now here's the thing that really has me jazzed. Or a variation on that theme... I think it's more the humor in it that has me going... Big T said that he's off now on Mondays and Tuesdays... He called me both yesterday and today to ask if I wanted to play golf. What an idiot question! Of course I did! But I couldn't. When I said it was because I was too busy, he made mention of his two new days off. So I immediately asked him how much he wanted an hour. He named his price and I immediately hired him. Only it wasn't a formal hiring. I still have to 'Jew' him down (Hey, it's okay for me to say that, as I am a big fan of Israel and loose Jewish women) to a more realistic hourly rate...

But can't you just see Big T driving around in my patented customer attractor, drumming up business and entertaining the crowds? I think he's a natural !!

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Jesse's Girl . . .

I found this pretty cool internet radio station, Pandora.com. You do have to register after 24 hours of listening, but it's free. In return, you get to create your own radio station. You name your station and then give them the name of a song or an artist and they find songs in that artist or song's style. You can create quite a number of stations and then either play one station, or do a shuffle between your different stations.

What's cool is that if they play a song you don't like, you click on the thumbs down icon and the song is replaced by a new song, and you won't hear the song you 'thumbed down' for at least 30 days. So this works for a song that you eventually get tired of hearing.

There are commercials constantly visible on the screen, but with tabbed browsing I only go to that screen to thumbs up or thumbs down a song.

So tonight I was listening to my one station, named Heart Radio, and Jesse's Girl came on. I totally grove on this song, not for the words, but for the beat/melody. I was in my office and I jumped up, closed the door and cranked up the volume. Then I grabbed a pair of 50 lb dumbbells and started slinging them around (...okay, they weren't 50 lbs each, but there was a 5 on each one...). I did some curls, then some reverse curls, then some presses, then back to curls... two-thirds of the way through the song I was begging for it to end. I could have been seriously injured if they'd played the 16 minute concert version. I made it through the song and then put the dumbbells down and went and complained (yeah, okay, whined...) to my wife, trying to get some sympathy.

I got none.

On top of that, I'm going to have to take an Advil tonight, so that I don't wake up all achy. I want to be loose and limber for golf. We're playing at a course I've never played at before. Virginity becomes me.