11.24.2004
as you have no doubt been alerted to by now [because you won't shut up about it - ed.], i was robbed last month when i comically fell asleep in a queens-bound subway at four o'clock in the morning whilst wearing a red sox hat. for one glorious train ride from queens to brooklyn, i was one NO FAT CHICKS t-shirt away from being the dumbest person alive. to be fair: it wasn't as dumb as the time i opened up my tanning salon in East St. Louis, and not quite as dumb as getting my "Max Headroom... Catch the Wave!" tattoo, but it ranks right up there.
what McGruff never told us, though, is that there's a plus side to getting robbed... namely, new phones (minus all my contacts, but still). when i went to pick up the afore-mentioned phone, however, i was told by my friendly non-english-speaking Sprint representative that i didn't have insurance "versus" loss, so it looked as though i would have to pay through the nose for a replacement. after making a mental note to look up the origins of the phrase "pay through the nose" and, subsequently, deciding i'd rather not know, i started to look for ways to cheat the system. through a stroke of good fortune (origin: also unknown), my friendly nonresident Sprint representative apparently hated everything her company ever stood for, and was soon hell-bent upon scoring me a free phone.
i won't get into the specifics of her plan mostly because her limited language skills made it sound as though the plan involved "baking services" and teleportation, but it was a doozy.
thirty minutes later i was walking out of the store with a shiny new camera phone and specific instructions to call Sprint service within 24 hours and, for some reason, cancel my phone service, then call right back and tell them that my phone wasn't working. i did as i was told, but just to be safe i made the call from a local bakery service. miracle of miracles, the dim bulb on the other end of the line was as confused by my request as i was, but hated his employers enough to give me my old number back anyway and thank me for choosing such an exceptionally inept cellular carrier. had science invented a way to transmit free lollipops over phone lines by now, i'd have been sucking one.
as per the Standard Operating Procedure handbook that accompanied the phone, i dutifully ignored all of the important organizational features and made every effort to master the finer nuances of sophisticated photojournalism. first piece de resistance: Stormtrooper avec Pretzel.
while i realize that the pretzel he bought is not actually visible in either photo, i believe that the concept of twisted dough resonates throughout.
stay tuned for next week's posting of my latest work, tentatively entitled Petite Chien, un Wookie, et le Taxi.
nathan filibustered at 1:14:00 PM
as you have no doubt been alerted to by now [because you won't shut up about it - ed.], i was robbed last month when i comically fell asleep in a queens-bound subway at four o'clock in the morning whilst wearing a red sox hat. for one glorious train ride from queens to brooklyn, i was one NO FAT CHICKS t-shirt away from being the dumbest person alive. to be fair: it wasn't as dumb as the time i opened up my tanning salon in East St. Louis, and not quite as dumb as getting my "Max Headroom... Catch the Wave!" tattoo, but it ranks right up there.
what McGruff never told us, though, is that there's a plus side to getting robbed... namely, new phones (minus all my contacts, but still). when i went to pick up the afore-mentioned phone, however, i was told by my friendly non-english-speaking Sprint representative that i didn't have insurance "versus" loss, so it looked as though i would have to pay through the nose for a replacement. after making a mental note to look up the origins of the phrase "pay through the nose" and, subsequently, deciding i'd rather not know, i started to look for ways to cheat the system. through a stroke of good fortune (origin: also unknown), my friendly nonresident Sprint representative apparently hated everything her company ever stood for, and was soon hell-bent upon scoring me a free phone.
i won't get into the specifics of her plan mostly because her limited language skills made it sound as though the plan involved "baking services" and teleportation, but it was a doozy.
thirty minutes later i was walking out of the store with a shiny new camera phone and specific instructions to call Sprint service within 24 hours and, for some reason, cancel my phone service, then call right back and tell them that my phone wasn't working. i did as i was told, but just to be safe i made the call from a local bakery service. miracle of miracles, the dim bulb on the other end of the line was as confused by my request as i was, but hated his employers enough to give me my old number back anyway and thank me for choosing such an exceptionally inept cellular carrier. had science invented a way to transmit free lollipops over phone lines by now, i'd have been sucking one.
as per the Standard Operating Procedure handbook that accompanied the phone, i dutifully ignored all of the important organizational features and made every effort to master the finer nuances of sophisticated photojournalism. first piece de resistance: Stormtrooper avec Pretzel.
while i realize that the pretzel he bought is not actually visible in either photo, i believe that the concept of twisted dough resonates throughout.
stay tuned for next week's posting of my latest work, tentatively entitled Petite Chien, un Wookie, et le Taxi.
nathan filibustered at 1:14:00 PM
11.19.2004
i'm small town. i know that.
the majority of my formative years, meaning those years spanning from original nintendo through the salad years of the turbografx-16, were spent getting used to the smell of cow poop, in marshfield, wisconsin.
this is not at all important to you, but vital to this story. so, i now live in new york, a place where, just today (and i swear to you that i am telling the truth) i saw a fully dressed storm trooper order a hot pretzel, "no mustard," outside Madison Square Garden, then 5 minutes later jay-z's maybach park in front of my place of business (he owns an apartment on the block). in marshfield, the biggest news story i can recall off hand from my high school days is some kid tossing a bowling ball into oncoming traffic off of, now that i think about it, the only bridge in town.
all of this, of course, i expected when i moved to new york. i read about this kind of thing. friends tell me these bizarre things all the time, yet years of practice allow them to act casual about it.
Jill: "Last night I ran into Dolph Lundgren, again, and eventually we ran into Baron von Taco at his club. The three of us ended up sailing his catamaran up to the mayor's house and doing rainbow jello shots." Sara: "I knew I forgot to call someone... Baron von Taco and I are supposed to go to the Knicks game tonight with the voice of the Geico lizard."
i'm careful not to be impressed. of course, no one had warned me about the B&H Photo Video Pro Audio Super Store (thenceforth referred to as B&H). my boss ordered me to pick up some video stuff from them, and warned me that, as a small town kid, i was going to either love it or hate it. this sounded strange, because that's generally not a standard description of a purveyor of professional-quality audio/video goods. but they pulled a quick one on me. for easy visual reference:
+ 
= B&H
every employee is an orthodox jew. they're steeped in religion and hot deals on camcorders. i didn't see it coming. this, to a marshfieldian, is equivalent to an Olive Garden being run by the Blue Man Group. which helps explain, i think, what happened next.
i was doing great at first. i only mildly chortled when the guy at the door asked to hold onto my bag [a.k.a. man purse] for me, and said "It's our policy." he meant the store's policy, of course. i pressed on and went about finding whatever it was that my boss was running low on. there's a joke there, but making it would guarantee that he somehow spills a beer on his keyboard and this site's address gets punched in while he's wiping it up. too risky.
anyway, upon checking out, i went to go pick up my bag from the nice gentlemen with the curls at the front of the store. while waiting in line, little number tag in hand, a voice behind me said, "I like your shoes. I almost bought the same ones." now, if i were on my game, i would have turned around and said something like, "You should have, because, frankly, yours look like two jellyfish wearing corsets." when i turned around, though, i saw [almost exactly] this:
at this point, the unholy marriage of earlocks and electronics, combined with the Possible Supermodel Sans Descernable Bra, rendered me legally retarded and I heard myself say, quote: "Rye."
She smiled, clearly out of pity, and before I could think of anything that might cover my tracks, like "Rye... is the name of the Labrador Retriever puppy I will buy for you on our first anniversary," or, better, "Rye... I got these shoes at Rye.com,"
defeated, i picked up my man purse (not helping things either probably) and walked out onto 9th Avenue, a changed man.
what a town.
nathan filibustered at 3:47:00 PM
i'm small town. i know that.
the majority of my formative years, meaning those years spanning from original nintendo through the salad years of the turbografx-16, were spent getting used to the smell of cow poop, in marshfield, wisconsin.
this is not at all important to you, but vital to this story. so, i now live in new york, a place where, just today (and i swear to you that i am telling the truth) i saw a fully dressed storm trooper order a hot pretzel, "no mustard," outside Madison Square Garden, then 5 minutes later jay-z's maybach park in front of my place of business (he owns an apartment on the block). in marshfield, the biggest news story i can recall off hand from my high school days is some kid tossing a bowling ball into oncoming traffic off of, now that i think about it, the only bridge in town.
all of this, of course, i expected when i moved to new york. i read about this kind of thing. friends tell me these bizarre things all the time, yet years of practice allow them to act casual about it.
Jill: "Last night I ran into Dolph Lundgren, again, and eventually we ran into Baron von Taco at his club. The three of us ended up sailing his catamaran up to the mayor's house and doing rainbow jello shots." Sara: "I knew I forgot to call someone... Baron von Taco and I are supposed to go to the Knicks game tonight with the voice of the Geico lizard."
i'm careful not to be impressed. of course, no one had warned me about the B&H Photo Video Pro Audio Super Store (thenceforth referred to as B&H). my boss ordered me to pick up some video stuff from them, and warned me that, as a small town kid, i was going to either love it or hate it. this sounded strange, because that's generally not a standard description of a purveyor of professional-quality audio/video goods. but they pulled a quick one on me. for easy visual reference:
+ = B&H
every employee is an orthodox jew. they're steeped in religion and hot deals on camcorders. i didn't see it coming. this, to a marshfieldian, is equivalent to an Olive Garden being run by the Blue Man Group. which helps explain, i think, what happened next.
i was doing great at first. i only mildly chortled when the guy at the door asked to hold onto my bag [a.k.a. man purse] for me, and said "It's our policy." he meant the store's policy, of course. i pressed on and went about finding whatever it was that my boss was running low on. there's a joke there, but making it would guarantee that he somehow spills a beer on his keyboard and this site's address gets punched in while he's wiping it up. too risky.
anyway, upon checking out, i went to go pick up my bag from the nice gentlemen with the curls at the front of the store. while waiting in line, little number tag in hand, a voice behind me said, "I like your shoes. I almost bought the same ones." now, if i were on my game, i would have turned around and said something like, "You should have, because, frankly, yours look like two jellyfish wearing corsets." when i turned around, though, i saw [almost exactly] this:
at this point, the unholy marriage of earlocks and electronics, combined with the Possible Supermodel Sans Descernable Bra, rendered me legally retarded and I heard myself say, quote: "Rye."
She smiled, clearly out of pity, and before I could think of anything that might cover my tracks, like "Rye... is the name of the Labrador Retriever puppy I will buy for you on our first anniversary," or, better, "Rye... I got these shoes at Rye.com,"
defeated, i picked up my man purse (not helping things either probably) and walked out onto 9th Avenue, a changed man.
what a town.
nathan filibustered at 3:47:00 PM
11.18.2004
a paper left behind on the W train this morning mentioned a random shooting. as a literary counterweight, here is a random shout out:
alison h. sent this to me on sunday, september 20, 1998, and i hope to one day determine whether she was trying to tell me she was a vampire or asking for my hand in marriage. either way, call me.
I am tired without you, who's length is above equal sometimes turned between my consciousness walls of thought meaning I would like to remember exactly keeping nobody. You've just enjoyed her world somewhat for a moment but experience suggests further very changed skin touch here for no order however certain wants are ideal. Little dressing seems simply elegant looking for someone completely exclusive responding easier casual doesn't end anything indifferent nothing ever was a result. Get that urge once so choose strange while big always sensual never common both waiting and living vision has made following lifestyle most attractive even before you swept it. She's all maybe friends who nobody or anybody or whatever can fall sleeping warning your time your drama your energy. The perfecting just very becomes me. -A.
elsewhere, sondreal sent me another perfect email in october of 2000; more concise, yet melodious nonetheless methinks.
I moved into a new apartment this weekend.
I saw a dead bird on the sidewalk on my way to work this morning.
And I just ate the perfect banana.
nathan filibustered at 5:02:00 PM
a paper left behind on the W train this morning mentioned a random shooting. as a literary counterweight, here is a random shout out:
alison h. sent this to me on sunday, september 20, 1998, and i hope to one day determine whether she was trying to tell me she was a vampire or asking for my hand in marriage. either way, call me.
I am tired without you, who's length is above equal sometimes turned between my consciousness walls of thought meaning I would like to remember exactly keeping nobody. You've just enjoyed her world somewhat for a moment but experience suggests further very changed skin touch here for no order however certain wants are ideal. Little dressing seems simply elegant looking for someone completely exclusive responding easier casual doesn't end anything indifferent nothing ever was a result. Get that urge once so choose strange while big always sensual never common both waiting and living vision has made following lifestyle most attractive even before you swept it. She's all maybe friends who nobody or anybody or whatever can fall sleeping warning your time your drama your energy. The perfecting just very becomes me. -A.
elsewhere, sondreal sent me another perfect email in october of 2000; more concise, yet melodious nonetheless methinks.
I moved into a new apartment this weekend.
I saw a dead bird on the sidewalk on my way to work this morning.
And I just ate the perfect banana.
nathan filibustered at 5:02:00 PM
11.15.2004
with your permission (or, rather, barring any death threats relating to this post), i will try to make this a regular feature.*
here's a direct transcription of an interview for a television show that i may or may not work for which may or not have something to do with stories about weddings. names have, and will, been changed to protect these peoples' identities from their junior high grammar instructors.
GABE: "I think it's going to be weird saying she's my wife now. But it feels right, so, but I think when I go on my honeymoon and say 'This is my wife' instead of 'This is my fiancee' or 'This is my girlfriend.' It's the like same transition as me saying, like, from 'This is my girlfriend' to 'This is my fiancee' or to 'This is my wife.' And it's weird. But it's something that I'm going to look forward to, is saying that I have a wife."
busy day today, so i'm looking forward to writing more tomorrow, which is kind of like saying that, if i were busy yesterday, and wouldn't be busy today, that i was going to write more today. but it's something that i'm looking forward to, which is writing tomorrow.
nathan filibustered at 4:57:00 PM
with your permission (or, rather, barring any death threats relating to this post), i will try to make this a regular feature.*
here's a direct transcription of an interview for a television show that i may or may not work for which may or not have something to do with stories about weddings. names have, and will, been changed to protect these peoples' identities from their junior high grammar instructors.
GABE: "I think it's going to be weird saying she's my wife now. But it feels right, so, but I think when I go on my honeymoon and say 'This is my wife' instead of 'This is my fiancee' or 'This is my girlfriend.' It's the like same transition as me saying, like, from 'This is my girlfriend' to 'This is my fiancee' or to 'This is my wife.' And it's weird. But it's something that I'm going to look forward to, is saying that I have a wife."
busy day today, so i'm looking forward to writing more tomorrow, which is kind of like saying that, if i were busy yesterday, and wouldn't be busy today, that i was going to write more today. but it's something that i'm looking forward to, which is writing tomorrow.
*assuming i can remember.
nathan filibustered at 4:57:00 PM
11.12.2004
no way is that a real yoga position.
as i peer out my trusty office window, some guy on the fifth floor of the building across the street is either doing yoga or to attempting to pass the giant saguaro cactus he ate for breakfast. my gut tells me that whomever showed this guy how to do this move is not really a certified instructor at all; rather, some office workers downstairs from me showed up to work drunk one day, saw this wuss across the street, and spent the rest of the month taking turns posing as a yogi and teaching him progressively more ridiculous positions.
as i write this, they are two floors down with a camcorder and a fifth of scotch, taking their turn as the happiest people in the world.
because no way is that yoga.
nathan filibustered at 11:43:00 AM
no way is that a real yoga position.
as i peer out my trusty office window, some guy on the fifth floor of the building across the street is either doing yoga or to attempting to pass the giant saguaro cactus he ate for breakfast. my gut tells me that whomever showed this guy how to do this move is not really a certified instructor at all; rather, some office workers downstairs from me showed up to work drunk one day, saw this wuss across the street, and spent the rest of the month taking turns posing as a yogi and teaching him progressively more ridiculous positions.
as i write this, they are two floors down with a camcorder and a fifth of scotch, taking their turn as the happiest people in the world.
because no way is that yoga.
nathan filibustered at 11:43:00 AM
11.10.2004
Our prisoner asked us to give you this. Thanks -- V.G.
if you are reading this then the vincents have made good on their promise.
i imagine i've been here for at least 2 weeks, though my sense of time's passing has been muddied by an utter lack of natural light. never trust a gas station restroom. how could i have seen it coming? i can understand the squalor normally associated with such a place, but when i am abducted by three vincent gallos mid-micturation and dragged by my feet through a secret door in the graffitied wall, i can not help but reevaluate the natural order of things.
three vincent gallos. i didn't immediately make the association, but the inhabitants of this subterranean society all bear much more than a passing resemblance to said actor/director. i first postulated that they were brothers, but soon found myself in a underground barracks of approximately two hundred of them, and had to abandon the theory.
there are no women to speak of.
the vincents speak some sort of vague bridge-and-tunnel english but do so very sparingly, and what little they do say offers no clue as to their intentions, much less the nature of their being. my questions are met by looks of mild comprehension but, ultimately, indifference.
"what do they want from me?" i marvel, often aloud.
it's certainly not my money, as they all dress to the nines in a laissez faire millionaire sort of way. dolce and gabbana. diesel. rem garson. bruno magli loafers. this extravagance is in sharp contrast to the afore-mentioned surroundings, which essentially are an extension of the gas station restroom. the floor's tiles, once white i presume, are now plaque. water is dripping from a thousand unseen sources, and the fluorescents hum away overhead, some flickering lazily. the collective works of irving berlin emanates from one of the tunnels, though i can not seem to pinpoint which one. their diet (and therefore mine) consists entirely of gas station sandwiches and pall malls. i roam free but can not hope to navigate the maze of tunnels back to the restroom.
what is happening to my car? i left the restroom key on the sink. would any police officer of sound mind check the walls behind the urinal for a secret entrance to an underground vincent gallo sanctuary? hardly standard procedure.
an hour ago i was approached by one of my captors (he may well have been one of the original three, but can't be sure) and was promised that i could compose a letter to the outside. scribbling on the nutritional labels of discarded vacuum-packed tuna sandwiches, i can only hope that they will make good on their promise to post this.
i will find my way out of here before long (with or without the vincents' blessing)... rest assured.
.
nathan filibustered at 2:29:00 PM
Our prisoner asked us to give you this. Thanks -- V.G.
if you are reading this then the vincents have made good on their promise.
i imagine i've been here for at least 2 weeks, though my sense of time's passing has been muddied by an utter lack of natural light. never trust a gas station restroom. how could i have seen it coming? i can understand the squalor normally associated with such a place, but when i am abducted by three vincent gallos mid-micturation and dragged by my feet through a secret door in the graffitied wall, i can not help but reevaluate the natural order of things.
three vincent gallos. i didn't immediately make the association, but the inhabitants of this subterranean society all bear much more than a passing resemblance to said actor/director. i first postulated that they were brothers, but soon found myself in a underground barracks of approximately two hundred of them, and had to abandon the theory.
there are no women to speak of.
the vincents speak some sort of vague bridge-and-tunnel english but do so very sparingly, and what little they do say offers no clue as to their intentions, much less the nature of their being. my questions are met by looks of mild comprehension but, ultimately, indifference.
"what do they want from me?" i marvel, often aloud.
it's certainly not my money, as they all dress to the nines in a laissez faire millionaire sort of way. dolce and gabbana. diesel. rem garson. bruno magli loafers. this extravagance is in sharp contrast to the afore-mentioned surroundings, which essentially are an extension of the gas station restroom. the floor's tiles, once white i presume, are now plaque. water is dripping from a thousand unseen sources, and the fluorescents hum away overhead, some flickering lazily. the collective works of irving berlin emanates from one of the tunnels, though i can not seem to pinpoint which one. their diet (and therefore mine) consists entirely of gas station sandwiches and pall malls. i roam free but can not hope to navigate the maze of tunnels back to the restroom.
what is happening to my car? i left the restroom key on the sink. would any police officer of sound mind check the walls behind the urinal for a secret entrance to an underground vincent gallo sanctuary? hardly standard procedure.
an hour ago i was approached by one of my captors (he may well have been one of the original three, but can't be sure) and was promised that i could compose a letter to the outside. scribbling on the nutritional labels of discarded vacuum-packed tuna sandwiches, i can only hope that they will make good on their promise to post this.
i will find my way out of here before long (with or without the vincents' blessing)... rest assured.
.
nathan filibustered at 2:29:00 PM
11.09.2004
Uh oh.
If Tuesday night's election results are any indication, 58,000,000 Americans think they either own Disney Land or will have the resources to buy one at some point in the next four years.
If you voted for the incumbent president [capitalization mine] Tuesday, you are either (a) reading this email from the holo-deck level of your Vector 9 Personal Flying Fortress whilst having money fights with the Hilton sisters, (b) wearing Velcro shoes, a bib, and your "magic" helmet, (c) comically trying to fix your time machine in order to get back to good ol' 1919, (d) one of the reanimated corpses Cheney keeps in Area 51 till election days, (e) a Nazi, or (f) convinced that your clever "What Would Jesus Do" license plate variation, WWJ-DEW, will get you preferential treatment when you ascend to the Kingdom of Heaven in a dove-drawn chariot, and certainly makes up for the time you caught yourself admiring the way Hank's Cotton Dockers hugged his special area.
And/Or you happen to live in Utah (almost 70% for W). For fun, try telling a friend that the company you work for is transferring you to Utah, and take a picture of their reaction. Now, tell a different friend that you just found out that you contracted genital herpes, and take another picture. Lastly, find a third friend and ask him/her to match each picture to its corresponding announcement. To do so is impossible.
To be fair, Oklahoma wasn't much better (66% pro-Dubya). Mind you, this is the last state in the union to encourage its elected Congressmen to engage in pork barrel politics by actually shipping genuine barrels of wieners from the District of Columbia to Tulsa by boxcar. Interesting fact: If you type "millionaire from Oklahoma" into Google, the first page that pops up is about an Eastern Oklahoma State College Phi Beta Lambda presentation entitled "Millionaire Square" which features, swear to God, a Monopoly tournament. Translation: Dear Oklahoma, George W. Bush could not possibly care less about you.
Can America really be this anti-intellectual (that means dumb)? I mean, I'm an idiot; I still pause whenever a broadcaster uses "auspicious" or "inauspicious" to describe the beginning of a sporting event in which one of the teams seriously screws something up. However, when I ask my brain to tinker with the notion of living in a country where more people trust an ex-alcoholic, ex-coke head, current-simpleton than a forthright public servant, my brain starts looking for an escape hatch. It's a dark day when, were someone to ask me who I'd rather have babysitting my kids, the Leader of the Free World or That Host From The Weakest Link, I'd answer "the latter" without any hesitation.
It's wholly embarrassing. The civilized world would SO be making fun of us if only our being morons didn't equate to the entire planet being, um, bent over. Diplomatically (and bad-allegorically) speaking, we've gone from class valedictorian to brash jock to that bully from fourth grade with the facial hair in a little over 200 years. No one likes us, and most of us don't blame them. Want to hear something really stupid, and by stupid I mean poignant for me? I used to get all misty watching reruns of the 1980 Miracle on Ice on ESPN Classic, and now, when I play sports video games that feature international tournaments, I refuse to play with the U.S. team. I just will not do it. Instead, I'm more likely to choose France and yell things like "Where are your Freedom Fries NOW, bitch?" with my best Pepe le Pew accent whenever I score upon the hapless American goaltender.
Here's a fun exercise intended to help you relate to the Republican mindset: rent a copy of "Hercules In New York" and promptly break into the nearest mansion to watch it. Before you do so, however, get out your checkbook and write yourself a check for a "Ka-jillion and NO/100's Dollars." Now, press PLAY on the movie and start beating yourself in the face with the business end of a meat tenderizer until you start to think that the guy playing "Arnold Strong" would make a good governor and you feel compelled to go cash that check in order to donate to his campaign. If you swear that you can see a reflection of the Virgin Mary in a window one of the buildings in the background, give yourself an extra point, then dial the paramedics.
I just can't quite figure it out. What's more, I'm a little concerned about living in New York now that we have four more years of a smug, fleetingly-coherent primate as our spokesman to the rest of the world. Of course, I'm assuming that I won't be drafted and, due to W's creative budget allocations, dropped off in Fallujah with nothing but a pack of Girl Scout Thin Mints, a Halliburton windbreaker, and a length of "sharpened" rope.
That being said, who's ready to move to Italy with me? Or wait! An island of some sort? I could buy a dinghy and giggle whenever anyone made even a casual reference to it. Let me know, because we need an exit strategy, and the only sand I want to see anytime soon is the kind that's underneath my flip flops and bordered by a big damn ocean.
Any takers?
nathan filibustered at 5:15:00 PM
Uh oh.
If Tuesday night's election results are any indication, 58,000,000 Americans think they either own Disney Land or will have the resources to buy one at some point in the next four years.
If you voted for the incumbent president [capitalization mine] Tuesday, you are either (a) reading this email from the holo-deck level of your Vector 9 Personal Flying Fortress whilst having money fights with the Hilton sisters, (b) wearing Velcro shoes, a bib, and your "magic" helmet, (c) comically trying to fix your time machine in order to get back to good ol' 1919, (d) one of the reanimated corpses Cheney keeps in Area 51 till election days, (e) a Nazi, or (f) convinced that your clever "What Would Jesus Do" license plate variation, WWJ-DEW, will get you preferential treatment when you ascend to the Kingdom of Heaven in a dove-drawn chariot, and certainly makes up for the time you caught yourself admiring the way Hank's Cotton Dockers hugged his special area.
And/Or you happen to live in Utah (almost 70% for W). For fun, try telling a friend that the company you work for is transferring you to Utah, and take a picture of their reaction. Now, tell a different friend that you just found out that you contracted genital herpes, and take another picture. Lastly, find a third friend and ask him/her to match each picture to its corresponding announcement. To do so is impossible.
To be fair, Oklahoma wasn't much better (66% pro-Dubya). Mind you, this is the last state in the union to encourage its elected Congressmen to engage in pork barrel politics by actually shipping genuine barrels of wieners from the District of Columbia to Tulsa by boxcar. Interesting fact: If you type "millionaire from Oklahoma" into Google, the first page that pops up is about an Eastern Oklahoma State College Phi Beta Lambda presentation entitled "Millionaire Square" which features, swear to God, a Monopoly tournament. Translation: Dear Oklahoma, George W. Bush could not possibly care less about you.
Can America really be this anti-intellectual (that means dumb)? I mean, I'm an idiot; I still pause whenever a broadcaster uses "auspicious" or "inauspicious" to describe the beginning of a sporting event in which one of the teams seriously screws something up. However, when I ask my brain to tinker with the notion of living in a country where more people trust an ex-alcoholic, ex-coke head, current-simpleton than a forthright public servant, my brain starts looking for an escape hatch. It's a dark day when, were someone to ask me who I'd rather have babysitting my kids, the Leader of the Free World or That Host From The Weakest Link, I'd answer "the latter" without any hesitation.
It's wholly embarrassing. The civilized world would SO be making fun of us if only our being morons didn't equate to the entire planet being, um, bent over. Diplomatically (and bad-allegorically) speaking, we've gone from class valedictorian to brash jock to that bully from fourth grade with the facial hair in a little over 200 years. No one likes us, and most of us don't blame them. Want to hear something really stupid, and by stupid I mean poignant for me? I used to get all misty watching reruns of the 1980 Miracle on Ice on ESPN Classic, and now, when I play sports video games that feature international tournaments, I refuse to play with the U.S. team. I just will not do it. Instead, I'm more likely to choose France and yell things like "Where are your Freedom Fries NOW, bitch?" with my best Pepe le Pew accent whenever I score upon the hapless American goaltender.
Here's a fun exercise intended to help you relate to the Republican mindset: rent a copy of "Hercules In New York" and promptly break into the nearest mansion to watch it. Before you do so, however, get out your checkbook and write yourself a check for a "Ka-jillion and NO/100's Dollars." Now, press PLAY on the movie and start beating yourself in the face with the business end of a meat tenderizer until you start to think that the guy playing "Arnold Strong" would make a good governor and you feel compelled to go cash that check in order to donate to his campaign. If you swear that you can see a reflection of the Virgin Mary in a window one of the buildings in the background, give yourself an extra point, then dial the paramedics.
I just can't quite figure it out. What's more, I'm a little concerned about living in New York now that we have four more years of a smug, fleetingly-coherent primate as our spokesman to the rest of the world. Of course, I'm assuming that I won't be drafted and, due to W's creative budget allocations, dropped off in Fallujah with nothing but a pack of Girl Scout Thin Mints, a Halliburton windbreaker, and a length of "sharpened" rope.
That being said, who's ready to move to Italy with me? Or wait! An island of some sort? I could buy a dinghy and giggle whenever anyone made even a casual reference to it. Let me know, because we need an exit strategy, and the only sand I want to see anytime soon is the kind that's underneath my flip flops and bordered by a big damn ocean.
Any takers?
nathan filibustered at 5:15:00 PM
at the podium.
name: ..nathan..
shoes: thin, uncomfortable
sleeping in: queens (the city, not Latifah)
mirror: :rorrim
throws: righty
current crush: young britt eckland
lunch: i'm into brunch now
cohorts.
=audio science=
=LL Robot=
=Hasser Vision=
=Seanbaby=
archives.
11.04 12.04 01.05 02.05 03.05 04.05 05.05 06.05 07.05 08.05 09.05 10.05 11.05 12.05 01.06 06.06 01.07
talk to me Goose.