If you choke a Smurf, what color does it turn?

Pondering the imponderable, unscrewing the inscrutable, is a waste of time. But there are worse ways to waste time. Take TV for instance. Please.

I offer these things for you to think about while you are at work or just to throw into a conversation to confuse your friends and get them to give you that funny look like your mouth just ate your nose.


Where does your lap go when you stand up?

When snow melts, where does all the white go?

Why do people go to such great lengths to show others how stupid they really are?

One can be said to be having fun, but what is fun? What does it look like or taste like?

Are we having fun or, in fact, being had by fun instead? What if fun is a parasite and just using our bodies?

If time is an illusion, then why do we still do lunch?

Why do people complain about EVERYTHING?

Why are there Braille dots on drive up ATMs?

Where do all those socks go that disappear in the laundry? Are they somewhere in space developing an enlightened civilization with the lost ballpoint pens?

Do you have any more?

Please share….

Burnout

I have been closer and closer to burnout these past two weeks. The hours are long and getting longer.

Whenever I start working more than 48 hours a week, I get creative constipation and can’t seem to write. I HATE when that happens. I guess that too much work is like emotional cheese….it plugs up the creative asshole….

I wonder if there is an emotional laxative….

No, alcohol is not an acceptable answer……

Career musings

Most people hate paperwork. They hate the tedium and sheer drudgery of mucking about with paper, printer, figures and such.

I like it. It beats the hell out of what I usually do for a living; hauling big heavy things, wrangling them into place and wielding great heavy tools about to get the big heavy thing to fit just right, all the while making a LOT of noise and spewing dust into the air like a savage demented beaver on speed AND a deadline to build the damn dam before the flood hits.

Compared to that, paperwork is serene, placid, a hell of a lot cleaner, and far less sweaty.

I know there are worse jobs in the world than mine; Porta Potty cleaner, for instance. Somehow the idea of sucking some one else’s body waste out of a plastic bucket with a huge vacuum cleaner mounted on the back of a truck does not seem like something I would want to do. Its bad enough I have to use the smelly closets every day, but having to clean them seems like a job for that guy that always stands at the exit on the freeway with the sign saying, ”Will work for food” and his finger up his nose to the second joint.

Another job I could never wrap my brain around is roofer. Standing on a roof makes me kinda queezy and watery at the knees, but to have to work there seems unreasonable. Its HOT up there, there is never any shade, and the idea of hauling heavy bags of paper soaked in tar, then sprinkled with tiny stones, up a ladder seems worse than hauling big heavy things on the ground. On the ground I feel sure I am not going to slip and fall off the edge.

I don’t think I would want to be a doctor, either. I don’t have the people skills to tell someone that I am going to have to cut off their leg because they slathered themselves in bacon grease before leaping into a pen of rabid badgers and venomous snakes. I would laugh and call them stupid. “I am going to cut off your leg because you were stupid” is not what someone about to loose a limb wants to hear.

So paperwork is the dream for me. Sitting in a nice clean office, moving pieces of paper (Which weigh practically nothing) from one pile to another, making entries into the computer, and commenting on how tacky Carrie from accounting looks today seems like the perfect job.

Answering the phone is no problem for me. Try answering the phone while you are holding a spinning saw in one hand and someone that you pissed off earlier in the day is bearing down on you in a huge orange forklift. That should be a test for phone answering school, keeping your cool while someone on a forklift tries to ‘industrial accident’ you. That will prepare you for the office, where the only orange thing that threatens you is the big fat guy in the parking garage that wears an orange vest and waves his ‘flashlight of doom’ at you for parking in a spot other than the one that he picked out for you.

My father always said I should be a lawyer. Now that I am grown, I can see his point of view. They make obscene amounts of money for arguing with people. That’s something I can do, arguing with people. Sometimes I will get into an argument just for the fun of it, not because I believe in a particular point of view. Too bad that at the time I was so busy being stubborn and pubescent that I never listened to him or anything he said. I was so stubborn that I am surprised that I remember that he told me that I should be a lawyer. He was probably being sarcastic at the time. I always remember sarcasm.

Unfortunately at this stage of my life, paperwork is not looking likely. I have been making dust for a long time and people know that. Once you get known for doing something it gets harder and harder to break out of the mold and do something new.

I am not unhappy at my job. I feel that I get paid rather well for doing something that gives me a lot of satisfaction. Its just some days when the ol’ bones seem to hurt that I think that I made a mistake and should be in a nice, clean, air conditioned office looking at the latest thing in women’s fashion on the women that make that fashion look nice.

But let’s face it. I would not be happy in an office and would probably piss the boss off to such an extent that I would never work indoors again or worse yet, the only job I could get is Porta Potty cleaner. ‘Tis better to stick with what you know. After all, someone has to build the air conditioned offices that the pretty girls go to every day, don’t they?

Reincarnation

I noticed a long time ago that people who claim to be the reincarnated always claim they were someone famous or somehow associated with someone famous. You always hear stories along the lines of, “I was the daughter of the Goddess Fontabula in Egypt.” Or “I was the second cousin of Catherine the Great and died in a terrible plague of toads.”

You never hear, “ I was the result of a drunken coupling of two people who never even knew each others names and died as a child by falling into the large hole in the outhouse where I starved to death.”

People who promote reincarnation seem to be promoting self-importance.

Just once I want to hear a tale of inadequacy and doubt. A tale of abusive parents selling their hastily conceived children into slavery to gay bipolar hermaphrodites to work day and night in the peat bogs, harvesting the soggy burnable for others while knee deep in muck.

Somebody who had a hard life like that seem more deserving of a second try than someone who had a life of luxury.

Instead, I hear of someone claiming the soul of Napoleon is now planning a campaign to take over the department store and eventually the whole mall. Diminutive megalomaniacs wishing they were something they are not.

It is people like that who make therapists wealthy.

What is love, anyway?

I was listening to a pop station on the radio today and something hit me. (Not literally, just a thought. I don’t think that will hurt me.)

In five minutes I bet that I heard three songs about love. They were popular songs and I think a lot of people have heard them, but do people really listen to them? Is listening to the radio like trying to eat when you have the flu? (In one hole and out all the others.)

“I can’t live without you, have to be near you, I touch myself when I think of you,” kind of song that we have all heard on the radio is prevalent in our society, but what in hell are they really singing about? I hear the word ‘love’ a lot, but it is obvious that they are not singing about ‘love’. In these songs, the word ‘love’ is being used as a euphemism for lust.

Can you define love? Do you have a clear picture in your head of love? Can you explain to others what you think of when you think of love or are you just using verbal shorthand to express attractiveness or desire? How can you decide that you want to be with someone forever when you have just met? Your potential mate could have the disposition of a rabid badger and addicted to crack, but still be stunningly sexy and appealing. You want to make a long-term commitment with that? Are you crazy?

Just because someone has eyes that you want to get lost in or butt cheeks that you could use to crack walnuts or long hair that you want to run through barefoot means that your potential mate has any values that you share. There is more to love than the hot, sweaty part that takes place between the sheets. (Or any other place that you choose. I recommend against the dryer at the Laundromat. People stop and stare.)

I know that most of the songs I hear are about lust. Sex sells, and in the music biz, its all about sales. But do YOU know the difference between lust and love? (For my older readers, this should not be a problem. My younger readers, however, could not tell the difference with ‘Fucking for Dummies’ in one hand and every sex education video ever made on their portable viewing device.)

Modern pop music promotes lust, plain and simple. They do that because people want to do IT and want to see it, hear about and do it. Censorship has done little do stem the flow of innuendo from the mouths of nubile young pretties with large firm breasts and round bottoms, or attractive young men with strong facial features, flat stomachs, and bulging biceps.

News flash; lust can lead to babies, which in turn leads to long term commitment. Remember that someone actually has to take care of the little offspring until it can take care of itself. (Sometimes this can take over eighteen years!) That is a long time. (Hence the phrase; long term commitment.)

My point is this; if you are getting into any kind of relationship and the word ‘love’ comes up, consider it a warning sign. It is time to stop and THINK about the relationship. Don’t start making marriage plans just because someone says they love you. Don’t convince yourself that you feel love when you are not really sure what it is. (It helps to know that you mean when you think of love, not just the warm and fuzzy mental pictures that songwriters give us, or poets want us to believe.)

If, after thinking about things for a good, long, comfortable while, you think you are in love, by all means go fer it! I took a short step off the bridge and fell in love with the lovely Mrs. Troll, one of the smartest things I have done in my life. (I have a good head on her shoulders.) She and I seem to be made for each other, complimenting each other in behavior and other ways. (Nudge nudge, wink wink) Love keeps men sane and women interested in life. It is more than lust and is almost as good as the songwriters would have us believe.

But no matter what the songs would tell us, think about it before you do it. When you do it, make it last, work at it, and never forget it is a gift. You are damn lucky in life if you can find someone that will tolerate you.

Stainless Steel Monuments to Greed

I am sure that you have seen them, those self-checkout lanes in your local market or superstore. All gleaming stainless steel, they give off an aura of efficiency and a no nonsense attitude. They call to you with glowing touch screens and bags at the ready, no lines and no waiting, just for your checkout pleasure.

I have always been a bit tentative about them. You have to do everything in just the right order or the checkout monitor person feels compelled to come over and show you how to do things, embarrassing you and making you want to never use one again.

Today, however, I decided to take the plunge and go right to the self-checkout, hoping to get out as quickly as possible. Yeah. Right. I stand a better chance of having monkeys fly outta my butt. I can never seem to get through the checkout line quickly. There could be a flood going on and I will get in the line where the checkout person goes on break just before it’s my turn.

The cute gal in front of me just could not get it right. I think it’s fairly simple; Pick up item, scan it, put it in the bag, repeat. Kinda like washing your hair, only with a lot less water and more beeping noises. Once you do it, just do it again, and again until you are at the end of the pile on your left and all the bags have something in them on the right. Pay the machine and go on your merry way. It seems quite simple, actually.

She would pick the item up, put it in the bag, take it out, scan it, put it back in the bag, confuse the machine, and then Freak Out. (Her emotional turmoil over being chastised by a machine was dramatic and inventive in its intensity.) When she finally got to the part where you actually pay for what you put in the bag, she failed miserably. She inserted a five-dollar bill wrong fifteen times. (I counted) She would crease it, fold it, roll it over her leg, and every time inserted it backward from the way that the little picture shows.

The machine would spit it out back at her, where she would stare at it for a moment before taking it out to try again. She was obviously convinced that the machine was defective and that the repairman was going to magically appear any second to wave his magic wrench and make all her problems go away.

I kept my cool. I never said a word. I put on my best placid face and watched passively, but the whole while I was screaming inside my head; “Gawdammit! What in the hell is wrong with you? It is telling what to do in Spanish! I KNOW you speak Spanish! You selected the language! How can you get it wrong? Just follow the directions! Look at the picture! See the little picture? Hold the bill like the little picture!

“Flip the bill over. Flip the bill over. Flip the bill over. Flip the bill over. The OTHER side, dammit! Flip the bill over. Flip the bill over,” and so on and on and on.

She had a stunned look on her face when she accidentally put the bill in the right way and the machine finally gobbled her money and spit the change into that little cup with a machine sigh of relief.

I learned from her mistakes and did my checkout in record time, actually encouraging the person in line behind me to go on and start because I was done and just putting my stuff in the basket to take it to the car.

Then I walked out without the receipt.

Rain???

I think I remember rain. Water falling from the sky, right?

I haven’t seen rain in far too long. I actually can’t remember the last time I saw rain. I heard a short shower one night about a month ago, but that’s not rain. That was more like a brief demonstration of ability to rain, but not really wanting to

It seems like every place I go ends up in a drought. Here I am in the Gulf Coast and I haven’t seen rain in over two months. I thought they got rain here. Someone once told me that it rains a lot here. The ‘grass’ is brown and turning into powder. People are watering lawns and trees just to keep them alive. It’s almost as dry as New Mexico.

And the wind simply won’t go away. It has been blowing here for the last week and the weather on the news tonight said that we should expect it to get windy this week. What the hell has is been doing, Sucking?? They call air blowing at 14 miles an hour a BREEZE! That’s a wind where I come from! It is breezy at night, when I am asleep and can’t enjoy it. As soon as the sun comes up the wind begins and before 9 AM it is seriously windy. Every day. 30 to 45 miles an hour is very very windy, no matter what they tell you.

I tried to fly a kite the other day, but it was blowing too hard. It is blowing even harder today. I don’t have one of those expensive stunt kites that the people fly on the beaches and in winds that would blow your hair off, I just have a nice kiddie type kite. The kind that just shrugs it’s kite type shoulders and does a suicide crash straight into the ground when the wind is too strong.

I guess I should just reconcile myself to crappy weather. I’m scheduled to go to Oklahoma in April, so I better think ahead and get a portable tornado shelter, lightning rods, and extra fire extinguishers. While I am at it, I may as well throw that rain gear that I bought before coming down here right into the trash and prepare for being swept away in a twister that has absolutely no rain with it..

I remember in one of Douglas Adams’ books a character that the rain followed everywhere because the rain liked him so much. I feel like that characters doppelganger. I am beginning to think that rain hates me.

I have thought about doing the naked rain dance but gave that up as a bad idea. (Possibly why the rain hates me in the first place.)(Even I don’t want to see myself naked.)

What I am getting at; I miss rain. I want it to rain. I want to sit in comfort inside The Dog House and listen to the cacophony of rain on the roof, that musical sound the drops make mingling into a symphony of water falling from the sky. I want to bathe in the relaxing noise of rain. I want to fall asleep to the sounds on the roof that wash away all stress and cares in a blanket of white noise.

Instead I will listen to the sounds of wind and the police pulling over all the thousands of kids during spring break.

Life is funny that way.

Spring Break SPI

It’s finally here, that time of year when the youth of America breaks forth from their cold, heartless universities and other places of higher learning to migrate here in droves to partake in water, sun, sand, and beer, while chasing outrageous behavior and members of the opposite sex.

I had to go to the island this morning. (Bullshit. I could have done something else, but I just can’t resist an excuse to see the remains people behaving badly. The length that people will go to act stupid amazes me each and every day.)

Empty alcohol containers lined the bridge, as did litter all over the town. When you began to look in the nooks and crannies you found that young bodies were filling them to capacity. There were sleeping and hung over people everywhere. The hotels were overfull and the beaches were lined with cars, RVs, and tents all containing people who were not ready to face another day.

The police were pulling cars over all night and were still going strong at 6 AM. The traffic was heavy from dusk till dawn and did not thin out until well after sunup. Eyes as red as the molten lead sunrise were everywhere to be seen.

For one month each year, South Padre Island becomes a temple to sex, drugs, all night debauchery and wasted youth. A giant pilgrimage to hormones and trendy chemical amusement aids. A great party celebrating spring and parents that want their children to have everything.

I can’t tell you how happy I am to not have been there to actually see it.

These are the people who are going to be in charge of the government when we are old and unable to take care of ourselves.

I can feel you get uncomfortable with the thought all the way over here. But think for a minute. Remember the 70s? Remember the smell of marijuana just about everywhere you cared to go? Remember the throngs of young semi-nude people stoned out of their gourds that were in every gathering place you could imagine? Remember hippies and stoners forming communes and protesting everything?

Remember that the ones that were convinced they were going to change the face of government are now all grown up and things have not gone all to hell.

I think that this generation is more devoted to capitalism than we were. When I was young, we would have been sleeping on the beach and telling ourselves how cool we were. These young people bring RVs, tents, and stay in hotels. They drive nice cars and eat at restaurants and buy new clothes. They take showers and care about how they look.

I think I would rather trust my future to them than my generation, and I don’t think we fucked things up all that badly.

Optimism

I vaguely remember the 1970s. It was a time of optimism and hope, forever looking to the future and thinking great things were going to happen to us. We partied and took drugs while swilling vast amounts of alcohol, truly believing that we were immortal. We thought that nothing bad could happen and that we held the secrets to the future. We all told each other how great we all would be and how the world would remember us for eternity. We were the generation that would save the world from itself.

Then we grew up.

We had children, responsibilities, and our future seemed darker, somehow. That bright shiny light that we all saw so clearly was now dimmed a little bit by reality. We got real jobs and began to see that being a responsible human was not such a bad thing after all. We started to obey the laws instead of doing what we would and found we liked it.

The 80s became the decade of excess, more of everything to make us forget that we were failures in our own minds, that the dreams that we were certain would come true were gone like farts in the wind. We traded material things for those dreams of spiritualism and enlightenment, and did it with a gusto that made us feel young again and helped us get so fucked up that we forgot our loss. (If just for a little while.)

The 90s were the decade of conformity, the dreams of the 70s finally gone from our minds, forgotten in a haze of booze, new experience, and affluence. We could finally drown our loss in things, great, shiny, beeping, glowing, cleaver things that do things that we never thought possible, like computers and satellite TV. We became entertained like no generation had ever become entertained.

Now we live in the new millennium. Now finally mature, we are thinking of retirement and taking things a little easier as the creaks in our bones grow louder and more insistent. The optimism of the 70’s is finally gone, replaced with a new hope of leisure time and knowing that the past 30+ years have been better than we thought they were at the time, that all those dreams and feelings were just part of the cycle of life, and, if nothing else, we did not blow up the whole world in a fit of nuclear rage.

I think we all did pretty well after all.

On the naming of things

I love naming things. I name everything, and the more unusual the name the better. I have never given a child a name like “Moon Unit”, but I have been sorely tempted. I named my bicycle, “Gargravarrr”, and my dog, “Fexophenidine”. People often come to me, asking that I assign a name to their pet, house, or the occasional tree.

Once I was asked to name a friend’s penis. That one I declined. I don’t think it is my place to name someone’s hoo-ha, especially as I really wanted to name it “Twinkie”.

If I thought I could get away with it, I would rename one of my steptrolls something like “Frottageman”, or “Breastbruiser”. That would guarantee that he would remain a virgin forever and that I would not have to deal with more Grandchildren as I grow old and like small children even less that I like boils on my ass. (Funny how as you grow older you get more boils on your ass AND more Grandchildren. I think scientists should look at the possible relationship between the two.)

I give nicknames to people at work. They seem to either really like the names, or more likely, they come to hate me and call ME names when I am out of earshot. I can’t say that I blame some of them. Being called “Tweak” on the construction jobsite can get you in trouble with your boss, or at least a lot of drug tests. The guy that I started calling “Butterbutt” took it kind of personally, but with a permanent case of plumbers crack and creamy yellowish skin, it seemed to fit.

I call my home away from home “The Dog House” and I have given a series of feminine names to all my vehicles. I even named my shoes. “Left” and “Right” don’t seem to mind. (Not very creative, I know. But they are Shoes!! What do you want, “Honored Protector of Feet and Tender Digits”? Sheese!)

But I have never named my computer. I have never even thought of it as having a gender. I talk to it, but never gave it a personality. (Don’t even TRY to tell me that you don’t talk to your computer. I have never known anyone that did not talk to their computer if they actually use one for any length of time. ‘Puters can be notional bastards after all, and frustrating as all hell.)

As I sit here, contemplating what I would name it, some things almost immediately come to mind. It is a Toshiba notebook computer of the series called “Satellite”. It goes most everywhere with me and I tell it everything. The first name that comes to mind is, “Satan”.

I don’t think naming my computer “Satan” would be a good idea. I can see it now, “Wait a minute while I put that into Satan.” Or “Satan is giving me fits today.” Or better yet, “I keep that information in Satan” Everyone would become convinced that I was in league with The Lord of Darkness and plotting something sinister. “Would you help me with my problems with Satan?” would certainly get me in a bathtub of holy water with people dressed in black muttering things while pushing my head under.

“Satan” is officially out.

Something with the letter “S” I think. I like the letter “S”. It is all curvy and wavy at the same time. Writing the letter “S” can be fun.

“Sputnik”? “Spaz”? “Sparky”? “Spatula”? “Sprocket”? “Spastic”?

What do YOU think? Leave a comment. All suggestions welcome.

Scattershot

The other day I was riding my bicycle on the roads of South Texas and having a wonderful time. The day was perfect for riding, the sun low in the morning sky and just cool enough to still be comfortable.

I wandered very near the wildlife refuge near here. The geese were flying overhead, heralding their flight with honks and squeaks typical of their species.

The serenity of the scene was shattered by the sound of a shotgun, then another, then birds dropping from the sky.

I am not against hunting. I am not against guns. They were not shooting on the refuge. Get over it.

I stopped to watch the hunters pick up their prey and congratulate themselves, then stayed long enough to watch them take another nice double.

About this time I noticed an unusual noise. It was the sound of shot that had missed its intended target, and was now falling around me, sounding somewhat like sleet on a window.

I was so startled that I  almost considered moving, and then didn’t bother.

They were not shooting at me, and there was no way the shot had enough oomph left to hurt me. It was just weird, hearing the shot fall from the sky. Not one bit ever touched me.

And I didn’t feel one little bit like a lawyer.

(For those of you who did not get it, it was not far from here that the Vice President accidentally shot one of his lawyer friends.)

Our bodies are dirty, and in more ways than one.

We live in a very carefully sanitized society. We have managed to remove bodily functions and odors from conversation and everyday living. Plastic seated sanitary pedestals make for swift removal of human waste. Sales of deodorant products run in the billions. Bath items are a holiday favorite. We are taught from a young age that things our bodies do are bad. Children giggle about farts, but adults pretend that they do not even have them, and have created chemical assistance to avoid flatulence.

Modern advertising tells us that menstruation is something that should be only alluded to, (That which shall not be named.) that it is smelly and uncomfortable, and makes women unclean. Defecation is so unclean that we should not even keep the brush that cleans the sanitary pedestal that briefly held the offensive substance.

Sex is so dirty that we never want to tell our kids that parents actually do things like that. When kids learn if it, they say that they can’t imagine parents actually DOING it. Sodomy is unheard of in a large portion of the population, and ignored by most of the rest. Oral sex goes unexplained and masturbation is called ‘unclean’.

Do we really think that putting our head in the sand will make these things go away? Do people think that modern science will somehow magically eliminate and sanitize everything? I thinks that it’s time we face it; we shit, fart, piss, and leak. We want to fuck. Our bodies, on some level that we do not talk to, want us to perform wanton acts of a decidedly uninhibited nature, giving ourselves to the moment, and leaving us with things to regret.

Yet we hide these things behind the closed doors of our minds. We generally associate our past behavior as ‘bad decisions’, or ‘my wild days’, or ‘ I was really drunk at the time’. Being drunk has become the excuse for doing those things that you really wanted to do in the first place, but were afraid to do without an excuse.

Denial is not how to deal with something; it is how to avoid it.

I don’t condone overindulgence, I certainly do not condone stupidity, but I do think that being aware of what your body is doing behind your back (figuratively speaking) is a very good idea. Knowledge is power, and knowing that your body is telling you to be a whore is the key to prevention of becoming that whore.

I personally think eating is far nastier than sex. All that chomping, sipping, burping, and spitting leads to disgusting little food bits all over the place. Next time you are at the table in a restaurant, take a moment to just LISTEN. I assure you that you will be offended. Mastication is more disgusting than masturbation, mostly because we do it in public. (The former, not the latter.)(I hope.)

We choose to eat in public, but most of us harbor fears of public eating-places. We trust that the government will protect us from the unmentionable germs that make our intestines go all grumbly. All it takes is one nasty kitchen helper that gets in a hurry and forgets to wash his hands to make a bunch of strangers sick enough to throw up that expensive meal.

Public bathrooms are possibly the most repulsive paces on earth. The filth is visible in a lot of places, especially on the sinks, yet that sink is just the place we are supposed to sanitize out hands. That seems to me to be like washing your hands in the toilet. Those signs that remind the workers to wash their hands are about as effective as telling a teen that touching him/her self will make ‘em go blind.

Let’s all agree that germs and ‘dirty things’ are out there and trying to get us.  Like terrorists, nature is out to reduce our numbers and send us back to the stone age. Natural selection is waiting in the wings to change our future.

Welcome to the Future!

Characters

I once worked with a man that had a ‘different’ view of the world. He would filter everything and reinterpret it how he wanted. Let’s just say that working with him could be difficult.

If he were told to do a certain thing one way, he would think about it, then do it the way he thought it should be done, totally ignoring the directives that he had been given. This often resulted in the thing being done wrong and having to be redone. This guy was oblivious to the fact and never changed a thing. He was stuck on one worldview and would not even consider contemplating the possibility that he might want to rethink things one little bit.

His personal life, (that we heard about every day) was just as twisted. He had imaginary relationships that he would share with us in detail, as if telling us would somehow make them real. We all knew they were all in his head and would asking biting questions, but he would just ignore the sarcasm and answer as if it were all serious and real.

The saddest part was that he was functional in society and earned a reasonably good living.

He always made me wonder if we are all filtering what we see and hear to make it more digestible. In short, he always made me wonder if I was just as nuts as he was, just from a different direction.

I think that was his place in this world, to get everyone around him to question his or her own sanity.

Now we get to the interesting part of this story. I made it up. There is no such character. He is a composite of quite a few people that I have known in the past 20 years.

So let me ask you a question; if I give this tale a personality, am I making it a lie? If I take all these personality traits and create a new character that never really existed, am I lying to you?

I hope that you don’t feel that I am. For me, the truth is not in the character that I made up, but what we can learn by looking at his view of the world and his effect on others. Frankly, the people that I based the character on are dull and you don’t want to hear about them, but collectively, they have a point.

Let me interrupt myself and get on my soapbox for a moment; If you have read ‘A Million Little Pieces”, and “My Friend Leonard” you may have been caught up in the hoopla about James Frey telling the truth. (Oprah really beat him up on TV.)

I don’t care how many days he was in jail or any of that shit. There is truth in what he has written that far transcends the details. I can fully understand his changing details to protect the innocent. (and himself from lawsuit) Perhaps the books were marketed badly or misrepresented, but I think the truths contained in those books far out weigh the question of the difference between a memoir and a novel. (putting soapbox away and getting on with the show.)

So take what I say here with a grain of salt. I will not always tell the truth. I think there is as much to be learned in fiction as in fact. When it comes to people, even more so. If you see yourself here in some way, you are probably wrong. You may see things about yourself here, and you even may know me, but I probably am not writing about you.

And if I am, get over it. Like Douglas Adams put it, I am “Mostly Harmless”.

Whats eating you?

In this age of trying to legislate everything, I am surprised that someone has not decided that we can’t be trusted with food and tell us what to eat.

The electronic age has finally created a way for all those assholes to bring us into line and thin us right up. I call it the Dietcard. You have to have a card for every member of the family and on that card is all the dietary information on that individual. He/ she is not allowed to purchase things that are bad for them or not on their diet or things that they don’t like to eat.

Whoever does the shopping would only be ably to buy food for people whose cards they have in their possession. A lost card means they loose all eating privileges until that card is replaced or found. (“Don’t piss off your sister or she will eat your Dietcard again.”)

If Johnny is diabetic, he is not allowed to buy more sugar than he is allowed. Since Jane is overweight, she can’t but any food that will let her actually enjoy eating.

With everyone legislated to eat better, the weightloss companies would be put out of business. No more exercise mania, and weightloss pills advertised day and night. No annoying bright and shiny people on the small screen yelling how their particular device will let me trim down, get healthy, and find love.

The government could keep track of consumption and use food more efficiently, growing what is needed and saving the soil for rapeseed and soy. Waste of food would be eliminated. Landfills would be saved the smell and space of rotting leftovers.

Refrigerators would be far easier to clean with far less space taken up by leftovers and partial portions. They could also become smaller and better looking, perhaps adding TVs and DVD players for entertainment in the kitchen. We could all spend the evenings in the kitchen again, staring at the fridge and bonding in a family way.

Restaurants would be forced to sell healthy food, and fast food would have to change. With all food purchases linked to the Dietcard system, anything that could go into your mouth would be monitored.

This would actually be less complicate than the credit cards system, with one database instead of competing companies. (And who would want to steal your eating habits from the database?)

Alcohol would be added, making responsible drinking easier and drunk driving nearly impossible. (“I’m sorry, Sir, But your Dietcard says you are over your limit.”) If you were driving drunk, you would have to gotten alcohol illegally, making your arrest far more serious.

This concept would create a black market for food. I see black market food vendors selling bacon and Oreos from the back of unmarked vans in seedy neighborhoods in the inner city.

The drug trade would be diminished because we would all begin looking at food as an addiction that needs to be monitored by the government. People would remember the Twinkie with romantic fondness.

A small shrine to snack food could be placed in small towns in the Midwest, making us remember the days of unrestrained eating and popcorn.

“When I was yer age, boy, we could eat all we wanted and some people were FAT.”
“Don’t scare the boy, MizfiT.”

With the Dietcard, we would all be bright, shiny, happy people like those we see on TV and want to throw heavy things at. We would all be thin, full of energy, and ready to greet every day with a smile and healthy eating habits.

The more I think about it, the more I don’t like it. I think there is a place for grumpy, disaffected people in our world. I think heart disease is part of the natural order and death is inevitable. I think that the closer we come to a ‘perfect world’ the further we get from what it is to be human.

Please join me in thinking the Dietcard is a really bad idea.