Back in the 70's, the future that my parents looked forward to doesn't exist for me. I won't get social security, and retiring? Shit, I'll be working until they're shoveling dirt on my fucking head, degree or not. Reality is always ends up different than what we plan for. I would love to save fifty grand for my son's college and buy a house with a dog and a big yard with a shed to keep rusty tools and terrifying spiders in. But I've heard that announcing your plans is a good way to hear God laugh.
Thirty years ago, the plan for success, I was told, was highschool, college, marriage, kids. In that order. The first half of your life was a miserable struggle, all to ensure that the second half would be just ok, or adequate. My generation was raised to believe that success equals happiness. I believe it should be, and can be, happiness equals success. We've made our lives so much more complicated, but the silver lining is that there are many ways to be happy now. Work is work. Someone might tell you, "do what you love, and it won't feel like work". I love reading books and playing video games, since no one will pay me to do those things, I think it's more accurate to say, "do what you like, and you'll be in a better mindset to improve the rest of your life, if it needs it". I like working on computers, so that career will be something i can show up to without it feeling like the job is draining the vitamins out of my body. I know every job has its bullshit, it can be long hours or a boss that's so far in your business they'll show up on your next MRI.
My family's happiness is more important to me than anything. Anything. I would rather give them some comfort now, rather than try to deprive them of things so my 401k will be perfect when I'm 65. My father had a multitude of flaws, but if I can be half the father he was, I'll be alright. That's why the last thing I said to him before he died was, "Dad, I love you", and he deserved every one of my tears, and then some. Nothing is guaranteed, tho we as humans, and especially Americans, act as if we're entitled to a perfect, easy life. We forget about what's important. Instead we consume everything around us like a black hole until there is only darkness. We waste food, and whine about the government taking away our machine guns. And God forbid one of our precious gadgets breaks, then we're on the phone with customer service screaming into the receiver like we're calling them from the future. By the way, for my readers under 25, a receiver is the part of a payphone that you speak into, payphones still exist right?
I hope I can teach Grayson, my still gestating son, the value of things. The value of family and friends and even the value of a dollar. I hope that I can teach him to learn from his mistakes and to know what's worth fighting for and what to get upset over, like when you get every answer right in Jeopardy and there's no one around to witness it. I even got the 17th century Russian literature question right in final jeopardy, dammit. When he's born, he'll settle after the trauma of birth and give me that look that all babies give to their parents. He'll have all the profound wisdom of the universe in his little eyes, and he'll look at me as if to say "Dad, soon I'll forget about all this as I get older, but I want you to know that it's going to be ok, and I love you". That's my boy.
"With a little love,
and some tenderness,
we'll walk upon the water,
we'll rise above the mess.
With a little peace,
and some harmony,
we'll take the world together,
we'll take them by the hand." --- Hootie and the Blowfish
Tuesday, December 18, 2012
Sunday, September 30, 2012
Fantasy Football = Dungeons and Dragons for jocks
I was at Valencia the other day, doing Valencia stuff. I was walking through the main thoroughfare, when I happened upon two gentleman wearing football jerseys (probably). I overheard part of their conversation, "Dude, these replacement refs are ruining my fantasy league". I stop to give them a raised eyebrow. One asks, "You play fantasy football?". Without even taking a breath I replied, "No, that's a stupid waste of time".
That's when it hit me. Replace the word "player" with "character", "league" with "campaign", and replace the football itself with a +1 Loinhammer of Doom, and Fantasy Football becomes Dungeons and Dragons. Also called D&D, for the uninitiated. This cannot be allowed to happen. Growing up, the cool kids and jocks had everything; the hottest chicks, the early puberty and the popularity. D&D was the only way for the nerds and outcasts to feel powerful, or at least forget about their boobless middleschool years (this works for either gender).
Now, the jocks are hitting their thirties, and just now realizing they're not now, nor will ever be, NFL stars. The cheerleaders they dated in high school wised up and left during the summer after graduation. The jocks are now settling for the first person to say yes, and working at walmart, changing my oil. Their lives are but a shadow's reflection of what they thought it would be.
It's been proven over and over that nerds not only are the most successful high school archetype, but they've pretty much owned three quarters of the fucking galaxy since the eighties. I guess, secretly, this is our revenge, as a people. Nerds use their success to ridicule the failed jocks, just like George McFly used his to ridicule Biff Tannen in Back to the Future 2. That's our way of saying that intelligence trumps brute force everytime. Our decades too late comeback for all the ass kickings.
But now, apparently with the tables turned, I've become the cool kid. How the fuck did that happen? And if there was any doubt about my newly discovered social status, the evidence was clear on the faces of the jersey guys in front of me. After my comment, they had such an ashamed, repulsed look on their faces that I actually felt kind of terrible about it. Imagine me, wearing nerdy glasses, khaki cargo shorts and an old X-Men t-shirt, blatantly making fun of two former "kool kidz", both of whom could easily throw me across the campus like a lawn dart, and thats it. They don't get up and ruin my scoundrelish good looks, they have no comeback. They do nothing, and I win.
I mumble an apology and walk away like it never happened, pretending it's just the schizophrenia finally turning on me. Granted, I haven't played D&D in many years, having moved on to other mediums, (books, video games, etc.), but I still felt the need to defend an old nerd hobby. I understand there aren't many people whose lives have turned out exactly the way they've wanted, myself included, I've long ago had to give up my dream of being a dragon-slaying space pirate.
Even if i were unhappy with my life (I'm not), I wouldn't bastardize someone else's hobby. I wouldn't turn bowling into something where you fire the ball from a catapult, over a castle's well defended parapets to knock the pins down... Actually that sounds fucking awesome. Maybe I'm onto something. Catabowling?
"But it's just the price I pay
Destiny is calling me
Open up my eager eyes
'Cause I'm Mr. Brightside" --The Killers
That's when it hit me. Replace the word "player" with "character", "league" with "campaign", and replace the football itself with a +1 Loinhammer of Doom, and Fantasy Football becomes Dungeons and Dragons. Also called D&D, for the uninitiated. This cannot be allowed to happen. Growing up, the cool kids and jocks had everything; the hottest chicks, the early puberty and the popularity. D&D was the only way for the nerds and outcasts to feel powerful, or at least forget about their boobless middleschool years (this works for either gender).
Now, the jocks are hitting their thirties, and just now realizing they're not now, nor will ever be, NFL stars. The cheerleaders they dated in high school wised up and left during the summer after graduation. The jocks are now settling for the first person to say yes, and working at walmart, changing my oil. Their lives are but a shadow's reflection of what they thought it would be.
It's been proven over and over that nerds not only are the most successful high school archetype, but they've pretty much owned three quarters of the fucking galaxy since the eighties. I guess, secretly, this is our revenge, as a people. Nerds use their success to ridicule the failed jocks, just like George McFly used his to ridicule Biff Tannen in Back to the Future 2. That's our way of saying that intelligence trumps brute force everytime. Our decades too late comeback for all the ass kickings.
But now, apparently with the tables turned, I've become the cool kid. How the fuck did that happen? And if there was any doubt about my newly discovered social status, the evidence was clear on the faces of the jersey guys in front of me. After my comment, they had such an ashamed, repulsed look on their faces that I actually felt kind of terrible about it. Imagine me, wearing nerdy glasses, khaki cargo shorts and an old X-Men t-shirt, blatantly making fun of two former "kool kidz", both of whom could easily throw me across the campus like a lawn dart, and thats it. They don't get up and ruin my scoundrelish good looks, they have no comeback. They do nothing, and I win.
I mumble an apology and walk away like it never happened, pretending it's just the schizophrenia finally turning on me. Granted, I haven't played D&D in many years, having moved on to other mediums, (books, video games, etc.), but I still felt the need to defend an old nerd hobby. I understand there aren't many people whose lives have turned out exactly the way they've wanted, myself included, I've long ago had to give up my dream of being a dragon-slaying space pirate.
Even if i were unhappy with my life (I'm not), I wouldn't bastardize someone else's hobby. I wouldn't turn bowling into something where you fire the ball from a catapult, over a castle's well defended parapets to knock the pins down... Actually that sounds fucking awesome. Maybe I'm onto something. Catabowling?
"But it's just the price I pay
Destiny is calling me
Open up my eager eyes
'Cause I'm Mr. Brightside" --The Killers
Friday, August 31, 2012
"I speak in verses, prophecies and curses."
The heat is oppressive. A tangible, malicious force pressing me further into the car seat. Even with the air conditioning on high, my clothes feel like an extra layer of moist skin. My sweltering, pregnant girlfriend is nearly panting, she keeps leaning forward as if proximity will make the air vents work better. She turns to me with tired eyes, "Babe, we really need to move out of Florida". I agree immediately. This is the moment that decides it. My mother had a similar moment when I was small. Tho, her aversion was to the cold and snow. I don't understand it. I vaguely recall the incident, my mother was driving my younger brother and I home from somewhere. The road was covered in snow, we ended up sliding into a ditch. That was when my mother decided she couldn't deal with another New York winter.
My moment was in my car, stuck at yet another red light. The drinks we had bought twenty minutes previously already warm. I'm waiting for my poor testicles to wither into prunes, or just explode like an egg in the microwave. You're welcome for that visual, dear Reader. How can anyone be comfortable in this weather? How can anyone enjoy being covered in sweat eleven months out of the year? Even worse is the bubble of humidity floating around me like Pigpen's dirt cloud. People really like this shit?
When I talk about leaving Florida, the first thing people say is always, "You'll be sorry when you're shoveling snow all day". Really? All day? I think not. I don't want to live on the north fucking pole, wrestling Santa's feral elves for the last scrap of caribou meat. I don't want to live on Pluto anymore than I want to live on Mercury. I'm thinking Virgina, or maybe one of the Carolinas. Somewhere with four seasons. Especially somewhere with a good autumn.
You have know idea the mental/emotional high I get during a good autumn. The colors of the leaves, the crisp chill in the air. I can close my eyes and be there. I feel content, yet invincible in this place. I want to be outside, in some forgotten forest. That's why I read a lot of books that take place in a fantasy setting. That life seems so simple when you really think about it. That's my favorite part of those books, picturing the everyday life of the characters. Not the heroes, I don't want to have to fight a goddamn dragon or kill an evil wizard or something. Just live in peace. No internet, no cellphones, no television. Hunting food for my family. I talk a lot of shit, but the thought of skinning a deer makes me want to fucking puke. So my unlucky family would probably starve to death unless they learned some survival skills. I'm not exactly an outdoorsman.
I tell my girlfriend this stuff and she just says something like, "How did you go from talking about a hot car to fighting witches?" No babe, wizards and dragons, witches are just- "..." Nevermind. We tease each other a lot, but she puts up with my quirks, and lets me be me. Something I didn't realize was important until I met her. Not that she's without her own quirks, and at least her pregnant cravings are healthy(fruit), instead of unhealthy(soap). All I hear is every mother's curse, "I hope you have a kid that's just like you..."
"Says it feels right this time
Turned it 'round and found the right line
Good day to be alive sir
Good day to be alive he said.." --Metallica
My moment was in my car, stuck at yet another red light. The drinks we had bought twenty minutes previously already warm. I'm waiting for my poor testicles to wither into prunes, or just explode like an egg in the microwave. You're welcome for that visual, dear Reader. How can anyone be comfortable in this weather? How can anyone enjoy being covered in sweat eleven months out of the year? Even worse is the bubble of humidity floating around me like Pigpen's dirt cloud. People really like this shit?
When I talk about leaving Florida, the first thing people say is always, "You'll be sorry when you're shoveling snow all day". Really? All day? I think not. I don't want to live on the north fucking pole, wrestling Santa's feral elves for the last scrap of caribou meat. I don't want to live on Pluto anymore than I want to live on Mercury. I'm thinking Virgina, or maybe one of the Carolinas. Somewhere with four seasons. Especially somewhere with a good autumn.
You have know idea the mental/emotional high I get during a good autumn. The colors of the leaves, the crisp chill in the air. I can close my eyes and be there. I feel content, yet invincible in this place. I want to be outside, in some forgotten forest. That's why I read a lot of books that take place in a fantasy setting. That life seems so simple when you really think about it. That's my favorite part of those books, picturing the everyday life of the characters. Not the heroes, I don't want to have to fight a goddamn dragon or kill an evil wizard or something. Just live in peace. No internet, no cellphones, no television. Hunting food for my family. I talk a lot of shit, but the thought of skinning a deer makes me want to fucking puke. So my unlucky family would probably starve to death unless they learned some survival skills. I'm not exactly an outdoorsman.
I tell my girlfriend this stuff and she just says something like, "How did you go from talking about a hot car to fighting witches?" No babe, wizards and dragons, witches are just- "..." Nevermind. We tease each other a lot, but she puts up with my quirks, and lets me be me. Something I didn't realize was important until I met her. Not that she's without her own quirks, and at least her pregnant cravings are healthy(fruit), instead of unhealthy(soap). All I hear is every mother's curse, "I hope you have a kid that's just like you..."
"Says it feels right this time
Turned it 'round and found the right line
Good day to be alive sir
Good day to be alive he said.." --Metallica
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
"You lose! Good day sir!"
The Willy Wonka movie is not for children. It may look like it on the surface, but you have to look past the candy and all the orange little snookis running around to really get a taste of the dispair and hopelessness that this film represents. I am of course referring to the original movie featuring Gene Wilder, not the newer, lesser Johnny Depp version. No offense towrard Mr. Depp, I just didn't care for that version.
The movie opens on some dilapidated slum where the modern iteration of peasants must toil and live amongst factories that just make smog, apparently. We see Charlie's family, poor, worn out, destitute. But also somewhat happy in eachother's company. But when the contest is announced, they, and indeed the whole world, perks up just for the chance to tour a fucking chocolate factory.
In a world where the only entertainment adults have is watching their children become obese, all nations seem to join together, in a rare moment of unity, to find these elusive golden tickets. Maybe if we had offered the nazis the same chance, we could have avoided that little altercation back in the forties.
As soon as Charlie's family hears about the contest they get so excited, the grandfather even telling him, "This could be your chance, Charlie". His family gets excited because they know his life is shit, and will always be shit. You can see it in the eyes of his suddenly non-parapalegic grandfather. This golden ticket is Charlie's only hope for a life not miserable.
Of course the children that end up with the tickets represent the worse of humanity in its various forms, running the gamut from greed to sloth. These little shitheads are so rotten, the viewer cant help but hope for their gruesome demise. Thankfully you dont have to wait long before the viscious, near-sentient factory claims them one by one. All except for good Charlie, because the movie needs an underdog to root for.
But even Charlie isn't immune to temptation, as he and Granpa Joe steal some of the bubbling, flying water. Maybe it was peer pressure, or maybe he just needed anything to take his mind off of the crushing weight of his own lack-luster future. He honestly felt bad about it, and kharma is almost instant when Granpa and Charlie both are almost cut to ribbons by the ventalation fan.
After all is said and done, Charlie ends up with everything, the chocolate, the factory, and all the green haired little people he could ever want. His whole family is welcome to move in as well. What about his friends? Even if Charlie is a good person, he's only human and his hubris will get the best of him. "Oh you still live in a one room hovel with your entire family? I live in an amazing chocolate factory. No, don't touch my skin, you peasant. Have a gobstopper, on me", because in all of our secret heart-of-hearts, life is all about one-upping our family and friends, "My house is bigger than yours, because I'm better than you."
Right there, after Charlie gets everything, is the underlying message of the movie finally brought to light, and its not that "dreams come true" garbage that Disney force feeds everyone. It's this: a life of hard work and determination gets you nothing but a life filled only with constant struggle and hopelessness, and only random chance or dumb luck can improve your situation. We all know that if Charlie had never found the ticket, he would have just stumbled thru his poverty stricken existence, living and dying as a have-not. Which reminds me, I need to buy lotto tickets.
"Come with me,
and you'll be,
in a world
of pure imagination"
The movie opens on some dilapidated slum where the modern iteration of peasants must toil and live amongst factories that just make smog, apparently. We see Charlie's family, poor, worn out, destitute. But also somewhat happy in eachother's company. But when the contest is announced, they, and indeed the whole world, perks up just for the chance to tour a fucking chocolate factory.
In a world where the only entertainment adults have is watching their children become obese, all nations seem to join together, in a rare moment of unity, to find these elusive golden tickets. Maybe if we had offered the nazis the same chance, we could have avoided that little altercation back in the forties.
As soon as Charlie's family hears about the contest they get so excited, the grandfather even telling him, "This could be your chance, Charlie". His family gets excited because they know his life is shit, and will always be shit. You can see it in the eyes of his suddenly non-parapalegic grandfather. This golden ticket is Charlie's only hope for a life not miserable.
Of course the children that end up with the tickets represent the worse of humanity in its various forms, running the gamut from greed to sloth. These little shitheads are so rotten, the viewer cant help but hope for their gruesome demise. Thankfully you dont have to wait long before the viscious, near-sentient factory claims them one by one. All except for good Charlie, because the movie needs an underdog to root for.
But even Charlie isn't immune to temptation, as he and Granpa Joe steal some of the bubbling, flying water. Maybe it was peer pressure, or maybe he just needed anything to take his mind off of the crushing weight of his own lack-luster future. He honestly felt bad about it, and kharma is almost instant when Granpa and Charlie both are almost cut to ribbons by the ventalation fan.
After all is said and done, Charlie ends up with everything, the chocolate, the factory, and all the green haired little people he could ever want. His whole family is welcome to move in as well. What about his friends? Even if Charlie is a good person, he's only human and his hubris will get the best of him. "Oh you still live in a one room hovel with your entire family? I live in an amazing chocolate factory. No, don't touch my skin, you peasant. Have a gobstopper, on me", because in all of our secret heart-of-hearts, life is all about one-upping our family and friends, "My house is bigger than yours, because I'm better than you."
Right there, after Charlie gets everything, is the underlying message of the movie finally brought to light, and its not that "dreams come true" garbage that Disney force feeds everyone. It's this: a life of hard work and determination gets you nothing but a life filled only with constant struggle and hopelessness, and only random chance or dumb luck can improve your situation. We all know that if Charlie had never found the ticket, he would have just stumbled thru his poverty stricken existence, living and dying as a have-not. Which reminds me, I need to buy lotto tickets.
"Come with me,
and you'll be,
in a world
of pure imagination"
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
"Get your ass to Mars."
Most likely this won't get read by many people. I only know a small handful of people that are even on google+, so I'm sure this will end up being an exercise in talking to myself, or parler à moi-même, as the French say. I
have a way of thinking, a way of speaking that can be arduous to translate to text, so if you get lost in the foggy landscape of my thoughts, do not be
afraid, said the archangel, it is a place I often find myself wandering. I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it, probably.
I'm having a baby. Not me personally, but then you knew that. You're so smart. The first trimester is pretty stressful, anything that can go wrong usually happens during this time. And because you're a masochist like me, you're going to research all of the terrible things that God can do to children. I'm not as terrified about the baby as I initially thought, I just want the baby to be healthy.
I'm sure you noticed that I mentioned God a second ago, and it was capitalized no less. That shit is usually just for believers. Do I believe? Kinda yeah. I'm not big into the whole church thing and rituals and all that. I guess it's that as much as I cheerlead progress and science, I need to believe that there are some things science cannot explain. I need to live in a universe where magic exists, in some form. But that's my hang-up, not yours.
If you are reading this, than most likely you know, but if you don't, I also do stand-up comedy with a few other people. I would put their names, but I'm not sure if they're cool with that. I do love the comedy, and it's more work than most of you realize. There's the writing of the material, the set list, flow of different bits, and that's the easy part. The hard part is all the self promotion. The famous comedians have agents that do all that garbage for them, because we're no one famous, we do all the legwork ourselves. I just want to do the stand-up, but the others want to branch out a bit. The main other comedian I perform with suggested the blog to me, he knows I harbor a secret writing fetish, so here ya go. Another guy that performs with us suggested doing skits or sketches. I thought, yeah there's that real famous comedian that does sketch comedy. What's his name? Oh that's right, he doesn't exist. No one does that shit outside of Saturday Night Live, and that show hasn't been funny since the nineties. But he's salivating to be an "actor", so who am I to stifle someone's creativity?
Apparently, I seem to be getting some sympathy pregnancy symptoms. Mostly it's the sleep. My unborn child has already developed a loathing for anything close to REM. The restful state of sleep, not the band. How can anyone hate Michael Stipe's oddly soothing way of whine-stuttering into a microphone. Due to this declaration of war against sleeping for more than three hours at a time, I wake up every morning feeling like I just crawled out of a grave. But not in an avenge my own murder kind of way, but it's as if a wizard has forced me, by magic, to rise from the cold earth and entertain at parties or something.
I hope to keep this blog going if anyone ends up giving a shit. I used to keep one on myspace back when that was a thing, and it was pretty satisfying. I lost my train of thought.
"That's me in the spotlight,
loosing my religion."
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