Wednesday, January 31, 2007  

A Whole New Kind of Stupid

Being a believer in technology, the freedom of information, the power of guerilla marketing, and all that Boing Boing bullshit, a little over a year ago, I made my first CD avilable for free on this site (see it? down there to the right a little bit?). Then I added a "make a donation" button, so people could tip me for the tracks if they wanted. Putting my money where my mouth is, so to speak.

I just now discovered that I completely fucked it up, and any and all donations people may or may not have made have been going to an email address that doesn't exist and never has. I don't know how I managed this, but I did.

Remember - the only thing that can stop the free flow of information is a moron with internet access. POWER TO THE PEOPLE!

(P.S. If you feel like re-donating, I fixed the button.)

Labels: money, moron, poor impulse control

Radio Radio

Just a little quick market research, my little malcontents -- do any of you listen to comedy on the internet? If so, which stations/sites do you prefer? Help a brother out, would you?

Idolatry

I am the king of creativity today. Not only did I get my daily word goal written before noon, but I'm closing the show at the Comedy Studio tonight.

Last night, on the other hand, was just a simple descent into sloth. I did NOT make my pages, because I got distracted by American Idol, which has gotten just too mean for my tastes. Yes, yes. I know all right thinking hipsters everywhere already avoid the show, but I got stuck in its honeypot about 4 years ago and haven't looked back since. Hell, I feel guiltier than most people because of it, because I was once upon a time very good friends with one Brian Dunkleman. Remember him? Seacrest's co-host who got disappeared after the first season? Started comedy together and used to pass out drunk at each other's houses.

Anyway, the first few episodes of the season are always heavy on bad auditions, and those can be kind of fun. It's very satisfying to see a cocky deluded no-talent chump get their comeuppance. And sometimes, it's fun to see the freakiest of the freaky just splutter and screech. But last night, they ended up absolutely savaging more than one person who I'm pretty sure wasn't all there mentally, you know?

There's something just wrong about watching millionaires make fun of the retarded.

It is, of course, an inevitable byproduct of a society that's made celebrity a commodity and desperation a dervative to be bought and sold like refinery waste.

Labels: american idol, celebrity culture, sloth

Never Whistle While You're Pissing.

Hardly surprising, I'm sure, but I was a total nerd in junior high.

Now, this was in the 1980's, long before computers and the internet ushered in our current Golden Age where it's okay - even desirable - to be a geek. This was when good grades and an interest in comic books would get your flabby ass KICKED, jack. Sure, everybody has a computer now, but back then, possession of an Amiga and a modem was considered a casus belli by every jock on the planet.

Needless to say, such an environment did basically two things: (1) cause geekwads like your humble narrator to develop something of an introverted personality, and (2) make it essential that assorted freaks, dweebs, losers and misfits form something of a loose affiliation and mutual aid society. People who seemingly had nothing in common (computer fiends, metalheads, gamers, &tc, &tc) hung together so as to counterbalance the privileged and popular with sheer numbers, if nothing else.

It was one of these friendships of necessity that led me to meet one Neal Evans. On the surface, we had nothing in common. He chewed tobacco, went hunting with his dad, and owned his own shotgun. But he also loved science fiction and role playing games, as well as the dulcet tones of Ronnie James Dio, and thus was an outcast like the rest of us. He had this neighbor, John Waterman, who was easily the most exotic kid I'd ever met, because he went to private school.

Nobody went to private school except the mentally deficient and the hyper-religious (some would not make a distinction between the two), at least not in my experience. But Waterman, well, he went to private school because he was so goddamn smart. He was the kind of kid that learned crazy math proofs for fun, you know? He also ran all the role-playing games with these incredibly complex and well-planned campaigns, which he'd write in black notebooks in tiny, neat handwriting. You know, like the Unabomber. He was also a year or two older than us.

Anyway, he and Neal kind of adopted me. I'd ride my bike over there, and we'd play games, or listen to music (Waterman was into Fishbone - a definite rarity in Colorado Springs in 1984), throw ninja stars at stuff, or talk about science fiction, guns, and/or girls. I could relax and let my dork flag fly without fear of a beating.

It was during one of these long, lazy afternoons that they loaned me a copy of a book: The Illuminatus! Trilogy, by Robert Anton Wilson. I took it home, started it, and promptly lost my mind. This book had it all: drugs, freaky sex, anarchism, revolution, magick, rock and roll. And it was funny. Hilariously funny. It was like 1200 pages long, and all I did for the next two weeks was read, read, read.

That book changed my life. Quite literally, it changed my life, road to Damascus-style. My eyes were opened to all kinds of possibilities. Those good-looking shitheads on the football team weren't better than me. They were idiots. Oh, and my teachers? Pretty much lying to me. Ditto for the government. My parents? Probably. The priests at church? Definitely.

I learned to Question Authority. I learned to be a skeptic, and at the same time, I learned that there was High Weirdness everywhere. I learned that there were people out there who chose not to fit in; there were people out there who reveled in their freakishness.

I also learned that being funny impressed chicks. I immediately began trying to be funny.

So basically, The Illuminatus! Trilogy set in motion the events that would make me the furiously typing guy you see today. Still a geek, still funny, still questioning everything (and of course, simply irresistable to women because of it). Without that book, I never would have been open to discovering things like the Sex Pistols, Charles Bukowski, the Kama Sutra, Modern Savage...the list is endless.

Anway, I've got two little dudes of my own, and I hope to teach them some of the lessons I learned from that book and give them a head start on the saps and squares they'll be going to school with. Maybe not the kama sutra, but you're goddamn right the Sex Pistols.

Why do I bring this up? Because the man who wrote that book and changed my life, Robert Anton Wilson, died today. Hail Eris, indeed.

Farewell, Mr. Wilson. And thank you.

Labels: geekery, RAW, robert anton wilson

Mollies of MySpace

I don't know about the rest of you, but lately I've been getting about a million "friend" requests on MySpace from people who end up spamming my comments with some dumb ad for a MySpace map. You go to check their profile, and they always have only one picture and they always have a slick layout. I'm not sure if they're spam for the layouts or for the map, but it's fucking obnoxious.

So I've started leaving comments for my new "friends" that keep me entertained, if nothing else.

Check this one out - you may have to scroll down to find mine.

EDIT: the link may not work. Here's what it says:

Molly, Look. It's over between us. I meant it then and I mean it now. Of course the sex was incredible...I mean, I never had anyone do that with their thumb before. But it takes more than marathon sex to make a real relationship. It takes love, and at the end of the day, I could just never love a woman who donates money to the American Nazi Party. So please, just leave me alone. The restraining order was quite clear on this point.

Labels: marmoset, myspace, spam

Another Reason to Hate George Bush

You would think that an incompetent frat boy like our fair President would be a never-ending font of comedy. You would also be wrong. You can only write the same joke over and over for so many times before it loses its oomph.

I mean, it's been six years so far. Sure, he sucks at his job, but it's not like he's finding new and different ways to suck. He's been sucking in exactly the same way, non-stop from the second he took office. I mean, at least Bill Clinton found new and colorful ways to fuck up. He challenged himself. George Bush? Picked one and stuck with it, just like with everything else.

I guess that I'm saying that W is so horrible can't even be competent at being incompetent.

Labels: licorice, lungfish, pictogram

Happy New Year

One of my resolutions for 2007 is to post at least a paragraph to this blog every day whether I have anything to say or not. Therefore, I am posting this paragraph to my blog today. Does anyone know how many sentences it takes to be a legitimate paragraph? Let's say four.

Labels: lame, pickles, retarded, stupid