Author Archive

Scenes from the Font of Life: A play in 15½ scenes and 0 acts.

The following is a compendium of unrelated scenes and observations demonstrating why this world is the kind of place you’d like to settle down and raise your cholesterol. Think of these scenes as thin slices of life served up on a bed of roses, or on a bed of nails; depending on how rose-tinted your glasses are. This anthology (now upgraded from a mere compendium) is formulated with your privacy choices in mind. Should you wish to opt out and decide not to read them, I will not share your personal information with any of my subsidiaries, affiliates or nephews. However I do maintain certain files that include pictures of you smelling something really funky when you thought no one else was watching. It may be the only leverage I have to persuade you to read this appetizer-sized literary snack. I’m not blackmailing you. It’s called scent-shaming and I’m not afraid to use it. By the way, do you prefer your scent-shaming in Pumpkin Spice or Stinky Pinky?

In any event, please place your tray table in the upright and locked position. Put your head in airplane mode and enjoy these complimentary in-flight observations. Remember: life is about the journey so whether you paid full retail for your seat or used your Frequent Fretters’ miles, sit back, relax and enjoy the ride.

Caution: These observations were produced on equipment used in processing peanuts, tree nuts and dairy products. Consume them judiciously. Read the rest of this entry »

Well it’s that time of year again. No, not Amnesia Awareness Month, but Girl Scout Cookies Extortion Month, where citizens leaving grocery stores and banks are guilted into purchasing enough high-fructose cookies to power an aircraft carrier. There are some new varieties this year and I thought I’d highlight them for you:

1. Binge Mints
2. Heimlich Chokies
3. Nutty Doofuses
4. Transgendered Something er Others
5. WMDs (Wafers of Mass Delight)
6. Vegan Flytraps
7. Lemon Nothings
8. Extra-Gluten Peanut Clusters w/Benadryl
9. Fracture Snaps
10. Pralines ‘n Lint
11. Snickernipples
12. Whoopsie Daisies
13. LGBTs (Loganberry Treats)
14. Toucan Sandies
15. Three Can Ednas
16. Buttered Goobledygooks
17. Sugar-free Why Bothers
18. Upside-Down Right-Side-Ups
19. Powdered Snowglobes
20. Goiter Drops
21. Tagalogs (Available in Philippines only)
22. Forget-me-nuts
23. Double Stuff Oreogasms  (Women may have as many as they’d like, but men must wait at least 1 hour between cookies.)
24. Esophageal Conundrums
25. Silicon Wafers
26. Isaac Newtons

“Spike Lee to make an all-Black version of Hogan’s Heroes,” trumpeted the headline in Variety.  

Hogan and his heroes throttling the Nazi war machine. Sgt. Kinchloe on the left.

As I breathlessly absorbed those sweet words that I’d waited almost 50 years to read, a lump the size of a Sherman Tank began to grow in my throat. Could this really be happening? I mean it wasn’t the Beatles getting back together, but it was close. One of my fondest boyhood memories was cozying up to the TV on Friday night at 8:30 to watch experience Hogan’s Heroes. The show had everything the pure heart of a 6 year old boy yearned for: good army men outsmarting bad army men, a bunch of secret agent GI Joes camping out in a barrack, and plenty of pretty frauliens inexplicably parading about in a backwater POW camp – who cared if it didn’t make sense? It made me happy. Still does. This new Spike Lee Hogan’s Heroes would make me even happier.  

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1. Yorkshire Terrorist – Won’t stop yapping till they get their wet food
2. She Wow Wow – Sofia Vergara-influenced breed
   

   Don’t raise your eyebrows at me.

3. Lhasa Ipso Facto – Asian lawyers’ favorite dog
4. Angela Basset Hound – Ike Turner had something to do with its creation
5. Alaskan Mostlymute – Rarely barks
6. Uaintnuthin’butta Hound Dog – Found mostly in the South, Cryin’ all the time
7. Teacup St. Bernard – A contradiction in terms. Like jumbo shrimp.
8. Borderline Collie – Not quite a Collie, but close
9. Cocker Doodle Doo – Howls when the sun comes up
10. Chilean Sea Basset Hound – A sub-species of Dogfish. Sleeps on a bed of spinach.
11. Greenish Retriever – Not quite green, looks seasick, recycles
12. Nissan – Formerly Dachsund (Get it? Datsun became Nissan)
13. Hairless Sheep Dog – A frightening-looking animal. At least it doesn’t shed.
14. Mess Hall Chow – Featuring its trademark Blue Tongue Special
15. Belgian Airhead – (courtesy of Steve Martin)
16. Random Doodle – exists only on paper and, fittingly, does it on the paper
17. Jewish Shepherd – Enjoys Flocks and Bagels
18. Not-so-Great Dane – Underachieving Scandinavian canine.
19. Shih Tzu! – God Bless You.
20. Nikita – Nike’s corporate repurposing of the Akita breed. All Nikitas are named Swoosh.
21. Miniature Toy Chihuahua – Due to size challenges, must be raised under an electron microscope

Rare cartoon hand with 4 instead of 3 fingers. An analogy for my stalwart friend Chris who is playing with more than a full deck.

What better way to begin someone’s biography than for its author to prattle on about himself. I mean it’s important to break some literary rules, but to do it so shoddily seems rather unseemly and I don’t want to seem unseemly. I’d prefer to seem seemly. I’m stalling because I can’t possibly capture the multi-dimensionality of my dear friend Chris Gage’s human experience, so rather than attempting to paint a rich portrait of a man in full, I’m going to paint a diluted snapshot of a man in 1/16^th. I believe by setting the bar this low (capturing 6.25% of Chris) I set a metric (we don’t set goals anymore – we meet metrics) suitable to my talents. Besides, if this mini-bio flies off the shelves or, more likely, is digitally uploaded into people’s Kindles, I can follow it up with 15 more volumes at 6.25% each. With great swagger I might pause here and state, “You do the math,” but as you can see, I’ve already done it. Why do I undermine myself and then advertise it? Well at least you know what you’re dealing with here. Read the rest of this entry »

1. 

   Philosopher/vagrant sign says it all.

   Have worked for food. Now I’m hungry again.

2. It’s Obama’s Trump’s fault.
3. Your place or mine? I’m thinking yours.
4. If you can read this you’re too close. 
5. I’m the precipitate from trickle-down economics.
6. Down to 2 teeth-whitening strips. Anything would help?
7. Blew my MacArthur Genius Grant award money on whores and crack. Please help.
8. You should see the other guy.
9. I’m an optimist whose glass is 1/8^th How about some help with the other 7/8^ths?
10. Mistakes were made.
11. I used to fit into most overhead compartments. Now look at me.
12. Think of me as a tax deductible charity who doesn’t pester you with direct mail.
13. My inner dialogue is not free. Pay up.
14. Well I’m out of quips…and money.

(A husband overheard speaking to his wife Grace) Wow. Will you look at that. It’s just Amazing Grace. I mean amazing, Grace.

Thanks Ass-tronomers – could you make a guy feel any more insignificant? Just when I was getting comfortable with my place in the 200 billion galaxy cosmos, suddenly it’s 10 times larger thereby making me 10 times smaller. Although we live in an expanding universe, I prefer the tidiness of a static universe. A reliable place with a finite number of galaxies operating with exacting Newtonian mechanics. A place where video solitaire can tranquilize an entire nation and live streaming can mean different things; depending on if you’re watching Netflix or recently drank 2 cups of coffee. 

We are born purposely unaware of the universe’s enormity. That’s just the way it is. And it is that way so we’re better able to focus on the tasks at hand. For example, one time I had to return a substandard chicken pot pie I’d purchased at Costco. They have a very generous return policy – too generous. In fact I had already eaten it and I returned it in its digested form – and they still took it back. And if you think that’s bad, the lady in front of me returned a 7-layer guacamole dip – also eaten. The Costco Scatological Return Specialist could only identify 5 of the layers, so instead of a full refund, they issued her a store credit for 5/7^ths of the price – unbelievable. My point is, if I was overly aware of the goings-on in the Magellanic Cloud Galaxy, I might’ve been completely unaware of Costco’s generous return policy and I would’ve missed out on a good deal, and an even greater story. So we come to understand how it pays to not have our head in the clouds – particularly if they’re Magellanic Clouds.

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The Berkeley City Council will not rest until all the world’s karma is balanced out. Only then will its work be done.

The Berkeley City Council served an immediate cease and desist order to Bechtel Corporation in an effort to preserve the Spotted Hobo’s habitat. The council claimed the construction site, located at the Ashby Avenue underpass, is a natural spawning ground for the Spotted Hobo (Polka-dot vagranti) and its alteration could bring about the extinction of the group. The United Nations Commission on Compromised Wildlife has placed the Spotted Hobo on the endangered species list; one notch below the Goiter-Necked Parakeet (Magnum-thoraxed dinkus), but several notches above Syrian Refugees (Syrian refugees).

The Council believes that disturbing the Spotted Hobo’s biosphere would force the species to abandon their natural habitat and move to less accommodating grounds in the urban center where they’d encroach on stairwells already strained by populations of unemployed raccoons (Loafus mascara). The Spotted Hobo is a rare sub-species of vagranti who’ve developed their trademark “spots” by eating from doggy bags “gifted” to them by predatory capitalists exiting the many fine bistros of Berkeley. And while the well-heeled foodie set embraces the Spotted Hobo, other groups are quite fearful of the breed and are what we term “hobophobic.”

Lawyers for Bechtel Construction pleaded with the Berkeley City Council to reconsider their order and reminded them that the project was designed as a 400-bed homeless shelter and as such could absorb 8 times the number of displaced Spotted Hobos. The council refused the request and had the site re-zoned as an Indigenous Spotted Persons’ Habitat. Antioch (whose city has an open borders policy) offered to take in the Spotted Hobos, but Berkeley refused the offer stating, “The forced eviction of any species from their natural hunting and gathering grounds only serves to strengthen the oppressors and weaken the oppressed.”

When Bechtel Construction reiterated that the project was designed to house the very people they were so concerned about displacing, Berkeley Gender-neutral Council Entity, Trax Hillman remarked, “Logic has nothing to do with our decision. This is a reparation for Andrew Jackson’s forced removal of the Cherokee people along the ‘Trail of Tears’ in the late 1830’s. And if you don’t understand that you’re just one of the oppressors. We at the Council know why the caged Goiter-necked Parakeet sings. And as long as we have something to say about it, the Spotted Hobo will continue to live unmolested ‘neath, the bridges of Ashby Avenue where they’ll be protected by rapacious capitalists like Bechtel Corporation. Yes they’ll continue to thrive in their natural biota provided they’re fed by the doggy-bag toting restaurant patrons they’ve become dependent on as a primary food source.”  

Next week the Council takes up an application by Whole Foods for a store on Telegraph Avenue. Already the application is meeting strong headwinds as some members are calling for the Whole Foods to first open a Half Foods for one week and then the open other half the next week, so that by the end of 2 weeks they’d have a Whole Foods. Council member Hemp Wurther (who puts the “Q” in LGBTQ) explained, “Whole Foods is an admirable grocer and we’d be pleased to have them as a part of our nation. It is our intention however to have them showcase some of the less popular or disadvantaged food one week and then display the more adaptive mainstream foods the next week. Additionally, no matter which week a patron shops, all shall receive a participation trophy. And in case it isn’t abundantly clear already, we are doing this as a reparation for Andrew Jackson’s forced removal of the Cherokee people along the ‘Trail of Tears’ in the late 1830’s.”

The Rolling Stones at their height of popularity – about 5’10” or 5’11”

What if the Rolling Stones had been a Chinese band and their Mandarin Chinese publicist was tasked with translating their Chinese song names into the American idiom? This is what those song titles might look like alongside their more familiar title:

1. Gratification (I am Unable to Obtain) No, No, No           Satisfaction
2. Copulation and Pharmaceuticals and Sway & Twist      Sex and Drugs and Rock & Roll
3. Impress Upon the Authorities, I’m an Alienated Youth   Virtually any Stones song           
4. Ignite Me (I’ll Continue Ceaselessly)                              Start Me Up
5. Chronology is a Champion of My Cause                        Time is on My Side
6. Beneath My Opposable Digit                                          Under My Thumb
7. We Celebrate Our Boorish Behavior                              Any Stones song
8. I’m Aware of our Music (And I Enjoy It)                          It’s only Rock and Roll (But I Like It)
9. Tiny Matriarchal Abettor                                                 Mother’s Little Helper        
10. We Choose to Rebel in an Anti-social Manner              Any Stones Song
11. A Sleepover – For Us, You Think?                                Let’s Spend the Night Together
12. Yu-Lin                                                                            Angie
13. Darkness for All to Share                                              Paint it Black and Sympathy for the Devil
14. Many Numerous Anxieties Deconstruct Me                  19^th Nervous Breakdown
15. Hoochie Koochie Lady Girl                                            Honky Tonk Woman
16. Chevaux Sauvages                                                       Wild Horses (Sung in French)
17. Jumpin’ Jack Flash                                                       Jumpin’ Jack Flash
18. Thank God It’s Friday                                                    Ruby Tuesday
19. Sweet, Sweet and Almost Black                                   Brown Sugar
20. Altocumulus Standing Lenticular Banishment               Get Off of My Cloud
21. The Mighty Oxen Doth Plow for Us                               Beast of Burden
22. I Demand Quarters                                                        Gimme Shelter
23. Your Choice, Sometime No Can Do                              You Can’t Always Get What You Want

Thank you masses of fans. And these Cascading Down Pebbles of Various Sizes (The Rolling Stones) have played music for you long time. Over 50 years now. I am being enjoying them too. We hope to visit your walled cities soon and perhaps group sing without hypo-allergenic face mask. All goodness to you ~ Yao Zhen-Foo, Publicist for Cascading Down Pebbles of Various Sizes.

Look for my next installment in the Things One Should Not Wonder About, when I discuss people who speak sign language with an accent. All Goodness to You ~ David Hardiman