Archive for the ‘The Stories’ Category

Everything you don’t need to know all in one incomprehensible edition.

As a dilettante of the second order, I occasionally glance at The New York Review of Books just to see how the other half lives. Alright, just to see how the other .00000000025% live. Except for Presidents giving a State of the Union Address, no one reads any more. Instead they troll for satisfying videos of some do-gooder giving a homeless guy $100 or an abandoned kitten being breast fed by a honey badger. I know I do. And I get it. Reading takes time and application. It’s proactive, but it is ultimately more rewarding and nourishing than idly surfing some video screen seeking temporary fulfillment. Well that’s as preachy as I’ll get because Wimp.com just posted a video of a Dolphin making oatmeal. That Dolphin happened to be former Miami Dolphin fullback Larry Csonka.

The NY Review of Books is bone dry and devoid of juicy gossip. If it were any drier it would spontaneously combust. It’s a narrow publication appealing to people who sometimes equate intellectual heft with spiritual awareness. The NY Review of Books is replete with bravura verbal muscularity and apposite aphorisms, soft as church music. However as comprehensive as it may be, the following words or ideas seem to creep into about half the articles or reviews. For example I’ve detected these recurring themes or phrases throughout the NY Review of Books:

• • Sylvia Plath’s suicide changed nothing. She was still unhappy.
  • So that was it. Jane immersed herself in English romantic poets as a means of coping with her intractable psoriasis.
  • Harold’s homosexuality was known only to his wife, Ralph.
  • All we had were parsnips. Fortunately all we wanted were parsnips.
  • the Zionist experience of Jewish Semites
  • the Jewish experience of Semitic Zionists
  • the Semitic experience of Zionist Jews
  • the influence of chivalric modalities in 12th century Hohoenzollern 
  • Marcel Proust would often mispronounce his name as “Proust.” Knowing that if anyone were to write about the event, no one would be able to know how Proust pronounced “Proust” in the first place. 

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~ In the decade of the 1840’s a series of catalytic technological leaps conspired (in a good way) to turbocharge the era and toggle society from primitivism to modernity. ~

21st Century man just can’t get it through his head that there was a time before FaceBook.

The pervasive wizardry of the Digital Age has palsied our ability to appreciate its origins. It seems the ubiquity of ever-advancing gadgetry has quietly rendered us both a slave to its expediency and a marveller at its everyday sorcery. Whether it’s asking Siri to; “Find me the nearest Weinershnitzel” or waving our sudsy hands beneath a motion-detecting faucet, we’re unthinkingly demanding of the technological feats which, until recently, were nothing more than crack pot ideas found in the back of decade’s old Popular Mechanics magazines.

A proper accounting of how we got here demands a deliberative look at where we came from. Being fortunate enough to have missed the Dark Ages (unless you count the Disco Era), I have a mighty appreciation for the technological marvels which have allowed us to avoid the drudgery of the past. For example, there was a time when Wheel of Fortune hostess Vanna White had to actually turn the letters by hand. Such drudgery! Now she just touches a screen and the letters magically appear. This kind of enabling touch-screen technology will add years to Vanna’s letter-revealing hostess duties. Read the rest of this entry »

Only suicide bomber you ever want to meet. Ladies and Gentlemen: A Kamikaze!

This supremely ironic New York Times headline from February 10^th reads like a ripe premise for a comedic bit. And in a sense it is a bit. It’s one of 3000 sad little bits that fell into my hands as a result of the explosion. They’re called smithereens, and like a dutiful sleuth I’ll attempt to piece this accident back together smithereen by smithereen to discover just how something so awful could go so right. In Iraq suicide bombers have become obscene background noise like rap music is in this country. What drives these suicide bombers? Where the Beach Boys once promised “♫Two girls for every boy♫,” the Taliban promise 77 virgins for every boy in the afterlife. With this sheer volume of women, one assumes there are also towelettes. 

What We Know so Far

We know the noble gas Xenon (Xe) is No. 54 on the Periodic Table of Elements. We also know Xenon is considered a “noble gas” due to its philanthropic work with underprivileged elements like Bismuth and Tin. Xenon is an odorless, colorless gas similar to Senator Harry Reid. But that bears little impact on today’s story and probably shouldn’t have even been included in this reconstruction. Read the rest of this entry »

The King of Late Night catalyzes a revelatory moment…or words to that effect.

In 1976, at the tender and impressionable age of 15, I experienced a life changing event that has informed my behavior ever since. What made this event all the more remarkable is that it took place entirely above the waist. As with most revelations it presented itself in a most epiphanic fashion. And if you’re looking for a heartfelt memoir that has the word “epiphanic” in it…this is it. Allow me to explain. I never thought there was a chance in hell I’d ever attend a live taping of The Tonight Show starring my comedic idol Johnny Carson. No roads led there. It wasn’t even on my bucket list because, back then, I didn’t know what a “bucket list” was. Seeing The Tonight Show in person seemed well beyond the realm of possibility – like a Pope saying he’s fallible. Actually I think Pope Francis recently said as much. Anyway, I don’t mean to undercut my own argument that The Tonight Show and I weren’t even in the same universe; because in 1976 we weren’t. However, as events would later confirm, not only were we in the same universe, we would soon be in the same studio. Read the rest of this entry »

The coolest, smartest and handsomest guy in the room: Col. Robert Hogan US Air Corps.

If I was dying and the Make-A-Wish Foundation could grant me one request, it would be to enter into the idealized world of TV’s Hogan’s Heroes featuring Colonel Robert Hogan and his intrepid band of brothers. Truth is however, I’m not dying (at least not ahead of schedule) and yet I still want to go there. Forget Tomorrowland and Pirates of the Caribbean, couldn’t Disney create a HoganWorld where adolescent adults like myself could revel in a fantasy realm of cunning espionage, brotherly camaraderie and busty blondes working for The Underground? “Goldilocks this is Papa Bear, come in Goldilocks.” A place where never is heard a discouraging word and the skies are not cloudy all day. C’mon Disney you can build it. Please Walt. Pretty please. Forget about Saving Mr. Banks, how about Saving Mr. Hardiman? Read the rest of this entry »

Twitter’s Proto-Tweet machine created in the Twitter Research Labs in September of 2002. Now housed in the Museum of Silicon Valley Relics.

Twitter Central

Nothing but tweets. This network features all 140 characters available in the Twittersphere. Twitter Central salutes the character Tweety Bird who’s been tweeting long before it was even invented. Other twitter characters range from sympathetic antiheroes like Don Vito Corleone to repugnant antagonists like Voldemort. All these characters are just like the ones in your real life. Some characters tweet you well, others tweet you like hell. And when I say real life I’m referring to the life you appear to be living. The one that makes you angry after you’re 3 miles away from the MacDonald’s drive thru only to discover your cheeseburger, fries and a Coke, is really a Filet-O-Fish, onion rings and a Mr. Pibb.      I’m not lovin’ it! Read the rest of this entry »

“Happy to have made my acquaintance and so will you.”

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has awarded a special Oscar to dogs for their convincing portrayal of man’s best friend. Other creatures in the Animal Kingdom felt slighted by their exclusion, but admitted, “We can’t compete with those lovable brownnosers. They just completely rollover for humans. Literally. And once you start rubbing their belly and they begin that cutesy spastic leg kick….we’re toast. It’s no wonder they get all the chew toys they want. Like they need any more. As it is now the males carry around their favorite chew toy with them full time .” Read the rest of this entry »

Will the reign of man ever end?

Things haven’t been right since my mama accidentally dropped her little bundle of joy on the vinyl game mat so many years ago. It’s hard balancing a baby when you’re playing Twister. Mama taught me a lot about life, but all I can remember is: left foot red, right hand blue. Oh, that Twister ties you up in a knot.

As I got older (mostly due to the passage of time and not because I matured), my education continued in The School of Hard Knocks; most of which landed on my head and hence the title of our little story today. Mother thoughtfully enrolled me in this school simply by birthing me. Your mother did too? I knew it. We’re all classmates in this school whether we like it or not. However, this is not a tale of woe. It’s a tale of whoa! As in, slow down Dr. Phil while I sort this out. But even if I were to succeed, all I’d have is a well sorted life. So what? Botanists do the same thing categorizing plants and they’re no happier than I am. Still I wonder, if a botanist was a vegan, would they feel guilty about eating their work. Read the rest of this entry »

Mom thought we were going fishing. But wait’ll she sees these sheaves we caught. Sheaves! It’s what’s for dinner.

This Protestant hymn begs the question: What exactly is a sheave and why does it need to be brought in?

Well to answer that question, you’ve first got to listen to the song and then you should read the story. Here is the audio: Bringing in the Sheaves (Disco Version). Pay particular attention (if you can withstand it) to the chorus beginning at the 30 second mark.

I’ll assume you’ve just endured it, I mean listened to it. Are you still conscious? You surprise me then. Let me begin by defining some terms:

Sheaves    –       Bundles in which cereal plants are bound after reaping.

Bringing in  –      Picking up something that was formerly out, and carrying it to a place that is now in. Read the rest of this entry »

“Mom, I’m home. Mom. Mom!”

It’s not easy coaxing a demented fictional character to write a humorous piece based on a personal experience, but with the help of Dr. Brown’s Flux Capacitor (on loan from Back to the Future) I brought the whole project together with minimum time warping and maximum hilarity. Although Mr. Bates is nutso to the core, he’s kinda entertaining when he puts pen to paper. No one was hurt in the making of Diarya and the only casualty was melancholy. So without further ado I present to you with limited run on sentences:

Diarya – A remembrance by Norman Bates of Psycho fame.

Trust me. This is some good sh*t. Read the rest of this entry »