The Virgin Prince's War Journal
The grim and gritty side of things. If everyone had a soundtrack to their lives, mine would be the best.
Tuesday, December 23, 2003
The Best Christmas Movie of All Time
My recent bar-room adventure with Blitzen has gotten me thinking about the best films of the season. A popular favorite is It’s A Wonderful Life. It should come as no surprise to many of you that Wonderful Life bombed and was largely considered a failure upon it’s initial release. The huge build-up behind the film has come as a direct result of the fact that it has been shown on television nearly every year since it’s release. Now I would say the film is by no means bad. It’s quite entertaining. Who could forget the part where the floor to the high school dance opens up and everyone falls in the pool? That’s bitchin’! It was always to my regret that the floor to our high school gym didn’t open up similarly.
Another popular favorite is Miracle on 34th Street. Anyone you ask will tell you the original is the best, and I tend to agree. Just the same, as a child I always found the film boring. I mean, what kid wants to see a film with a lengthy courtroom scene? A courtroom scene may get you instantaneous approval for the Lifetime Television Network, but children and 30 year old single mothers have very different minds. The film does have it’s merits however. You get to see a drunken Santa Claus in a Christmas Day parade, and you also get to see Santa get pissed and sock someone in the face. You just don’t see enough of that these days.
The one we used to always watch as kids was the animated short, The Snowman. This film was made even more wholesome by way of an introduction by the mascot of forbidden love, David Bowie, who claimed to be the boy in the film. It was a silent film with musical accompaniment about a kid who builds a snowman that then comes to life. They cause a little trouble, then go flying around the world, eventually meeting up with a bunch of other snowmen and Santa himself. Of course, then they go back home and the boy goes to bed. The next morning, surprise, surprise, he finds the snowman melted to death. This movie always made me cry as a kid.
Fucking Snowman.
My dad’s favorite Christmas film is without a doubt A Christmas Story, a delightful story that stresses the importance of BB guns to growing boys. Although it is without a doubt one of the greatest Christmas films ever made, I have seen it far too many times in my short life for it to hold any entertainment value for me anymore. I have it memorized. The film is good though, and I recommend watching it if you want to see what Scottie Shwartz looked like before he was a fat pornstar. Not many people know it, but this movie spawned 2 sequels with different actors. I got to see a little bit of one where Charles Grodin played the father.
There’s been a ton of Christmas films made, so it goes without saying that there’s a whole bunch of films I won’t be mentioning. Some, such as Santa Claus vs. the Martians, aren’t even worth mentioning. However, I would be remiss in my duty if I did not mention Scrooged, and Ernest Saves Christmas. Some of you may shudder at the thought of an Ernest film. I don’t care. Ernest Saves Christmas rocked! As for Scrooged, can Bill Murray really do any wrong? He’s already got Groundhog’s Day covered.
I’ll tell you the best Christmas film of all time though. It’s the Laurel & Hardy classic, The March of the Wooden Soldiers. There’s no doubt this is the best. Disney later remade it as the ultra-crappy Babes In Toyland, complete with their own generic fat guy and skinny guy (cast members from their Zorro films) used for comic effect. But this one is the true original and by far the best. It is also one of the only times Mickey Mouse appears in non-Disney film.
For that matter, Mickey Mouse is played by, you guessed it, a monkey! 1930s brilliance! It goes without saying that Laurel and Hardy are absolutely brilliant. As for the rest of the characters, well they’re all fairytale characters. Santa ties into the story by ordering 600 1 foot tall wooden soldiers for Christmas. Luckily, Laurel builds 100 6 foot tall soldiers instead, which helps out greatly at the end when the heroes have to fight an army of bogeymen. Long before that Robin Williams piece of crap Toys came out, the greatest toy fight scene ever had already been filmed.
I could go on and on about the brilliance of March of the Wooden Soldiers, but it’s better if you just watch it. So go ahead and grab it if you should be looking for a Christmas film this holiday season. Or, you could just be like me and celebrate Festivus, in which case, any movie about Romans, pirates, or ninjas would work. If Festivus IS your holiday of choice, allow me then to suggest Caligula, Muppet Treasure Island, and Remo Williams. Happy holidays!
Another popular favorite is Miracle on 34th Street. Anyone you ask will tell you the original is the best, and I tend to agree. Just the same, as a child I always found the film boring. I mean, what kid wants to see a film with a lengthy courtroom scene? A courtroom scene may get you instantaneous approval for the Lifetime Television Network, but children and 30 year old single mothers have very different minds. The film does have it’s merits however. You get to see a drunken Santa Claus in a Christmas Day parade, and you also get to see Santa get pissed and sock someone in the face. You just don’t see enough of that these days.
The one we used to always watch as kids was the animated short, The Snowman. This film was made even more wholesome by way of an introduction by the mascot of forbidden love, David Bowie, who claimed to be the boy in the film. It was a silent film with musical accompaniment about a kid who builds a snowman that then comes to life. They cause a little trouble, then go flying around the world, eventually meeting up with a bunch of other snowmen and Santa himself. Of course, then they go back home and the boy goes to bed. The next morning, surprise, surprise, he finds the snowman melted to death. This movie always made me cry as a kid.
Fucking Snowman.
My dad’s favorite Christmas film is without a doubt A Christmas Story, a delightful story that stresses the importance of BB guns to growing boys. Although it is without a doubt one of the greatest Christmas films ever made, I have seen it far too many times in my short life for it to hold any entertainment value for me anymore. I have it memorized. The film is good though, and I recommend watching it if you want to see what Scottie Shwartz looked like before he was a fat pornstar. Not many people know it, but this movie spawned 2 sequels with different actors. I got to see a little bit of one where Charles Grodin played the father.
There’s been a ton of Christmas films made, so it goes without saying that there’s a whole bunch of films I won’t be mentioning. Some, such as Santa Claus vs. the Martians, aren’t even worth mentioning. However, I would be remiss in my duty if I did not mention Scrooged, and Ernest Saves Christmas. Some of you may shudder at the thought of an Ernest film. I don’t care. Ernest Saves Christmas rocked! As for Scrooged, can Bill Murray really do any wrong? He’s already got Groundhog’s Day covered.
I’ll tell you the best Christmas film of all time though. It’s the Laurel & Hardy classic, The March of the Wooden Soldiers. There’s no doubt this is the best. Disney later remade it as the ultra-crappy Babes In Toyland, complete with their own generic fat guy and skinny guy (cast members from their Zorro films) used for comic effect. But this one is the true original and by far the best. It is also one of the only times Mickey Mouse appears in non-Disney film.
For that matter, Mickey Mouse is played by, you guessed it, a monkey! 1930s brilliance! It goes without saying that Laurel and Hardy are absolutely brilliant. As for the rest of the characters, well they’re all fairytale characters. Santa ties into the story by ordering 600 1 foot tall wooden soldiers for Christmas. Luckily, Laurel builds 100 6 foot tall soldiers instead, which helps out greatly at the end when the heroes have to fight an army of bogeymen. Long before that Robin Williams piece of crap Toys came out, the greatest toy fight scene ever had already been filmed.
I could go on and on about the brilliance of March of the Wooden Soldiers, but it’s better if you just watch it. So go ahead and grab it if you should be looking for a Christmas film this holiday season. Or, you could just be like me and celebrate Festivus, in which case, any movie about Romans, pirates, or ninjas would work. If Festivus IS your holiday of choice, allow me then to suggest Caligula, Muppet Treasure Island, and Remo Williams. Happy holidays!
Friday, December 12, 2003
Hot Lesbian Strap-On Action!
Some of you may have noticed inconsistencies in the word spellings in my posts. There are a number of reasons for this. For one, the spell-check on my computer at work is set to British spelling, while the computer at my home uses the superior American dictionary. I hate British spelling. Among the flaws contained within the British written language is their overuse of the letter U in words where it isn’t needed. Words like “colour”, which we spell “color”. (Agh! The spell check is doing it right now! Leave my words alone you British beast!)
The British also like to make words unnecessarily long and add “E”s to the end of things. What is a “shop” to us becomes “shoppe” to them, “point” to “pointe”. I could be wrong about this. My point is, keep it simple. The Japanese spell words like they sound, which is something I think perhaps we should put a little effort towards trying. Of course, the Japanese alphabet is horrendously large and I think we’re better off sticking with our single consonant and vowel symbols, as opposed to their combined consonant and vowel symbols (ba be bi bo bu, repeat 16 times with d, f, g, h, j, k, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w, y, z, and then probably with even more symbols I don’t know about.)
What’s with the backwards “re” the British dictionary uses so much? That doesn’t sound how it looks! I much prefer our “meter” to their “metre” and our “liter” to their “litre”, though I must admit to preferring “theatre” as it does look far more regal, which is appropriate, being that theatres are generally places of culture.
What is with the British overuse of the letter S? Why must “practiced” be “practised” and “sympathize” be “sympathise” to them? The letter Z is terribly underused! And a fine letter it is! Let’s get some variety out there, Britain!
Not that American spelling is perfect. As a young lad I can recall deliberately losing a spelling bee because I took offense to the spellings of “dessert” and “desert”, thinking the spellings should be reversed. Being that “desert” is pronounced “deh-zert”, it was my firm belief that it should be spelled “dessert”. This is of course because dual consonants are supposed to follow soft vowels while single consonants follow strong vowels. For example, “later” (lA-ter) and “latter” (la-ter). Growing up, I always heard the word “dessert” pronounced “dE-zert”, hence my feelings that the word should only have one “S”. In the years since, I’ve come to accept that some people actually do pronounce it “des-zert” and have let my grudge go, submissively accepting the spelling.
One thing you may have noticed about my posts is that I only type “it’s” and never “its” and I’ll tell you why. There’s the two spellings for the two uses of the word, one, “its” pertaining to something’s ownership of something, and “it’s”, a contraction of “it is”. I say both have a right to an apostrophe! Obviously, contracted words always have apostrophes in the middle of them, indicating two merged words (like “don’t” for “do not”), but that’s not all! When something is “John’s”, it belongs to John. When something is the “giraffe’s” it belongs to the giraffe. When something belongs to it, should it not be “it’s”? Okay, granted “his” and “hers” break the rules, but SCREW THAT CRAP! Damn right I’m going to use an apostrophe.
My solution is this: the English-speaking countries of the world should pay me a million dollars each to rewrite all their words. I will create superior “Virgin Spelling”. Words that sound like they’re spelled! I’ll just sit down with a few dictionaries and in a few years I’ll be done. Sounds good to me! Granted, the new way will take some getting used to, but come on, admit it, wouldn’t you love to see the Dixie Chicks written about as performing “cuntry music”?
In an unrelated story, I was yelled at by my teacher in my 4th grade class once because I corrected her for wrongly phrasing a vocabulary word (“tail” was the word) during the middle of a dictation test. Ms. Boyd (as I recall her being named) had said something about, “I told a TAIL blah, blah, blah”. We had a predetermined set of vocabulary words and if we wrote the sentence CORRECTLY we would be marked as wrong. Personally, I thought it was outright irresponsible and immoral for a teacher to be teaching kids to use words the wrong way, but heck, I was just a 4th grader. Maybe this fully grown and officially educated teacher was right to screw with the kids’ understanding of the definitions and spellings of words.
I suppose I’ve always been a bit anal about words.
The British also like to make words unnecessarily long and add “E”s to the end of things. What is a “shop” to us becomes “shoppe” to them, “point” to “pointe”. I could be wrong about this. My point is, keep it simple. The Japanese spell words like they sound, which is something I think perhaps we should put a little effort towards trying. Of course, the Japanese alphabet is horrendously large and I think we’re better off sticking with our single consonant and vowel symbols, as opposed to their combined consonant and vowel symbols (ba be bi bo bu, repeat 16 times with d, f, g, h, j, k, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w, y, z, and then probably with even more symbols I don’t know about.)
What’s with the backwards “re” the British dictionary uses so much? That doesn’t sound how it looks! I much prefer our “meter” to their “metre” and our “liter” to their “litre”, though I must admit to preferring “theatre” as it does look far more regal, which is appropriate, being that theatres are generally places of culture.
What is with the British overuse of the letter S? Why must “practiced” be “practised” and “sympathize” be “sympathise” to them? The letter Z is terribly underused! And a fine letter it is! Let’s get some variety out there, Britain!
Not that American spelling is perfect. As a young lad I can recall deliberately losing a spelling bee because I took offense to the spellings of “dessert” and “desert”, thinking the spellings should be reversed. Being that “desert” is pronounced “deh-zert”, it was my firm belief that it should be spelled “dessert”. This is of course because dual consonants are supposed to follow soft vowels while single consonants follow strong vowels. For example, “later” (lA-ter) and “latter” (la-ter). Growing up, I always heard the word “dessert” pronounced “dE-zert”, hence my feelings that the word should only have one “S”. In the years since, I’ve come to accept that some people actually do pronounce it “des-zert” and have let my grudge go, submissively accepting the spelling.
One thing you may have noticed about my posts is that I only type “it’s” and never “its” and I’ll tell you why. There’s the two spellings for the two uses of the word, one, “its” pertaining to something’s ownership of something, and “it’s”, a contraction of “it is”. I say both have a right to an apostrophe! Obviously, contracted words always have apostrophes in the middle of them, indicating two merged words (like “don’t” for “do not”), but that’s not all! When something is “John’s”, it belongs to John. When something is the “giraffe’s” it belongs to the giraffe. When something belongs to it, should it not be “it’s”? Okay, granted “his” and “hers” break the rules, but SCREW THAT CRAP! Damn right I’m going to use an apostrophe.
My solution is this: the English-speaking countries of the world should pay me a million dollars each to rewrite all their words. I will create superior “Virgin Spelling”. Words that sound like they’re spelled! I’ll just sit down with a few dictionaries and in a few years I’ll be done. Sounds good to me! Granted, the new way will take some getting used to, but come on, admit it, wouldn’t you love to see the Dixie Chicks written about as performing “cuntry music”?
In an unrelated story, I was yelled at by my teacher in my 4th grade class once because I corrected her for wrongly phrasing a vocabulary word (“tail” was the word) during the middle of a dictation test. Ms. Boyd (as I recall her being named) had said something about, “I told a TAIL blah, blah, blah”. We had a predetermined set of vocabulary words and if we wrote the sentence CORRECTLY we would be marked as wrong. Personally, I thought it was outright irresponsible and immoral for a teacher to be teaching kids to use words the wrong way, but heck, I was just a 4th grader. Maybe this fully grown and officially educated teacher was right to screw with the kids’ understanding of the definitions and spellings of words.
I suppose I’ve always been a bit anal about words.
Sunday, December 07, 2003
Thoughts From Work
Back at the old work-place, weather has been just as unstable as it is everywhere else. Now generally, where I work is always sunny, without fail. I could step outside my house and have a thick, heavy fog, wet and cold, that soaks my hair and chills my bones, but when I get to work the sun is out and shining brightly. Which pisses me off. That means a harsh sunburn for this poor Irish Mongolian lad. Of course there’s sunscreen, I have 3 brands to choose from. There’s the Safeway generic brand that doesn’t work, the stuff Mom gave me that turns my face white and sticks to my hair, earning me the nickname “Casper”, and the Banana Boat stuff I use that makes me look like a well-greased pornstar gleaming in the light. Not to mention the shit always gets in my eyes and burns like napalm, and somehow always creeps into my mouth too, leaving a particularly unpleasant flavor. Hmmm... wet looking skin, stinging substance in my eyes, bad taste in my mouth. Maybe they should call the sunscreen “Pornstar”. Then it would form a matching pair with the Rockstar I drink in the morning.
So I like foggy days. Well, at least where work’s concerned, I hate when it cuts into my kite-flying. A nice layer of fog keeps the sun out of my eyes, helps slow down the progress of malignant melanoma (which is good, because it leaves me free to focus on lung cancer), and gets me out of having to put on that icky sunscreen. The fog also keeps the sun off of the computer monitor on my desk, which is good, it means I can actually read the thing. I have no idea why, but when they installed the thing they put it facing the window where the sun shines in, which is just stupid. There’s a lot of things I don’t get about why they installed it where they did. It doesn’t even fit properly on the desk. Heck, I can’t complain. Access to the internet makes work pass a lot faster and has helped me immeasurably.
The rain has finally won out. Glorious dark clouds fill the air and it’s great for my ever-squinting, sun-sensitive eyes. I don’t like wearing shades. I don’t like seeing the world darker than it really is and I like the idea of people seeing eachother eye to eye, not to mention something about sunglasses just seems pretentious to me. I’m well equipped for rain as well. It always cracks me up to see my coworkers scrambling to grab their umbrellas, and running inside. I love the rain. I love throwing on my trenchcoat and treading out there into the rain. I love walking back inside with a wet coat and my hair dripping water. They all look at me like I’m crazy for going out there. It’s great.
The next street up from my work is filled with trees. As I’ve walked along it on my way home from work I’ve noticed something that never ceases to impress me and make me as emotional as a menstruating female. The leaves of the trees have turned a wonderful yellow, and the rain has caused the leaves to start falling off. They cover the sidewalk and ground around the tree in a literal thick blanket. The first time I saw it I was completely amazed and impressed by it’s beauty and I had a 2 minute internal struggle with myself as I tried to decide whether to throw myself on the ground and roll around in it as if it were snow or to just keep on walking. It’s kind of like that struggle you have with yourself when you’re trying to keep from eating the flavored lipstick.
So I was reading news on the old monitor at work. Apparently there was this lady that just got convicted for running over a McDonalds manager, back in April. The incident started because the McDonalds staff wouldn’t initially give her a cheeseburger with mayonnaise on it as she requested. Okay, long story short.
Ex-hooker goes to McDonalds drive-thru and orders a cheeseburger with mayonnaise. 18 year old says they don’t make them that way. Lady starts screaming and being abusive. Manager comes and specially makes the cheeseburger for her, with mayonnaise, without onions and mustard, as she asked. Lady complains that cheeseburger is cold and throws it at them. They give her new cheeseburger. She complains that fries have gotten cold and demands more. They give her new fries. She then complains that she wants a new soda. They give her a new soda. She continues to be mean and abusive. Manager calls cops. Cops say to get the license plate number. Manager goes outside to write down license plate number. Lady sees her and drives her vehicle forward. Manager screams “STOP!” Lady laughs and keeps driving, dragging manager 20 feet, caught between tires. Lady then speeds off the wrong way down a one-way street. Manager has a broken pelvis and spends lots of time in the hospital. To this day she can’t pick up her grandchildren.
So this thing went to court a few days ago. The defendant, Waynetta Nolan, faced up to a possible 20 years for aggravated assault. After her laughable defense was over the jury went to decide on her fate. Less than an hour later they returned with a verdict of guilty. The offender got a sentence of 10 years.
Now personally, I think the lady should have gotten the death penalty, and that’s just for ordering a cheeseburger with mayonnaise on it. Crikey! That’s wrong on so many levels. Here we have a burger made from dirty, fatty processed beef (and it’s not the good parts) with a slice of that nasty, plastic artificially processed cheese they call American cheese here in the states (which is self-deprecating if you ask me) and served with a fat helping of white, egg-based sauce, the nastiest of sauces. Why bother ordering this cholesterol treat? Wouldn’t she have been happier with a patty made of solidified fat, garnished with grease, served on a bun of congealed margarine?
Yuck. The chair. The chair I say!
So I like foggy days. Well, at least where work’s concerned, I hate when it cuts into my kite-flying. A nice layer of fog keeps the sun out of my eyes, helps slow down the progress of malignant melanoma (which is good, because it leaves me free to focus on lung cancer), and gets me out of having to put on that icky sunscreen. The fog also keeps the sun off of the computer monitor on my desk, which is good, it means I can actually read the thing. I have no idea why, but when they installed the thing they put it facing the window where the sun shines in, which is just stupid. There’s a lot of things I don’t get about why they installed it where they did. It doesn’t even fit properly on the desk. Heck, I can’t complain. Access to the internet makes work pass a lot faster and has helped me immeasurably.
The rain has finally won out. Glorious dark clouds fill the air and it’s great for my ever-squinting, sun-sensitive eyes. I don’t like wearing shades. I don’t like seeing the world darker than it really is and I like the idea of people seeing eachother eye to eye, not to mention something about sunglasses just seems pretentious to me. I’m well equipped for rain as well. It always cracks me up to see my coworkers scrambling to grab their umbrellas, and running inside. I love the rain. I love throwing on my trenchcoat and treading out there into the rain. I love walking back inside with a wet coat and my hair dripping water. They all look at me like I’m crazy for going out there. It’s great.
The next street up from my work is filled with trees. As I’ve walked along it on my way home from work I’ve noticed something that never ceases to impress me and make me as emotional as a menstruating female. The leaves of the trees have turned a wonderful yellow, and the rain has caused the leaves to start falling off. They cover the sidewalk and ground around the tree in a literal thick blanket. The first time I saw it I was completely amazed and impressed by it’s beauty and I had a 2 minute internal struggle with myself as I tried to decide whether to throw myself on the ground and roll around in it as if it were snow or to just keep on walking. It’s kind of like that struggle you have with yourself when you’re trying to keep from eating the flavored lipstick.
So I was reading news on the old monitor at work. Apparently there was this lady that just got convicted for running over a McDonalds manager, back in April. The incident started because the McDonalds staff wouldn’t initially give her a cheeseburger with mayonnaise on it as she requested. Okay, long story short.
Ex-hooker goes to McDonalds drive-thru and orders a cheeseburger with mayonnaise. 18 year old says they don’t make them that way. Lady starts screaming and being abusive. Manager comes and specially makes the cheeseburger for her, with mayonnaise, without onions and mustard, as she asked. Lady complains that cheeseburger is cold and throws it at them. They give her new cheeseburger. She complains that fries have gotten cold and demands more. They give her new fries. She then complains that she wants a new soda. They give her a new soda. She continues to be mean and abusive. Manager calls cops. Cops say to get the license plate number. Manager goes outside to write down license plate number. Lady sees her and drives her vehicle forward. Manager screams “STOP!” Lady laughs and keeps driving, dragging manager 20 feet, caught between tires. Lady then speeds off the wrong way down a one-way street. Manager has a broken pelvis and spends lots of time in the hospital. To this day she can’t pick up her grandchildren.
So this thing went to court a few days ago. The defendant, Waynetta Nolan, faced up to a possible 20 years for aggravated assault. After her laughable defense was over the jury went to decide on her fate. Less than an hour later they returned with a verdict of guilty. The offender got a sentence of 10 years.
Now personally, I think the lady should have gotten the death penalty, and that’s just for ordering a cheeseburger with mayonnaise on it. Crikey! That’s wrong on so many levels. Here we have a burger made from dirty, fatty processed beef (and it’s not the good parts) with a slice of that nasty, plastic artificially processed cheese they call American cheese here in the states (which is self-deprecating if you ask me) and served with a fat helping of white, egg-based sauce, the nastiest of sauces. Why bother ordering this cholesterol treat? Wouldn’t she have been happier with a patty made of solidified fat, garnished with grease, served on a bun of congealed margarine?
Yuck. The chair. The chair I say!
Thursday, December 04, 2003
Poured From A Blender On A Plane
Where have all the pink elephants gone? The dancing, slightly sexual, pachyderms promised to me as a gift upon reaching a drinking age. Much firewater has come and gone, in by mouth, out by bladder, and still more out by mouth, but nary a pink elephant. The lusty magenta vulgarians stay hidden deep within the hot tub and cocaine splendor of their Congo condominiums.
And I wonder what happened to all the little people. At one time they seemed plentiful, being enough to stand 3 at a time at Santa's side, with one more working the counter at the video store down the way, hidden behind the Cheech and Chong tapes and still yet, one or two more at the new McDonalds opening up the street, handing out cheap plastic decoder watches, the ones with hidden compartments in them, my favorite kind of piddly crap. Ronald McDonald of course would smile wide and lift you up, sit you on his shoulder, and Pops would take your photo. Inevitably, Pops would get distracted, either talking to another adult or checking his camera and Ronald would always take advantage of these moments, tossing you to his midget sidekicks, the round blonde one and the albino, who would hold you down while the third assistant, the effeminate Latino boy in the bright yellow suit, would shove food down your throat, McNuggets, fries, oversized bites of burgers, all forced down with generous helpings of ketchup, honey, and sweet and sour sauce.
This may all sound sweet and nice, like loads of fun, but was in fact far more insidious. What they did with those few bites of McDonaldland fried food was give you your first taste of their patented artificial beef flavor, gross, unholy shit that they inject their burgers with. This chemical concoction made from the foulest bits of a horse's ass, designed to stick to your arteries and get your body to gradually form a dependency on this foreign matter.
Old man McDonald wants your money and he makes sure he gets it. What starts out with a burger a week becomes a burger daily and from there continues to escalate to a value meal at every sitting and bringing you closer to your inevitable death, the final stage where you mix cocktails of chicken fat and biodiesel to shoot up between your toes. I've seen it happen and it's never pretty.
Indeed, as I've gotten older, everything seems to have lost its glossy shine, hope is harder to come by, and the friendly, furry creatures don't come by as much anymore. Perhaps I was better off in those naive days of thinking girls were gross and uncool. Those childhood gender battles, though tiring, kept you safe from the cute loose Persian girls that get inside your head and make you doubt your very sanity, or the Russian lasses that break your heart and crush your spirit, the ones that make you question your self worth. Even Mother, who at one time could make a boy feel 10 feet tall, now makes me feel hollow inside, shriveled up, dead and worthless.
And I get to thinking. I am the dreamer, but this is not my dream. I did not ask for this, this work-a-day world, this place of life-hour consuming employment, barely adequate domiciles, years wasted on educations that won't actually help you in the job market or improve your living situation. This loss of freedom that comes from being an adult. I would not waste my dreamstuffs on this, nor even the stuffs of my nightmares, for it's just not good enough. Not for me. This is not my dream. This must be YOUR dream. Perhaps then, you are the dreamer.
And I wonder what happened to all the little people. At one time they seemed plentiful, being enough to stand 3 at a time at Santa's side, with one more working the counter at the video store down the way, hidden behind the Cheech and Chong tapes and still yet, one or two more at the new McDonalds opening up the street, handing out cheap plastic decoder watches, the ones with hidden compartments in them, my favorite kind of piddly crap. Ronald McDonald of course would smile wide and lift you up, sit you on his shoulder, and Pops would take your photo. Inevitably, Pops would get distracted, either talking to another adult or checking his camera and Ronald would always take advantage of these moments, tossing you to his midget sidekicks, the round blonde one and the albino, who would hold you down while the third assistant, the effeminate Latino boy in the bright yellow suit, would shove food down your throat, McNuggets, fries, oversized bites of burgers, all forced down with generous helpings of ketchup, honey, and sweet and sour sauce.
This may all sound sweet and nice, like loads of fun, but was in fact far more insidious. What they did with those few bites of McDonaldland fried food was give you your first taste of their patented artificial beef flavor, gross, unholy shit that they inject their burgers with. This chemical concoction made from the foulest bits of a horse's ass, designed to stick to your arteries and get your body to gradually form a dependency on this foreign matter.
Old man McDonald wants your money and he makes sure he gets it. What starts out with a burger a week becomes a burger daily and from there continues to escalate to a value meal at every sitting and bringing you closer to your inevitable death, the final stage where you mix cocktails of chicken fat and biodiesel to shoot up between your toes. I've seen it happen and it's never pretty.
Indeed, as I've gotten older, everything seems to have lost its glossy shine, hope is harder to come by, and the friendly, furry creatures don't come by as much anymore. Perhaps I was better off in those naive days of thinking girls were gross and uncool. Those childhood gender battles, though tiring, kept you safe from the cute loose Persian girls that get inside your head and make you doubt your very sanity, or the Russian lasses that break your heart and crush your spirit, the ones that make you question your self worth. Even Mother, who at one time could make a boy feel 10 feet tall, now makes me feel hollow inside, shriveled up, dead and worthless.
And I get to thinking. I am the dreamer, but this is not my dream. I did not ask for this, this work-a-day world, this place of life-hour consuming employment, barely adequate domiciles, years wasted on educations that won't actually help you in the job market or improve your living situation. This loss of freedom that comes from being an adult. I would not waste my dreamstuffs on this, nor even the stuffs of my nightmares, for it's just not good enough. Not for me. This is not my dream. This must be YOUR dream. Perhaps then, you are the dreamer.
