California is Sinking

"The Promoter" debuts on Howard TV

2009-03-02T17:03:00.000-08:00

Check out the promo for our new series on Howard TV. Don't be a cheapskate...order it today!

Road Rage

2008-07-24T01:14:00.000-07:00

Nothing in this world captures the hypocrisy and self-absorption that classifies mankind as road rage. The competitive nature that has driven our species forward, ensuring that we stayed fed through the lean years, and clothed through the cold ones, is still alive and well. Let’s face it; everyone who is on the planet right now is here because all of his ancestors—humans, monkeys, four-legged fish, amoebas, whatever—were pretty damn good at survival. That pressing need to go after a precious resource, to take what’s yours, is part of our genetic code.

So road rage is only natural. You can see an advantage, an edge in the grand struggle to exist: an opening two lanes over, a light that has yet to turn red, an emergency vehicle with sirens blaring you can draft behind, but there’s some idiotic old lady, who has the nerve to be driving only five miles over the speed limit, in your way. And you’re in a rush—you’re trying to get to your fantasy baseball draft or some one day sale at Nordstrom, or whatever else you’re into, and that’s what’s really important and this lady is ruining everything.

And who cares if there’s another hundred cars ahead of her, and she hasn’t yet had a safe opening to make her left turn, and she is waving apologetically out the window, and she has a bumper sticker that says “Practice Random Acts of Kindness”?

Learn to drive, grandma.

And then there’s the total opposite: when you’re fat and happy. Day off. Sun shining. Basking in satisfaction like a lion chewing on a wildebeest thigh bone. And someone is coming up from behind real fast. Something about their fast pace, the way they seem to feel entitled to the road you’re cruising on, just rubs you the wrong way. So you slow down a little bit more, maybe block them just a little from a newly forming lane. Just to show them how uptight they are, and how smooth you are. How you take life as it comes, and they are a spaz.

There is no one truly immune. The same self-righteous, do-gooders who are so quick to point out how they wake up at sunrise like a farmer (the uncontested, most virtuous of lifestyles), listen to public radio, and never watch reality TV, will claim to be above the fray. But road rage exists even in the most noble of places: church, library, and farmer’s market parking lots.

There will be no reprieve from the fight until we are all self-replicating, artificially-sustained, brain-based organisms. Then none of us will be in a rush, and we can share the road like the gentlemen that we pretend we are.

History of the Future (hybrid technology)

2008-06-30T23:13:00.000-07:00

In the year 2008 it became apparent to the majority of Urban Americans that their lifestlyes were unsustainable.

In a halfhearted attempt to save the planet, the people turned towards what is now known as“band-aid” technology .

Rather than addressing the near irreversible damage they had inflicted on the planet and making any meaningful changes; the peopletook to labelling incremental improvements with feel-good terms like green and hybrid.

The phenomena began with automobiles (the primary transportation of the era), but soon spread to encompass all sorts of products and services.

Studies show that, although the new technologydid nothing to slow down their inevitable demise, the new labels helped the people feel less guilt, and eased their minds as they endured obliteration.

Here are a few examples from the height of the "band aid" technology era:

A Short History of the California Housing Crisis

2008-05-21T01:00:00.001-07:00

The Tourist Junk Market (down at the boardwalk)

2008-04-15T23:31:00.000-07:00

There is a bizarre phenomenon that causes a person’s consumptive discretion to decrease in direct proportion to the distance he is from his home. It’s a condition that afflicts all travelers, from young Euro hipsters to fanny-pack-wearing-red-staters.

We’ve all been guilty of haggling some poor third worlder out of an extra dollar or two, only to walk away with a tacky necklace that will be instantly forgotten and spend the rest of its life in the bottom of a knick knack drawer.

Whether you’re walking through a Tijuana marketplace, or cruising the Venice Beach boardwalk, you see the same junk market spring up wherever the hoards of tourists are.

Take the t-shirt stands. It’s like they went slogan hunting in the Appalachians armed with a bottle of Wild Turkey and a digital voice recorder.

“Here have a few drinks, kind sir. Now tell me about your attitude towards women, and how you might express that in a crude statement, five words or less.”

What a fantastic way to commemorate your trip to Los Angeles — T-shirt designed by drunken redneck. There aren’t enough hipsters in LA and New York to absorb all the irony in those shirts.

Or how about the Your Name on a Grain of Rice craze?

Click here for the "Definitive Guide to Buying Name-on-Rice Jewelry" (you won't be sorry)

Who cares if the target market is kids? It’s still lame. When I was ten I wanted a Rickey Henderson card not the smallest grain-based reproduction of my name humanly possible.

Has this become a skill, handed down from generation to generation? How does the rice-writer make enough money to buy his own rice for dinner? Does she survive by eating the un-inked rice at the end of the day? Just another mystery of the tourist junk market.

Another, apparently popular, Venice Beach travel purchase is a henna tattoo. I suppose this fills the same niche as getting your hair braided in the Caribbean; a harmless, mildly-titillating form of body transformation.

But walk down the Venice boardwalk and you’ll see these stalls everywhere and they’re almost always empty. Is there a group of people who keep coming back to get their henna tats redone? Or is it a craze that has run its course, doomed to disappear when the last hippie checks out? Will their stalls be taken over by people writing on rice, or something even more useless? Even a seasoned economist would have trouble predicting the direction of the tourist junk market.

I envision a future in which tourists no longer feel the need to purchase something…anything…to feel that their trip is complete. Or, at the very least, the offerings available to the traveler are environmentally responsible products, not landfill-bound junk. Perhaps commemorative carbon credits, or reusable shopping bags. At least then we'd be killing two birds with one stone.

How Ikeas Are Made

2008-04-10T02:44:00.001-07:00

Beach Bums

2008-03-28T23:45:00.000-07:00

Not all bums are created equal.

For every ten hyper-agressive zombies begging for spare change, there is usually one free-spirited, feel good, seemingly-wise street dweller. His never ending smile is infectious. He’ll make the nine to fiver question his commitment. A life without worries, without routine —the ticking clock is his alone.

He works his smile up and down the boardwalk, making a quarter here, a dollar there. This is his world. He owns the sunshine and the palm trees, the burning edge of the Pacific.

But when the sun drops, so does the high. The next 12 hours are going to be cold. The rats come out at night. Only the strong survive for another day in the sun.

The Promoter (Episode 2)

2008-03-11T12:31:00.000-07:00

The second episode of our web series has arrived! Enjoy...

Star Alert!!

2008-02-26T18:50:00.000-08:00

While I acknowledge that this website gets less traffic than any given side street in Santa Monica (which is where I saw this van parked), I thought it would be nice to help this guy out...

Calling all industry personnel…somehow every single one of you has missed Shawn De Vorse!

How could you fail to recognize the undiluted essence of star power? Have none of you found yourselves stuck in traffic on the Sunset Strip with this man’s head shot creating a blinding glare in your windshield—like light from heaven itself? How has this classic-featured, highly-refined thespian escaped your notice? Did you let the van that looks like it was previously owned by Ted Bundy cloud your judgment?

Next time you’re casting for “Limo Driver” or “Doorman #1” do yourself a favor and give Mr. De Vorse a call. He is also available as a Colin Quinn body double if the real thing gets too drunk. Of course Shawn will probably be drunk as well, but he works cheaper than Colin.

Smug Portland

2008-02-20T00:11:00.000-08:00

Fellow Californian, if you like people thinking you’re an asshole, head north. And make sure you tell them where you came from.

I spent the last week in Portland, Oregon, and was shocked at how much cooler everyone is there than down here in California.

“California is everything that is wrong with the world today,” said some guy I met in a bar; right after I told him I live in LA. Then he tricked me into buying him a drink. The exact sequence of events is a little bit hazy, but it involved him promising to buy the second round and then promptly disappearing into the crowd.

But I’m not complaining. As a dickhead Californian, I deserved it. Thanks for setting me straight, dude.

Then there was the elderly security guard in the airport who studied the Georgia driver’s license in front of me for three minutes engaging in friendly small talk with its owner. He took one look at me and my California ID, and said “Now this one I see too many of. You guys steal all our water.”

I could also mention the pale and flabby girl sitting alone at a bar, who pointed out to me and my friends that we “aren’t even from around here.”

We accidentally mentioned to her that we had just come from Cabaret, a local gentlemen’s club. “That’s the worst strip club in Portland.” She said. Fair enough, it was really narrow and dark, with two tiny stages pushed up against the wall and only three girls on the job. But we had enjoyed ourselves there.

“Where should we go then? What’s the best strip club in Portland?” We asked, wanting to take advantage of her wisdom.

“The Magic Garden.” She said confidently. So we went to the Magic Garden. It was darker, dirtier, and had one stage and two girls working. I had the feeling that if we had gone to the Magic Garden first, that would have been the worst strip club in Portland.

Don’t get me wrong. I actually fell in love with the town. The drinks are cheap, the mountains on the horizon beautiful. It reportedly has the nation’s highest number of brew pubs and strip clubs per capita. There is a vibrant local music scene. But I didn’t like the smug attitude towards its neighbors to the south.

Sure there are problems here in California—overcrowding, excessive materialism, hour long commutes, and so on. That’s what this blog is supposed to be about after all. But, Portland certainly isn’t immune from modern ills like the locals seem to think. The streets are filled with young runaways and drug addicts. Smugness and self-satisfaction are running rampant. And, let’s face it, the weather sucks. Really, Portland is a haven for people who can’t hack it in other, more fast-paced (and relevant) parts of the country.

So if those guys up there in the woods are going to be hating on California we are going to have to take action and defend ourselves. Let’s start with an embargo on Oregon’s main exports. That would include beer, Nikes, and, ummmm….more beer?

I think we can do just fine without them.

The Promoter (Episode 1)

2008-02-19T18:40:00.000-08:00

The team behind California is Sinking has created a Youtube Series. Follow along as we put together shows for the Killers of Comedy, a group of travelling misfits from the Howard Stern Show, and film the madness.

Bitch or Black Man?

2008-02-06T22:41:00.000-08:00

With the Republican Party’s Presidential hopes sinking to the bottom of the Mariana’s Trench, weighed down by a war that no one can justify or explain and an economy in constant peril, the Oval Office seems bound for a Democratic occupant.

So the real drama is being played out in the Democratic Primaries where, like two expansion teams meeting in the World Series, two heretofore downtrodden demographics are slugging it out for their chance to be the first first. Will it be the women or the blacks?

Although the official campaign buzzwords talk about Hillary’s “30 years of experience” and Obama “representing change” the fight at street level is far baser - do we want a bitch or a black man?

Through the eyes of the mainstream, most of the crude attacks seem to be directed at Hillary – her cankles, her shrill voice, her manly intensity. The media gets away with reporting on these sexist attacks because, as one feminist whines, there is a far lower standard in the public’s acceptance of woman bashing:

“Goodbye to the (Hillary Clinton) nutcracker with metal spikes between splayed thighs. If it was a tap-dancing blackface doll, we would be righteously outraged—and they would not be selling it in airports. Shame.”

There is some truth to the fact that we feel more comfortable bashing a gender than a race or ethnicity. I certainly felt a lot more at ease putting Bitch in my title than Negro (which I eventually changed to the less abrasive “Black Man”).

But, as I don’t have to tell you, the racism (true discrimination) is out there. Not on the nightly news—you have to dig a little deeper to find it (but not too deep – I simply googled “Obama n**ger). And it is far more vicious, more dangerous, than the woman-bashing that the Hillary-backers cry about.

In a few minutes on one message board, I came up with eloquent gems like these:

“One only has to look at what happened to Zimbabwe to see what America will become if Obama gets elected. Or just look at any African country that doesn't have white goverment. We'll be the laughing stock of the world. Support Obama? Flush twice, its a long way to Washington!!”

“Notice that the one and ONLY reason that the White shit for brains Liberals are voting for a n**ger is because he is a shit colored n**ger. According to them, its time for America to have a shitskin for president, no other reason. Imagine how these mindless assholes would squeal and scream 'racist' if anyone were to say 'vote for the White guy because he's White'.”

“Nigbama may be the final nail in the US coffin we need, so we can take this country back. Maybe not such a bad thing.”

With extreme racial tension like this bubbling under the surface it’s clear that the country is far more ready to paint the walls of the Oval Office pink than cover the couches in plastic. Personally I don’t care too much which victim of society wins, either would be better than a half-wit.

$ports Betting 101

2008-01-30T18:08:00.000-08:00

Breaking News…Natalee Holloway Alive! Cheerleaders Dead!

2008-01-22T14:14:00.000-08:00

I’m still holding out hope that Natalee Holloway will be found alive, quivering in the corner of a dark room in a dirty whorehouse in South America after her third round of sex with a Venezuelan businessman in one night; a victim of the white slave trade rather than murder. Certainly that’s what Greta Van Susteren, and the other media leeches who are still trying to suck blood out of the story over two years after the fact, are hoping.

Perhaps Geraldo Rivera can pose as a john, infiltrate said brothel, throw the pretty young blonde white woman over his shoulders, and deliver her back to her media savvy mom. Just think of the ratings. It could run during the Super Bowl halftime and upstage the game.

By this point everyone is aware of and pretends to be disgusted by “Missing White Woman Syndrome”. One flooded Pi Phi sorority house would easily attract more news cameras than New Orleans’ Lower 9th Ward. When an attractive white woman meets her demise the media provides us with an endless feed of stale “breaking” news. We, the audience, condemn the obvious pandering for ratings and then, evidently, misplace the remote control.

One of my personal favorite examples of the shallowness of modern news (and the news devouring public) was the story of five high school cheerleaders from upstate New York who died in a fiery auto crash last year. Teen drivers die in crashes with an alarming frequency (almost ten a day in 2003), but these girls and their headshots were featured as the main news story on CNN.com for at least two days.

Contrast that with this accident in Alabama, which I didn't come across until researching this article. It made the national news sites because people will always click on a link that says “dead cheerleader”, but it didn’t have the legs of the original cheerleader death story. I can’t help noticing that the Alabama girls are a tad bit chubbier, less photogenic, than their New York counterparts.

I’m not upset that the media plays to this lowest common denominator. They are businesses with bottom lines. If the public wanted to read about poor people in the inner city getting murdered, and fat, unattractive people dying prematurely in car wrecks, then CNN would gladly give it to us. What I do mind is the hypocritical, holier-than-thou attitude of the people who try to denounce what they eagerly consume — like rubberneckers who bitch about the traffic jam they are causing.

Let’s just stop the charade. CNN and Fox News can start running a regular feature called “Premature Deaths of Good Looking Women”. It will feel good for all of us to come clean.

Is Hannah Montana the Antichrist?

2008-01-14T19:25:00.000-08:00

Back in the old days (before say…1990), little girls were like miniature adults, taken to societal role-playing to have their fun, things like sitting down to mini grownup tea parties and nurturing baby dolls, while little boys spent their time killing small animals and playing video games.

They were the unspoiled demographic - mostly ignored by Madison Avenue, Hollywood, and the other assorted taste makers who define exactly what it is we want and need.

Back in those more innocent times, you would often hear that the women could be our salvation:

If women ran the world there would be no war. If women were in charge we would all eat three square meals a day, no one would spit or fart, and toilet seats would always be left down.

Now after almost two decades of bombardment from the heaviest artillery in MTV, E! Television, and US Weekly’s arsenals, that innocent little girl has been obliterated. A line that stretched from Laura Ingalls Wilder in her Little House on the Prairie…through “baby talk” Cindy Brady…all the way down to Drew Barrymore in ET, has been broken. Looking back Barrymore’s performance might have been the high watermark for pig-tailed innocence. When she fell, dramatically and publicly, she pulled all of our little girls down with her.

What has followed has been a steady stream of hyper-sexualized female role models; Lady Feminism has gone macho, like she took a shot of testosterone to the buttocks, grabbed her crotch, and took a seat on a bar stool in Reno, Nevada.

First there was Pam Anderson becoming the world’s most famous woman. Her constantly inflating and deflating breasts, questionable relationship choices, and public sexual escapades were an inspiration to a generation. Then came Christina, Paris, Lindsay, and Britney…

You would hope that the cautionary tale told by these new faces of feminism would scare the tweens currently coming of age. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to be working like that. The genie is out of the bottle (thanks Xtina for the metaphor). Today’s little girl knows that sex sells, that sex equals power, and she knows it before she can handle it.

The queen apparent of this new generation, Hannah Montana, the girl who came out of nowhere to suddenly be everywhere, appears to be mobilizing her army. Her minions are gearing up at your local mall, buying ever shorter skirts, and trading secrets on effective hand job techniques.

It would appear that tomorrow’s little boys don’t stand a chance, what with their raging hormones and all. The new girl-next-door, 10 years old and equipped with plastic C-cups, is far too formidable an opponent. I guess we’ll soon be seeing what the world would be like with women in charge. I, for one, will be making sure to put the toilet seat down.

To Win the War… Buy the Bonds

2008-01-10T01:31:00.000-08:00

To help finance the enormous costs of World War II, the United States government issued war bonds to the American public. The various releases of these patriotic bonds were accompanied by “Bond Tours” – traveling pep rallies that featured politicians and celebrities waving flags to help sell them.

The largest of these affairs, the Seventh Bond Tour of 1945, raised over $26 billion. To help put that number in perspective, consider that there were 160 million people in the US at the time. That means the dollar investment per US citizen was roughly $162, or about $1800 dollars in modern day spending power! Do you suppose those people had a clear idea about what they were fighting (and paying) for?

In a capitalist society, the mandate for war should only come from the people and their voting dollars. The process is unbelievably simple, capitalism at it's most basic: the public sees a real and coherent threat (in this case Hitler and the Japanese) and they pay to have it eliminated. It wasn’t America’s uncommon valor, or God’s will that won World War II. It was American investment backed wholeheartedly by the American people.

What does a government do to raise money for a war if there is no clear public backing? When the true reasons for letting bullets fly are obscure, based more on special interests than national security?

They don’t ask us for it directly, that’s for sure. They take it after conferring amongst themselves. They use their incumbency to justify their actions. Since the Iraq war started in 2003, Congress has allocated somewhere in the neighborhood of $470 billion to the effort. Every one of these dollars has been reluctantly squeezed out of the nation’s coffers by oil-based special interest groups who wrap themselves in the American flag and use convenient terms like “spreading democracy”.

Perhaps there could be an American victory in Iraq (which, I suppose, would mean the elimination of every single insurgent and the building of a Starbucks on every other street corner). But it would take the true financial backing of the American people. The Average Joe would have to be willing to pledge a large chunk of his monthly income to see the Stars and Stripes flying over Baghdad. And unless we clearly understand why we’re fighting, that’s never going to happen.

How many of you would show up at an Iraq War Bond Tour (without a basket of rotten tomatoes)?

Death of the American Dream

2008-01-02T21:52:00.000-08:00

As the world flocks to Southern California, lured by vague promises of the glamorous lifestyles lived by the citizens of Beverly Hills - 90210, Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County, Three’s Company, and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, the demand for a physical piece of the pie keeps going up. A little chunk of uneven land in the right zip code, with barely enough space to fit a cramped two bedroom house and squeeze an Escalade and BMW 3 Series in the garage, can easily cost well in excess of one million dollars.

The people who were here before the latest land rush sit back and watch the annual rise in equity, using the money to buy newer BMWs, while the poor middle class schlubs struggling to make ends meet (realistically anyone making less than $150k per year), either become lifetime renters, shoehorn their wives and kids into little condos, or move their family to the distant land of Riverside County where they might be lucky to spend as many hours with their kids as they do in their daily commute.

In much of California, the American Dream of home ownership is dead. Even with the housing boom finally leveling off, the situation is too out of whack to be rectified. Say you’re a middle manager at a decent company making $80,000 a year; you’re college educated, you followed the prescribed formula for attaining the Dream, and you’re getting what many would consider a decent salary. The problem is, at best, you can maybe afford a $2500 monthly mortgage, which will get you a one bedroom condo (as long as it’s not too near the beach). Or maybe you can move to the ghetto and buy a run-down house (not a very popular choice). Most likely, you will keep renting, living like a little hamster on a wheel.

Now add some kids to that mix. What are your options now? Pack your things and say hello to the Inland Empire and a lifetime of traffic jams.

What happens when the majority of a populace becomes disenfranchised? When the people no longer have a stake in the society they live in? History tells us they revolt. How much further can we continue down this path before landlords’ heads begin to roll?

Americans in Mexico

2007-12-30T11:47:00.000-08:00

Translations:

1 Would you like to buy some chewing gum, sir?

2 I need work so that I can buy food for my family. Please, can you help me, sir?

3 Take a good look, my daughter. All Americans are idiots.

4 It's true, Daddy.

Revenge of the Tigers

2007-12-28T14:27:00.000-08:00

Like everyone, I was shocked by the bizarre mauling of the 17 year old kid, who found himself being clawed and chewed to death by the world’s meanest predator, on Christmas Day, in the middle of the most cosmopolitan and progressive city in the western world.

From the online reactions I came across as I researched the event, the Bay Area public seemed to be split between militant vegans who already believed all zoos are inherently evil and should be closed down immediately, and others who simply believed that the San Francisco Zoo, as a substandard, poorly managed facility, was to blame.

However, as the story’s facts leaked out bit by bit a far more interesting angle emerged. No print reporter employed within five thousand miles of California would come out and say it explicitly, but, every account released suggested the same thing in between the lines: perhaps the victims were to blame.

The first few stories, on December 26th (the day after the attack) had quotes from celebrity zookeeper Jack Hanna, speculating that someone had taunted the tiger into making the improbable leap out of the cage. On December 27th, a few more clues were added to the stories: a footprint on the railing, a bloody shoe inside the enclosure (a report that has since been denied), concrete stuck in the back claws of the tiger as it pushed its way up the wall of the enclosure.

It isn’t politically correct to point the finger at three young people. Not when one is dead and the other two are in the hospital. Not when the parents of the victim are still on the center stage, mourning their loss and preparing for a massive lawsuit. And, as we have recently learned, perhaps the wall wasn’t as high as it should have been. But the fact is the enclosure was built during the Depression and had held tigers at bay for 67 years.

The image of three brats mocking the caged beast only to have the tables turned in the most real and violent way possible is too good to ignore. If tigers made movies, Tatiana would be a hero along the lines of a Rambo or Cool Hand Luke. Against all odds she righted the injustice of the world she was trapped in.

Of course, in our litigious and overly polite society, the focus from here on out will be on the low wall and the organizations that deemed the enclosure safe. The parents of the boys will all receive fat checks and a thousand apologies. But behind closed doors, away from the public ear, people will talk about the real story: how three young men got what they were asking for, and how all of our lawyers and walls can’t remove us from the dangers of the physical world.

Planet of the Dolphins

2007-12-19T19:32:00.001-08:00

The Inevitability of Extinction

2007-12-17T22:22:00.000-08:00

I think it's cute when the bleeding hearts among us get all misty eyed over a dwindling species. God forbid our grandchildren’s grandchildren (who, realistically, are as obscure to us as the contemporary semi-strangers we exchange forced nods with as we pass on the sidewalk) might not experience firsthand the unique and precious characteristics of the spotted owl or polar bear.

The fact is 99.9% of all the fantastic creatures that have ever existed, from the microscopic to the gigantic, have already gone extinct. Over the past 500 million years, since the dawn of complex life known as the Cambrian Explosion, the earth has produced untold billions of distinct species. Virtually all of them have already past into the annals of natural history.

And the present-day animals we feel so responsible for preserving (mostly to teach our kids the alphabet and admire together in zoos), they owe their very existences to the opportunities created by the departure of their predecessors.

We are overly obsessed with preserving the status quo, freezing the Earth as we know it into a snapshot we can show a thousand years down the line. The problem with that notion is that there are far bigger processes than our aerosol cans and gas-guzzling traffic jams at work.

Every million years or so the Earth undergoes a cataclysmic event: volcanic eruptions and asteroid collisions that muck up the atmosphere for long enough to destroy pretty much everything at the zoo (including the visitors), ice ages that would make you trade in your car for a snowmobile and your house for a cave under a thousand feet of ice, and even (as its been theorized) massive solar flares that would cook you and everyone you know faster than a bag of microwave popcorn.

Whether we pull the trigger on our demise, or Mother Nature does it first, is probably a 50/50 proposition at this point. Either way, as far as most species go, we’ve had a hell of a run.

So maybe we have sped things up a bit. Maybe there would still be schools of cod in the Atlantic without the invention of fish sticks. Whatever the case, let’s not blame ourselves too much.

When we worry that we’re the ones ruining the party, we’re giving ourselves way too much credit. The Earth will renew itself, probably without us, or at least the vast majority of us.

The things that we think of as “manmade”, (plastic, plutonium, Hot Pockets™, the exhaust of one hundred million, four thousand pound SUVs) are as much a part of nature as a rotting piece of fruit. Sure they might take a few thousand more years to break down—the Earth has nothing but time.

As highly as we like to think of ourselves, we aren’t nearly consequential enough to kill a 500 billion year old planet. We’re just starting to see the end of the line for us, and it’s a tough pill to swallow. The only positive spin is to appreciate how far we’ve come.

As for my grandchildrens’ grandchildren? I don’t even know their names.

Don’t get me wrong. I am sorry about how things seem to be shaping up for future generations. But, as we all continually remind the younger ones, whoever said life was fair?

Kindergarten Catwalk

2007-12-10T14:46:00.000-08:00

Why Me?

2007-12-10T14:36:00.000-08:00

I know its difficult, even painful to think about, but the next time you are stuck in traffic, or can't find anything good on TV, take a few minutes to ponder the imponderable.

You are an improbable collection of atoms, bound together for some unknowable reason, spinning at an inconceivably fast pace on a dense ball of remarkably similar matter (atomically speaking). No one knows why you think, why you feel, or why you breathe.

The gods that brought inner peace to your ancestors—tucked them in at night—are relics. The modern day equivalent, the all-too-human scientist, will freely admit he doesn’t have any real answers.

Sure, he can tell you a bunch of neat things about the world around you.

He’ll blow your mind about the size of the universe, while his feet are planted firmly on the ground. He’ll tell you what’s in the center of the Earth, without ever traveling there. He’ll tell you fantastic tales of giant creatures who lived millions of years before, and about the intricate, microscopic processes that govern matter on the atomic ( and even sub-atomic) level.

But ask him “WHY ME?” and he’ll come up short. There is no bridge between the what and the why. Ask him to explain consciousness and its origins, and get ready for silence.

The processes that science says makes you tick: atoms combining to form molecules, specialized molecules called amino acids joining forces to create proteins, which in turn perform essential life functions in our cells, and the DNA that keeps the process replicating over and over; none of it comes close to explaining what we really need to know.

To tell a story, we were told in school, you cover five essential elements: who, what, where, when, and why. Science has convincingly answered the first four. Unfortunately, I think that’s as far as we’ll ever get.

Wish You Were Here (Celebrity Water-Skiing)

2007-12-05T00:31:00.000-08:00

Tis the Season…For 4th Quarter Profits

2007-11-28T16:56:00.000-08:00

Chestnuts roasting over an open fire, sleigh bells ringing along a snowy lane, mistletoe hanging suggestively over a doorway, hallways decked with boughs of holly; these quaint notions represent what Christmas used to be (and how its still packaged to the sentimental and naive).

Somewhere along the line these simple, wholesome messages got lost, replaced by something more like “Get ye to the nearest Best Buy”.

Christmas is the nitrous oxide of capitalism. At the end of the yearly race for profits, the big boys of retail hit the yuletide button and sprint across the finish line flush with cash. In the last six weeks of the year, retailers typically generate 40% of their annual profits. The spending boom has a trickle-up effect, boosting corporate coffers for capitalists of all shapes and sizes—electronics manufacturers, toy companies, shipping concerns, and the financial speculators who watch it all unfold. Just about the only people not benefiting are the poor chestnut farmers who helped start it all.

These candid photos, of the once noble Santa Claus, show who he really works for…

With the true nature of the modern holiday season in mind, I propose a reworking of the Christmas carol classics to reflect the new Christmas spirit. Here are a few ideas:

Deck the Malls (Shop at Armani)

Silent Night (iPod night, headphones on, voices quiet)

Have Yourself a Visa-Enabled Christmas

Joy to the Girl (Who got Victoria’s Secret)

O’ Come all Ye Thrifty (We’re Rolling Back the Prices)

Tie a Red Ribbon Round a New Lexus*

O’ Little Store with Few Customers (While Wal-Mart’s business thrives)

*I know this isn’t a holiday song, but it works

Cooking with Barbara Bush

2007-11-21T20:20:00.000-08:00

My Experience Traveling with a Freak Show

2007-11-21T18:53:00.000-08:00

Well before 1843, the year PT Barnum began carting General Tom Thumb around the United States and Europe, teaching the 26 inch tall oddity to do impressions and smoke cigars for added amusement, people have been drawn to the more bizarre and unsettling representatives of our species.

In darker times, freaks were thought to be the spawn of the devil, something to be hidden away, feared, and oftentimes killed at birth. As we moved into the scientific era and superstitions eroded, physically anomalous humans began to attract the attention of the masses.

Strongmen, tattooed ladies, lobster boys, and a thousand other permutations of the human ideal became a source of entertainment, and the freak show was born. The golden era of the freak show in America lasted from between 1840 and 1940, as intrepid businessmen like Barnum, lined their pockets by parading these unfortunate deformed souls around the country in traveling circuses and boardwalk sideshows.

Then, somewhere along the line it became impolite to gawk at the freaks, and exploitative for the promoters to collect money from the gawkers. Freak shows were the first casualties of what would come to be known as political correctness. Legislators from Michigan to Germany outlawed the display of people with physical abnormalities for profit.

On paper it looks like the nice thing to do—no one likes to be pointed at in disgust. But let’s face it, in their attempt to homogenize modern society; all the lawmakers did was to take away the freaks’ livelihoods. Of course a few freaks rose above their conditions (most notably Los Angeles news anchorwoman Bree Walker), but, for the most part, the deformed lost their most lucrative career path.

Enter Howard Stern. Howard was able to bring the freak show back into the mainstream by re-labeling the freaks as radio personalities. He assembled a motley cast of side show characters to populate his bizarro radio world—Crackhead Bob, Eric the Midget, Gary the Retard, Hank the Angry Drunken Dwarf (you get the picture). The show is a mishmash of obnoxious misfits and modern day freaks. This is the world I found myself immersed in this past weekend.

My friend was working as a promoter for the Killers of Comedy tour, a group of touring Howard Stern Show comedians and personalities, and I was hired for the weekend to help drive. As I carted the group around Southern California, stopping at hotels, gas stations, and In-N-Out Burgers, I relished the looks of curiosity and astonishment that followed our every move.

Freak number one was Beetlejuice, a four foot black man with a head the size of a grapefruit and a mouth short on teeth. Wherever we stopped someone would shout his name and try to get a picture with him. No one stood a chance. Beet (as his friends call him) is a nasty little bugger. His bad attitude and limited grasp on reality is Beet’s main draw for Howard and his fans. When he would inevitably refuse the photo and ignore the attempted handshake, the frustrated fan would turn to me and ask for help. “Sorry man, Beet makes his own decisions”

The second biggest attraction in our van was former World Wrestling Federation superstar, the Iron Sheik. I like to think that the Sheik and I grew quite close as I listened to stories of his past as the bodyguard of the Shah of Iran and an amateur Greco-Roman Wrestling gold medalist (the AAU not the Olympics, although he is only too eager to let that distinction go unnoticed). At the age of 65, his body broken by years of wrestling, steroids, and drug abuse, he shuffled around on a cane, needing me to buckle him into his car seat.

Despite his feeble physical condition, the Sheik is still capable of short bursts of invective, during which he curses his various enemies at the top of his lungs. These diatribes would typically end with his bread and butter: “First I break your back; then I fuck you in the ass!” The Sheik would do this bit on stage for a few minutes, momentarily rejuvenated, and then stride off and collapse into a chair backstage, his whole wad of adrenaline blown for the day.

But the real Iron Sheik is a soft-spoken, kind, and respectful man. My friend warned me that, at some point, he would get angry and I better be prepared. But I couldn’t see it happening; he was too old, too thoughtful, too considerate. It was all an act, his stage persona.

I couldn’t have been more wrong. In the lobby of a swanky hotel in downtown San Diego, I was charged with watching Beet and the Sheik until it was time to go to the show. No problem. The only real challenge was to keep Beet from getting drunk, and after a quick aside to the bartender that was taken care of. The little guy never suspected the beer was non-alcoholic, and the shot of vodka was water. “That shit is smooth” he said of the latter.

I was sitting next to the Sheik, gladly listening to his Persian tales, when Beetlejuice came walking up with a mischievous twinkle in his eye.

“No way I’m in a room with that guy tonight”, he said gesturing to the Sheik. “He damn near killed me last night.”

“What you mean?” demanded the Sheik.

“You killed me man.”

“What you talking about?”

“You smell so bad,” said Beetlejuice, looking at me for support.

This set the Sheik off, and what I believed to be only his onstage character exploded in the quiet-but-not empty lobby of the hotel. “I pay my dues and no one fuck with me.” Employees and patrons alike started to glance over, as the Sheik’s voice grew louder. “I snap your little head off. You show me fuckin’ respect!”

Beetlejuice looked at me to step in. “It’s alright Sheik, he was just kidding,” was the best I could do.

“I don’t need to take crap from little nig**r!” A black employee at the front desk looked up.

In a weird twist, Beetlejuice became the voice of reason. “You can’t swear like that man. You got to keep it down.”

As the Sheik’s tirade continued, I talked calmly to him, and watched for his cane to rise to a striking height. Just as it seemed there was no chance of peace, the situation was diffused when Beet wisely shuffled back into the bar shaking his tiny head.

By this point everyone in the lobby was looking at us, equal parts shock and amusement on their faces. It was then that I realized that, try as the politicians and do-gooders might, the good old traveling freak show would never die.

Blues Man Meets Wigger

2007-11-12T02:22:00.000-08:00

Theories of Evolution

2007-11-05T20:36:00.000-08:00

Because, in the larger scheme of things, each of us spends such a short span of time breathing the air on this planet, it is easy to forget that evolution isn’t stagnant. The same process or genetic compulsion that caused us to drag ourselves out of the swampy muck and mire, that caused our ancient ancestors to find upright gaits and opposable thumbs attractive, is still at work.

It is almost impossible for our 27,010 sunset brains (365 x 75) to wrap around changes that happen on the true scale of life—more like 200,000,000 sunsets. So the mountains that we know and the faces we see in the mirror are easily defined as the way things are.

But things happen faster than you think. Consider, for instance, that the average human height across the globe has increased approximately 4.5% on average since 1800.

The current and dramatic changes in our living conditions (dependence on technology, climate shifts, and medical breakthroughs) will undoubtedly speed up this process.

According to this interesting-despite-its-overly-definitive-tone study, humans will eventually evolve into two separate species—genetic haves and have-nots. Given that modern society so often rewards stupidity I’m not sure I believe in this model.

Another theory I’ve heard is that the quintessential Roswell alien is the natural evolutionary end product of the human race—enlarged brains, decreased dependence on strength and physicality, pale skin because, evidently at some point, albinos come back in style.

Perhaps this is the case. Despite the billions of evolutionary possibilities (actually probably because of them) perhaps all evolutionary roads inevitably lead to one optimum result. A biological Rome, if you will.

Whatever the case in the long run might be, as we gravitate towards hi-definition, multi-media digital entertainment as the be all end all, I’m afraid our next step on evolution’s ladder might look something like this…

Salad vs. Steak

2007-10-26T22:29:00.001-07:00

Attack of the Marketing Executives

2007-10-16T20:11:00.000-07:00

If any of you are like me, and spend way too much time in a state of partial consciousness watching television at night, then you are very aware of the bombardment of images, sounds, ideas, special offers, depictions of the better-than-you Jones’ you have to keep up with, products that you never knew existed but all of a sudden need—in a nutshell, the noise of capitalist society.

Actually, you are subjected to the overwhelming cacophony of sensory clutter every time you leave the house. Any direction your eyes can point you see something trying to worm into your brain. Lying on the beach, relaxing, and taking in the sun (which, by the way, is an idea I think we got from the folks at Coppertone; I’ve never seen depictions of sunbathing indigenous peoples) you think you are safe from the attack of the marketers.

Then a plane passes overhead, dragging a forty foot long message: 20% off at your local tanning salon.

And we always look. These messages are to modern humans like shiny objects to a crow. We have been conditioned to require the constant input of information. I won’t deny some benefits gained, but for the most part, I am carrying at least an extra 500 gigabytes of useless data gleaned from Geico commercials, radio ads with two wacky voices engaged in some inane dialogue, billboards of Tom Cruise, and ten million other sources.

How much more can the marketers cram in? And, more importantly, what is getting pushed out?

According to this very informal, but interesting, estimation, the brain can hold somewhere in the range of 1 to 1000 terabytes. Even on the low end of this absurdly wide range, that’s a lot of info. But if we are inputting information constantly—perpetually downloading the biological equivalent of pop-up windows, spyware, and spam—it might not be enough.

What if I can’t remember the special things my mother did for me on my twelfth birthday, because my brain had to give up that space to store info on how much I hate those Carl’s Jr. commercials where the actors chew their food really loudly, and then have the gall to say “don’t bother me I’m eating.”

I know you’re eating, it’s really loud and disgusting, and you’re in my living room. Actually, isn’t it you who’s bothering me?

Truth be told, I can’t remember what happened on my 32nd birthday, and I’m only 33. But I know all about that little pink bunny who keeps going and going and going…

Each of us is on the frontlines of the mindshare battle. Our adversaries, the marketing executives, are trained in the nation’s most prestigious institutions to capture our minds. Some use subterfuge—clever slogans, well written ads. Others go for more of an artillery type approach—pounding our brains into submission, running the same ad over and over, leaving a trail of destroyed grey matter in their wake.

Our only defenses are meditation, oversleeping, or moving to the jungles of Papua New Guinea. I’m afraid, for me, the battle is lost.

With all the content backed up on my DVR, I don’t have available leisure time for meditation. I can’t sleep in, because I have to work in the mornings to be able to afford a flatter television. And moving to Papua New Guinea is out of the question—who would be impressed by my shiny new car?

I’m Not Lazy; I’m European

2007-10-13T21:34:00.000-07:00

We Americans think we are so dope; we scoff when we look at people of different nationalities and their respective cultures.

Germans are mechanical bores. Brits are uptight stiffs. Japanese brains are more computer than human. Canadians are a tad bit dumb, their neural processes slowed to a crawl by the cold climate. The French are arrogant. Italians are violent. Indians (the ones with dots, not feathers) provide terrible customer service. The Chinese make poisonous toys.

I could go on, but don’t want to come across as racist. I’m only repeating opinions I recently heard while walking down Main Street, America.

Our view of ourselves, on the other hand, is golden. We perfected both the political and economic processes. One of our own invented the internet (thanks Al…and an honorable mention to the other un-acknowledged, nameless nerds who helped create your vision).

The Germans might have invented the car, but Henry Ford put one in everyone’s driveway. Airplanes are neater than cars anyway, and who came up with those, Adolf?

But, perhaps our greatest contribution to the world, our most popular global export, and what really makes us feel cool, is American popular culture.

Even our outcasts find success in faraway lands. We have all heard that David Hasselhoff, in between two martini lunches of deconstructed cheeseburgers, conquered Germany with his music. The French can’t get enough of Jerry Lewis. The Japanese devour our heavy metal music like we devour their sushi. Meatloaf is huge in Bosnia-Herzegovina—maybe I have that last one wrong.

But did you know, and this one’s true, that Lionel Richie is still one of the most popular recording artists in Iraq? Even a mild interpretation of sharia doesn’t permit the Lionel-endorsed practice of “partying all night long”, but that doesn’t mean the Muslims can’t hum along. Perhaps listening to tunes through a burqa or keffiyeh (known to most Americans as a head towel) muffles the nuances of better music. If that’s the case, I’m not sure what Germany’s excuse is; lederhosen doesn’t cover the ears.

Our culture is everywhere. Whatever corner of the world you visit, you are bound to see some local wearing a t-shirt, fashionable solely for its American-ness, with no idea of what it really means; perhaps a West African fisherman hauling in the day’s catch wearing an Alf shirt that used to belong to some fat American kid who outgrew it years before.

As much as they hate us, the world can’t get enough of us. I wouldn’t be surprised if Kim Jong Il tivos reruns of Everybody Loves Raymond. Someone has to be watching; no one I know cops to it.

But, as much as we like to think that we are the life of the world’s party, it simply isn’t the case.

Germans too humorless and mechanical? I hate to break it to you, but we invented the time clock—thank New Yorker Willard Bundy for accomplishing that great feat in 1888.

You say the English are the uptight ones? Who do you think invented the electric iron? We all could be saving countless hours if we collectively decided to go wrinkled. But no, some jerk named Henry Seeley (another New Yorker I’d like to smack in the face) made sure that we would all need to dispose of all those pesky wrinkles before leaving the house with his 1882 invention. Evidently the 1880s was a productive decade for decreasing the quality of life through innovation.

But the main reason we Americans aren’t nearly as cool as we think is the disgustingly high percentage of our lives that we spend working—far too many of us in despised careers or dead end jobs. I know everyone has heard this topic before, so I won’t bore you with too many details; here’s the main one, the average American gets two weeks of vacation a year.

We might like to make fun of the French for being wartime cowards. But, evidently, they aren’t as scared to ask their boss for a day off as we are. They get 39 days a year, on average. I suppose French CEOs, naturally occupying the top end of the scale, work two days a week. Maybe that’s why no one drives Peugeots.

The Germans are so efficient they can afford to take 27 days off a year. I would hazard to guess that, due to the well-planned schedule of the typical German vacationer, those 27 days are probably equal to at least 32 of anyone elses’.

How did we get so off track about what is important in life? Usually these discussions reference our Puritan heritage. I can’t say that I know anyone who identifies with the Puritans, but maybe that’s because of the people I hang out with. But who can argue with history?

During the Industrial Revolution, there was a really big American asshole named Frederick Taylor, considered the father of something known as “Scientific Management”. In one of his more obnoxious crusades, Taylor sought to maximize corporate efficiency by regulating the precise movements a worker made while performing a specific repetitive task. Industrial management, he preached, should define the optimal mechanics of each individual physical movement in a given task, even something as simple as shoveling coal, so that every worker followed a precise and repeatable formula and not one second of potential productivity escaped the balance sheet.

Sounds like a real fun guy, with a really well developed respect for the human soul.

So, I guess it’s in our blood. Don’t hold your breath for anything to change, just suck it up and wile away the extra hours you’re spending at work thinking about those lucky Europeans spending the day at the beach in their Speedos.

All is not lost, I’m sure, after your overly extended work week, you can unwind with some quality Everybody Loves Raymond reruns. I’ve heard the producers of that show put in 70 hour weeks to make sure we never run out of mildly humorous entertainment.

Canine Abuse

2007-10-04T00:42:00.001-07:00

A lot of focus these days is on the internet-based, underage-inspired, sexual predators. Thanks to Chris Hansen and Dateline NBC, it's a topic du jour. Seeing that they are on at least the seventh installment of "To Catch a Predator", it's apparent that America enjoys the spectacle of real lives ruined in a live format. Artificial drama can't match up to that--sorry Hollywood.

But while we focus on that particular perversion, slipping through the cracks, is another form of electronic deviance. The ugly practice of canine abuse.

This isn’t a reference to the recent abuses that have come to light in the Michael Vick situation. A few dogs chewing on each other to settle a bet is not that big of a deal. They give out a few bites, take a few on the chin, get electrocuted, and then it’s over. It’s what they were born to do.

There is a far more exploitative and damaging practice that is going unnoticed—the sexualization of bulldogs in funny costumes.

On some sick, evolutionarily unexplainable level, the uglier the dog, the more humans are attracted to it. It is a phenomenon that defies all reason. As I pored the deep recesses of the internet engaged in a harmless search for pictures of noble English Bulldogs in a sporting setting, I came upon a series of images, each more degraded than the last.

What makes the fetish even more decadent is the inherent unattractiveness of the species. Deny it if you will, but I firmly believe that more Jerry Falwells would come out of the woodwork to shut down the porn industry, if it was producing movies starring Aborigines.

Aborigines, for the record, are said to be the ugliest of the world’s peoples, closely followed by Mongolians. Apologies to anyone of either of those descents who might stumble on this, I heard it somewhere.

Not only is someone producing this stuff, evidently there’s a market for it. I won’t hazard a guess to the market’s size in dollars, but I would guess it is somewhere between the size of the markets for cat juggling and amputee pornography.

Something must be done to bring this issue to the forefront of the public’s attention. Let this essay be a call to arms.

Aristotle

2007-09-29T20:00:00.000-07:00

Aristotle’s intellectual brilliance has shown for over two thousand years. Even so, perhaps his wisest statement can be paraphrased thusly:

“All I know is that I know nothing.”

Where does that put you and me?

I guess we can say we know a little bit more than he did. Surely Wikipedia contains enough information so that anyone with broadband knows a little bit about something.

What occurs to me is thank God someone is writing this stuff down.

Each successive generation of humanity stands on shoulders of the last. But it isn’t making us any smarter. We just have the answers to the tests now.

It’s possible that the evolution of the species as a whole will be the eventual source of our deliverance from catastrophic global failure, but this evolution certainly isn’t happening on an individual level.

I’m afraid more likely is that the petty nature of the individual will prevent any meaningful change. The selfishness that above all guides us, hard-wired into our DNA since we were little four-legged mammals and necessary for individual survival, will be our collective undoing.

They say that if you put two lobsters in a bucket of water neither will escape. Whenever one of them makes a break for freedom he will be pulled back by his jealous peer.

Are we enlightened men or simple lobsters? I think the answer lies somewhere in between.

The Sport of People Watching

2007-09-26T20:28:00.000-07:00

Without a doubt, people watching is my favorite activity. I pretend to be into other activities as a ruse, a cover up for my real goal—to check out the mish mash of freaks, nerds, squares, fatties, thinnies, mullet wearing and inappropriate skin bearing redneck couples, unruly kids and their oblivious parents, foreigners, potential terrorists, and, of course, the mentally retarded (sorry, I know it’s wrong).

I will tag along to ANY event to engage in my sport. Ask me to a NASCAR event, the zoo (the real show is outside the cages), a Las Vegas casino, or better yet a rural Indian casino. I will go gladly. I would go to a cat fashion show in Rancho Cucamonga—please don’t call me out on that one.

The twisted thing about people watching is that we don’t do it out of admiration, or a love of witnessing the human condition. We do it to mock the unfortunate, the ugly, and the fashion-less. Well at least that’s why I do it; perhaps you have a purer heart.

Even if you’re in Newport Beach, watching a steady stream of tanned and toned cougars and MILFs stepping in and out of Range Rovers and Mercedes convertibles, you are thinking to yourself how lost these poor people are. You, the watcher, never got caught up in their materialistic living nightmare, and so on.

It only recently occurred to me that I might be a part of the freak show. That, perhaps as I sat above the fray, on my high chair, heaping scorn on all that passed, I was being ridiculed myself. I mean, I have bad hair days. Soon I will have no hair days.

And so it goes, from the lowliest bum to the highest CEO, we are all pointing at the other guy.

Look at what an idiot he is.

And that’s what makes people watching such a great sport—its one we can all play.

So if I see you on the street, know that I am inwardly mocking you. And if I catch you looking at me...go ahead and say something, tough guy.

Rats

2007-09-20T23:10:00.002-07:00

I had trouble digesting my dinner tonight. A little bit of gastronomical mayhem put me out of whack chewing on nothing more than a salad. Turns out nothing throws an otherwise healthy stomach out of balance quite like stomping a fellow mammal to death with a baseball bat.

I had to do it. It was him or me.

I had a few advantages—he was stuck in glue and I was light on my feet. I also outweighed him quite a bit. But he was desperate. He had nothing to lose, and that’s the last kind of fight you want to get involved in.

My foe was a rat. Not a big one…tangled with bigger in my time. But I never got used to it. They’re nasty little fuckers.

I once lived in a house that rats thought they took over. We weren’t running the place properly. The rats were more efficient.

When a rat feels at home, you have failed as a homeowner. Towards the end, I could no longer look the rats in the eye. I would pass hesitantly through their strongholds, looking down, hoping not to get in their way.

They knew how we lived. Our filth and apathy was their Shangri-La. And they thrived.

They took to sauntering along the living room walls in the pale afternoon shadows. One of their top warriors—some sort of battle trained Spartan-like beast—jumped my roommate from inside a bag of chips on the kitchen counter. Another one survived a direct hit from a Hawaiian Sling, a three pronged spearfishing weapon. It was pinned for a full five seconds through the snout into the kitchen linoleum. When my friend pulled the spear out, the critter ran without hesitation to his money spot behind the oven.

Merely a flesh wound, human.

Eventually human ingenuity won that battle. Thank god these menaces have been keeping humans awake for centuries, and smarter men than I have figured them out. Their efficient eradication has come to symbolize ingenuity itself.

The first mousetrap was built in 1897 by James Henry Atkinson, a Brit with an understanding of springs, and, evidently, a sloppy lifestyle like my own. And since he made that fateful choice to retreat to his workshop rather than clean up after himself, mankind has been working on making his invention better.

Ever since Ralph Waldo Emerson famously announced: "Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door", killing mice has positioned itself right below curing cancer on the ladder of human achievement.

So here I was tonight, standing over a young rat stuck in glue. I’m not sure when the glue trap was invented—I am sure that the human version was banned at the Geneva Convention, perhaps even earlier.

From two rooms away, I heard him yelp when he realized his situation. You can’t ignore a rat in a glue trap. At best you listen to him moan for a few hours, at worst he chews off his stuck leg and comes seeking revenge. So I grabbed a wooden Louisville slugger—not a toy, the real thing, more club than stick.

Standing as far away as I could, I whacked him about five times, his squeaks growing weaker with each hit, like he was running out of batteries.

You learn about yourself in times like these. I learned that I am no killer. I have no problem stomping a roach or gutting a fish I just pulled out of the ocean, but there is something different about snuffing out a fellow mammal. Their warm hearts beat like little versions of our own. It’s like beating a hairy little cousin to death. But like I said, it was him or me, or rather them or us. I knew how easily the rats can win.

So I did the deed until it was done. And then I placed him outside, still stuck in the glue, as a warning to his buddies, a gory testament to what awaits intruders.

So now I am sitting here pushing salad around a plate, trace amounts of adrenaline still shaking my hands, knowing that there will be more blood to shed. Like the Indian who successfully defends his turf from the first white man on the block, I know the battle is not won and perhaps will never be. There is little satisfaction in that kind of scalp.

*****************************************
Next Day Update:

So I go to check on him this morning and find one of his buddies stuck right next to him. This guy had been there all night but he was still writhing slowly, his leg looking a little mangled, like he had done some half hearted chewing for freedom.

But that wasn’t the real shock. The kicker was that the first guy was gutted, his tasty entrails either in the stomach of his friend lying next to him or another of their tribe. This was the type of critter I felt for? This is why I threw away a perfectly good salad? A beast so vicious he would eat his brother’s heart?

I know all about the Donner Party. Time and time again, when faced with death, humans will choose to snack on each other. But I am pretty sure there were alternatives for the sick little cannibal fucker.

For one, there was a perfectly good salad in the trash can.