Just beneath the banality of our boring and domestic daily experiences, our lives are predicated on a primal war for survival. If you have a hard time reconciling that fact to your own life, then try giving up food and water for a full day, and then reevaluating your worldview afterwards over a turkey sandwich and a Coke. Maybe a tofu sandwich and some wheatgrass for the vegetarians. Fortunately for those of us who don’t live in places of conflict in the world, the war for survival is waged with pillow fights and with foam covered Nerf bats. We’ve learned to ignore the inherent savagery of day-to-day life while it feebly kicks us in the shins. In this climate, our attention inevitably shifts from the war for survival, to the war on boredom.

The majority of our days are spent working someplace where we’d rather not be. For the rest of the time — our free time — we wile away the hours at home fighting boredom with all forms of distractions created by others to entertain us: television, books, blogs, music, video games. For most people, it’s enough simply to be entertained. Yet for some of us, prolonged exposure to any form of entertainment breeds restlessness, regret over lost time, and a nagging desire to create instead of consume. I know this feeling all too well.

As a writer, I should take the time to appreciate the creative efforts of others, if only to avoid becoming that lout at the party who interrupts everybody without waiting his turn to speak, and without listening to what everybody else has to say. Yet every time I sit down to read or to enjoy somebody else’s creative efforts, I inevitably think to myself: “You could be creating something worth remembering, too, if you would only stop wasting your time.” Boredom has a funny way of swirling the mind with its pesky contradictions and its appeals to one’s vanity. I’m just one of those people who was never smart enough to figure out that free time is a commodity that was meant to be wasted.

With the imminent fear of death and starvation held steadily at bay, it’s amazing to think of all the trivial things that the mind can allow itself to view as urgent. The war for survival has devolved from what was once a fearsome, roaring beast, into a passive aggressive, elderly old aunt who guilts you into giving her rides to the airport every day. In my little sanitized corner of the globe, modern life affords me the peace of mind to live a soft, comfortable life punctuated by modest intervals of free time. Yet during those free hours, I sweat over silly things like whether I have it in me to write that novel I’ve been working on for eight years, or whether I’m even capable of writing another blog entry worth reading. With so many people in the world with real problems, it occurs to me that the only reason that I care about such frivolous concerns is because they happen to be my own.

Boredom is the best and the worst gift my free time has ever given to me. It compels me to action through unease and anxiety, yet it also sours my creative spirit with crushing cynicism. Sometimes I wonder whether boredom is just another weapon that the war for survival uses to wield against us. There’s an odd sort of romance to that kind of thought.

Posted by KZ on 04/24/09

This just broke my heart. I checked my blog’s visitor statistics from over the weekend and took note of visitor number 1001. Somebody in Saudi Arabia found my blog through a Google search for “arab booty and big dicks”. Piqued by curiosity, I clicked around and followed the referring URL. Visitor 1001 found my blog on page 51 of his Google search. I guess no matter who you are and where you’re from, sometimes the call for booty is just too loud to ignore. I assure you, though, there is none of that to be found around here. Whoever you are out there my Saudi Arabian friend, I hope you find what you’re looking for.

Posted by KZ on 04/06/09

I won’t bore you with the many reasons why I believe Fox’s 24 has degenerated over the years from a compelling action drama based on an interesting premise into a cartoon-like, farcical melodrama that parodies itself. No show is perfect. The fact is, for all of its ridiculous faults, I’m still a fan of the show. Jack Bauer shall never be forsaken.

But there is one thing that’s been bothering me for quite a while. What the hell is up with all of the show’s oddly named Asian characters? I’m not even talking about Indian actors like Kal Penn who get cast to play Arab terrorists with names like Ahmed Amar, although I do admit that subject is worth it’s very own “WTF” post. No. I’m talking about dudes from East Asia — guys who look like me — playing characters with the most generic, white bread, Caucasian-sounding names ever.

Here’s a breakdown of what I’ve seen so far.

• Tom Baker
  
  

  Seasons 2 and 3 have the Korean-American actor Daniel Dae Kim playing a CTU agent named Tom Baker. Tom Freaking Baker. What we have here is a bad-ass, federal counter-terrorist agent who is handy with a gun, invaluable during a rescue operation, and whose idea of a perfect meal is kimchi, bulgogi, and slices of baguettes and marzipan cakes. Seriously, 24 writers, how can you be this freaking lazy? Baker was a major minor player in the earlier seasons of 24. Daniel Dae Kim racked up a decent amount of face time during his stint on the show. Why would you disservice the guy by giving his character a name that very blatantly does not fit his profile?

  In all likelihood, the writers of 24 probably give all of their minor characters generic names, and then subsequently leave the rest up to casting directors. Once in a while, an Asian guy will audition for a part and land the role, and then he’ll get stuck with some goofy, All-American name like Tom Freaking Baker. Would it have killed somebody on the writing staff to adjust the character name to sound at least vaguely Asian once Daniel Dae Kim was cast for the role? I’m willing to suspend my disbelief when Jack Bauer kills off an entire squadron of rifle-toting goons with nothing more than a pistol, but I have a hard time taking a Korean guy seriously with a name like Tom Baker.

• Agent McCallan
  
  

  In Season 4, actor Vic Chao plays a minor supporting role as a CTU agent mysteriously named Agent McCallan. McCallan is your generic CTU field agent who chases terrorists as a member of a mobile tactical SWAT team. He will occasionally sound off on the team radio to give status updates to Assistant Field Director Curtis Manning, or to resident bad-ass Jack Bauer. I must confess, I’m not certain about Vic Chao’s ethnic origin, but he doesn’t look a damn bit Scottish to me. Is this 24’s way of adding depth to an otherwise forgettable character? This is a man of Asian descent who bravely fights terrorism as an agent of the federal government — and, oh yeah: his Asian parents divorced when he was nine, and his mother later remarried a white guy named Arthur McCallan, who was kind enough to adopt our brave Agent McCallan when he was but a child. I mean, really … Agent McCallan? Why not name the guy Joe Everyman?

• Mark Dornan
  
  

  In Season 7, Vic Chao returns to the cast of 24 as FBI agent Mark Dornan. Mark Dornan is a stone faced Fed in a suit who sits in on tactical FBI meetings led by Larry Moss, and who will occasionally utter the obligatory, plot-advancing line of exposition. Frankly, this character amounts to nothing more than window dressing. There are tons of actors filling in as nameless office drones on the show, and the fans get along just fine without learning each of their names. I find it odd that Mark Dornan has a name at all. I find it doubly odd that Vic Chao has now played two characters on 24 with generic white guy names. Would it have been so hard to make a last minute script change to rename the character Mark Chao? Did Jack Bauer beat the yellow out of this guy or what?

• Ranger Thompson
  
  

  This final example from Season 7 had me swearing at the television set in disbelief. Between 7:00pm – 8:00pm in Season 7, we are briefly introduced to a law enforcement officer, played by Chase Kim, who is on camera for no longer than two minutes. He appears out of nowhere to come to the aid of distressed FBI agent Renee Walker, delivers a generic line to advance the plot, and then runs to his patrol car to send out a radio message. “This is Ranger Thompson,” he begins to say, before he is rudely interrupted by a wall of bullets sprayed across his chest. I guess the stakes are higher when characters with names start getting killed. I guess. Ranger Thompson is another one of those characters who could have easily been written out of the show. There was hardly a need to even give the guy a name. But if you’re a writer on 24, and if you’re going to such pains to personalize a doomed redshirt, couldn’t you at least try to give him an appropriate name? There’s a thin line between television production efficiency and a lazy disregard for the details.

In general, American television shows have an annoying tendency to name their Asian characters either Lee, Kim, or Wong. It’s as if those are the only three Asian surnames that Hollywood writers know about. What’s peculiar about 24 is that the writers can’t even be bothered to give their supporting Asian characters stereotypical names, and they cynically slap on any generic, All-American white guy names that suit their fancy. Yes, I’m very much aware that there have been Chinese characters featured on the show with such names as Lee Jong, Koo Yin, or Cheng Zhi. I’m not mad about them. In fact, they baffle me even further, because their existence demonstrates that the writers of 24 realize that not all Asian people out there have names like Chad Smith or Reginald Bernard Caucasianton III.

I’m just saying, you know? I still love you, Jack, but your Asian consorts have a bunch of wack names. Keith Zahn out.

Posted by KZ on 04/03/09