Back in October 2011, My awesome writer friend, Rachel The Curly Muse (pictured above, assaulting me with her freaky hair), challenged me to write a short story by providing me a randomized creative writing prompt with really messed up plot requirements. Predictably, I didn’t make much progress in the past few months.

Tonight, Rachel came over to my place to visit, and she started giving me massive shit for failing to meet her writing challenge. Luckily for me, I write my best work when I’m under pressure and facing a deadline. All the while Rachel was breathing down my neck and snarling her nagging fits of disapproval, I wrote the following short story. I think it came out pretty well.

“I love to drink, but I hate kids.” That’s what Jerry said one day while getting piss ass drunk. He also went on some mystical journey or some shit to find a valuable treasure. He found something, all right.

The end.

Or, is it?

This has been a KZ joint.

Like I said in my previous post, I injured my hamstring while playing paintball recently, and now I’m stuck with a bum leg and a wicked limp for the next month and a half. Tonight while sorting my laundry, I pulled my paintball jersey out of the pile of clean clothing, and I put it on just for fun. As you might already know, I’m the kind of guy who wears his heart on his sleeve. I make it known when I feel something deeply enough. Tonight, as I stood there wearing my paintball jersey in the center of my modest living room, I felt something, and I simply had to let it out. Strictly as a matter of unfortunate coincidence, Diana happened to be there, too.

Kevin: Oh, Paintball. I love you so much, even when you hurt me. [grunting and wincing] Ah, it hurts when I try to stretch out my leg. I’d do it for you, though, Paintball. I’d stretch out my leg if you asked me to.

Diana: Shut the hell up. I’m trying to read.

Kevin: I’m not talking to you, Diana. I’m talking to Paintball. Where were we, Paintball? Oh yeah, I love you, Paintball. You would never hurt me as badly as Diana would. I would give you the sun, the moon, the stars, and the muscles and tendons attached to the posterior of my femur.

Diana: [Sprays Kevin with a water bottle, which is primarily used to discipline our cats]

Kevin: Hey, what the hell? What did I do to you?

Diana: I’m trying to read.

Kevin: And I’m trying to love Paintball. We all have problems.

Diana: [Sprays Kevin in the face]

Kevin: You see what I have to put up with, Paintball? At least you fight with honor. You would never shoot an unarmed man in the face — especially an unarmed man who is injured, and who’s not wearing a mask. Some people just don’t understand the “blind man” rule. You understand though, Paintball.

Diana: [Sprays Kevin in the face...repeatedly] I hate you so much sometimes.

Kevin: I can’t even place my faith in the woman I love anymore. You’re all I’ve got, Paintball. Don’t ever change.

Diana: Jesus Christ. You win. I’m going to the other room.

Kevin: Sorry, what was that, Diana? I was talking to Paintball.

Lately, it seems like a lot of my conversations with Diana end with her leaving the room. That’s weird. I wonder what Paintball would have to say about that. Or hell, I don’t know. Maybe I should just ask Helen Hunt instead.

Four to six more weeks to go. That may not seem like a long time to some people, but it’s ages in KZ time. I need you, Paintball. I don’t cope very well when I’m confronted with boredom. I wonder if that comes across at all in my writing.

Here’s how the conversation ended.

Kevin: I’m sorry, Diana. Were you saying something?

Diana: Yeah, I was just bitching about your feminism.

Kevin: So — you’re against the fact that I believe in the empowerment of women, and equality between the sexes?

Diana: Oh whatever, I was talking about your … fem-in-inity or whatever. It sounds like a made up word!

Kevin: No, it sounds like a real word which you happen to not know the definition of.

Diana: [Sprays Kevin with a water bottle, which is primarily used to discipline our cats]

Kevin: Jesus, woman. Use your words.

Diana: [Sprays Kevin again]

Kevin: You see? This is why you’re doomed to an eternity of earning $0.77 to every dollar made by a man in the workplace.

Diana: [Sprays Kevin one final time, and huffs away]

Kevin: Where are you going, Diana? Off to the kitchen to make me a delicious pie?

Diana: Asshole.

Kevin: Cherry, please.

Yes, I know. I’m a bad, bad man.

I might have only recently turned thirty years old this year back in the month of May, but I was a crotchety old man who was confused by the world long before I grew up to become the lame, overweight, khaki-wearing accountant who stands before you today. Although I’ve never been shy about voicing my complaints here on this blog, there has been a handful of topics that never quite made the cut simply because I figured that I was the only person cranky enough to complain about them. People who bitch online usually do so because they’re seeking a way to validate their gripes. With that being the case, what good is it to bitch about something esoteric or obscure if you’re pretty certain that nobody else will care? Case in point: Pierre Bernard’s Recliner of Rage is an amusing comedy bit premised on the futility of complaining about topics that nobody understands.

Maybe it’s the old age talking, or maybe I’ve just gotten crankier lately, but I think it’s time to speak my piece about some of those things that only seem to bother me. Here’s a warning to you, gentle reader: Your level of recognition and interest will very likely waver while reading through these bullet points. Don’t say I didn’t tell you so.

• Douchebags with Microphones

  Am I the only one who hates those pushy announcers at live shows who are never satisfied with the first round of applause? You know what I’m talking about:
  

  “Hey folks, how is everybody tonight? Oh come on, you can do better than that. How is everybody tonight?”

  I fucking hate those guys. I swear, they must have been one of the main contributing factors that led to the creation of the sniper rifle. Okay, that’s harsh. But at the very least, they must have been a significant contributing factor leading to the creation of the “backhanded bitch-slap”, am I right?

  

  When an announcer asks the crowd to applaud once, I usually oblige him politely. The second time he asks, I fold my arms and sigh. If the announcer is especially obnoxious, and he asks the crowd to applaud a third time, I cup my hands and begin to boo. Go work out your middle-child insecurity issues somewhere off the stage, asshole.




• The Constipated Anime Grunt
  

  Why do anime characters always sound like they’re either constipated, asthmatic, or like they’re constantly getting blown? If you have ever watched anime while listening to the original Japanese language audio track, then you might have noticed that there is basically no such thing as a silent moment in anime. Actually, come to think of it, there’s no such thing as subtlety in anime, either. Everybody is always grunting in exasperation, stammering on some half-formed thought, or gasping like they’re choking on their bipolar medication. Every moment in any given anime has been compulsively occupied by some form of verbal garbage.

  For an example of what I’m talking about, I invite you to watch the first four minutes of Young GTO, Episode 4. Take note of all the grunts, groans, gasps, moans, giggling, and gurgling noises that the voice actors make. Is everyone okay with that?

  I grant you, anime characters often have a good reason for making those crazy noises, because somebody is always suffering from a nervous breakdown, or getting their ass kicked in an anime flick. Anime characters always seem to exist between the balance of two basic operating modes: (1) Extremely violent and pissed off; or (2) Flabbergasted and overwrought with miscellaneous emotion. What the hell ever happened to that level place in between, where people react to the world on a neutral setting? For that matter, what the hell ever happened to the subtlety of silence?

  Please don’t mistake my meaning, because I actually do enjoy watching anime. I just wonder why anime directors always insist on filling in the silences with all of those irritating grunts.




• The Awkward “Next Gen” Look-Away
  Star Trek: The Next Generation is an awesome show despite its numerous, trademark flaws: the sterile off-ship set designs, the tedious battle scenes shown entirely from the bridge, the terrible acting by all of the extras, and all of those ridiculous, “Oh shit, the Holodeck safety protocols are offline” episodes. But above all other gripes, the one thing that bothers me most about the show is the terrible stage direction put on display during all of those two-person, heart-to-heart dialogue scenes.
  

  Does anybody know what I’m talking about? It seems like every time two characters find themselves in the middle of a private conversation on Next Gen, one of them inevitably interrupts the flow of the scene by walking across the room, and then continuing the conversation while facing their back to the other person. It’s such a stilted, artificial maneuver that absolutely reeks of melodrama, daytime soap operas, and live community theater. My suspension of disbelief immediately vanishes every time I see it happen — and it happens way more often than it should. As a fan of the series, I find the Awkward “Next Gen” Look-Away oddly insulting, because I get the feeling that I was never meant to notice the ridiculous maneuver on a conscious level. It’s as if the show’s writers and directors never gave their fans enough credit to suspect that somebody like me would one day stand up and shout, “Why the fuck do the characters keep turning away from each other like that? Is that how people communicate with each other in the 24th century? That’s completely fucking stupid.”

   
   

  The Awkward “Next Gen” Look-Away is such a weird, unnatural maneuver. In a television show where the actors walk around wearing automobile air filters for eyeglasses, and crazy rubber prostheses glued onto their foreheads, any additional displays of outlandish theatricality are simply redundant. There’s no subtlety or subtext added to the scene by something as lame as the Awkward “Next Gen” Look-Away. That maneuver is about as subtle as Lieutenant Commander Geordi La Forge lifting his VISOR to wink at the camera before delivering the following monologue:

  “Commander Riker, I believe this is an appropriate time to tell you something deeply personal about my past. Before I do that, however, please allow me to awkwardly walk five steps in this direction. I’ll keep my back turned to you for a while, which will enable an awesome, over-the-shoulder camera shot with my face in the foreground, and with your face slightly blurred in the background. You see, with these five steps that I am taking while walking away from you, I am providing a visually symbolic representation of my desire to ‘walk away’ from my past. Then again, I am walking away while I’m reminiscing; so am I, in fact, walking towards the past instead? I’m going to turn around now, mid-sentence, in order to face you and to add further ambiguity to the question. The past may always be behind you, but it also always faces you no matter which direction you face.”

  

  Pretty awful, right? I quoted that speech verbatim from an old Dr. Pulaski episode. Every episode centered around that bitch is total trash. Anyhow, all I mean to say is that Lieutenant Commander Data’s oft-derided poem,“Ode to Spot”, has ten times more nuance to it than all of the Awkward “Next Gen” Look-Aways combined throughout the history of the show. I love you to death, Next Gen, but your people have got to look each other in the eye a little more often in order for me to take them seriously.




• Insulting Assumptions at the Crosswalk
  

  Call me crazy, but I consider it a personal affront whenever somebody walks up from behind me and presses the crosswalk button when it’s clear that I’ve already been standing there at the street corner for a while, waiting for the “Walk” sign to turn green. I know how to cross a street, asshole. Do you believe me to be such a helpless person, that I would so passively stand on every street corner that I encounter, praying for the winds of fate to sweep you into my life each time just so that you could enable my journey forward by helping me click a befuddling, magical button? Get the fuck over yourself.

  Show me enough respect to assume that I understand the concept of a crosswalk button, and maybe I’ll spare you the intricate details about the many ways by which you can go fuck yourself.




• Bizarre Self-Censorship by The Roots

  This is an old gripe of mine from way back in the day. First of all, do we have any hip-hop fans in the house? I’m a longtime fan of hip-hop myself, and I’ve learned over the years to take the good along with the bad. Although I can think of a lot of good things to say about hip-hop music, there are also many embarrassing aspects of the genre which put me on the defensive, and which compel me to justify my reasons for listening to it. The one thing I’ve always appreciated about the hip-hop band, The Roots, is that they have never given me a reason to be embarrassed about being a fan of hip-hop. The Roots are all about consciousness, intelligence, clever lyricism, and skilled musicianship. Needless to say, I’m a big fan of their work.

  

  Even so, there is one small thing that has been bothering me about The Roots for the longest time now. On the explicit, “uncensored” version of their hit 1999 album, Things Fall Apart, The Roots have scratched out the word “bitch” from at least two of their audio tracks. That is to say, at least two songs on the album include the word “bitch” in the lyrics — and for some reason, somebody saw it fit to censor the portions of each song where that word is spoken. Now, I’m all for the eradication of misogynistic lyrics in rap songs, but I think the approach that The Roots took on their album is completely ass backwards. Why would you even include that word in your lyrics if it was your intention, down the line, to censor it out of the end product? What makes this self-censorship even more ridiculous is the fact that the album is full of all other kinds of profane words, like “shit”, “motherfucker”, and the N-word. Why is it okay to say all of those other words, but not “bitch”? I really don’t understand the point that The Roots were trying to make with all of that self-censorship.

  To hear what I’m talking about, go ahead and take a listen to the YouTube clip of the song, “Dynamite!” down below. You can hear the word “bitch” scratched out of the audio at 1:29.

  Dynamite!

  For further illustration, check out the clip below for another song from the album titled, “Don’t See Us”. The word “bitch” is scratched out at 1:13. Interestingly, the word “whore” is not censored out, and can be heard clearly just a second before, around 1:12.

  Don’t See Us

  I’ve been Googling this album for years, and it seems as though nobody else out there is complaining about the censorship inconsistencies on Things Fall Apart. I’m going to go out on a limb here and proclaim that I am the first person in the world to call out The Roots on the issue of self-censorship.

  Personally, I would prefer to listen to an album without any obnoxious audio censorship scratches at all. If I wanted to hear all that noise, I could have just dialed into my local hip-hop radio station instead of listening to what was supposed to have been a polished, professionally produced album. The Roots should have either left all of the profanity on their album untouched, or they should have had a band meeting a day before entering the recording studio in order to come up with an alternate, friendlier word for “bitch”. Might I recommend the word “Pulaski” for future reference? I’m just saying.




• Terminology Inspired by the “Good Samaritan” Parable

  Is it safe to assume that most people who grew up in Westernized societies know the biblical parable that Jesus tells of the “Good Samaritan”? As the story goes, an unfortunate Jewish man gets his ass kicked by some bandits, and is left for dead along the side of a road. Two fine, upstanding Orthodox Jewish men (a priest and a Levite) pass by the injured man, but they don’t offer any help. Later on, a third man, who happens to be a Samaritan, comes along and shows the injured man an extraordinary amount of care. The point of Jesus’ parable is to illustrate the importance of showing compassion to your neighbors, which is hopefully a sentiment that we all can get behind, regardless of our beliefs. What made Jesus’ parable so provocative for its time, though, was that it portrayed a Samaritan in a positive light.

  Back in those days, Orthodox Jews and Samaritans despised each other due to their fundamental disagreements over religious doctrine. By casting a Samaritan in the role of the helpful neighbor, Jesus was making a point of showing that the qualities of kindness and human compassion are far more important than our individual beliefs in esoteric, religious dogma. I can’t help but think, though, that the spirit of Jesus’ lesson began to tarnish as soon as people started referring to this parable as the story of the “Good Samaritan”.

  

  The way I see it, the phrase, “Good Samaritan” is basically an archaic variation of a centuries-old, prejudicial slur. When Jesus originally told the story, he just referred to the guy as a “Samaritan”. Later on when people started retelling the parable, they started calling the dude a “good” Samaritan, implying that the majority of other Samaritans out there are bad people.
  

  “Samaritans? They only adhere to the Pentateuch, so they can all go eat a dick. Oh, but not that one, though. The Samaritan from that biblical parable which Jesus tells is one of the ‘good’ ones.”

  Am I being too touchy about innocent terminology? I don’t know, maybe. It just seems odd to me that in this modern day, we would chastise a person for making a remark like, “You’re a credit to your race”, all the while the phrase “Good Samaritan” has become so ingrained in the lexicon, that you could find hundreds of examples of hospitals, laws, and charitable organizations all over the world that bear that very name.

  I’m telling, you man: If, one day, I ever came across a hospital named “The Good Chinaman Medical Center”, I would flip the fuck out. I couldn’t be held responsible for the inevitable shit-storm that would follow. Like, you know. I’d probably stomp home and blog about it in a very stern tone. Or something.

As always, there’s plenty more to bitch about, but I think I’ll call it quits for now. I can only dish out so many complaints in one sitting before even I want to slap my own damn self.

So, this is what it’s like to gripe as a thirty-year-old. It’s funny, because even though nothing much has changed between twenty-nine and thirty, everything somehow seems a little more significant these days. Maybe that’s wisdom catching up to me. Ain’t that some shit?

Monday the 23rd was Diana’s birthday. Every year, she tells me not to get her flowers because she thinks they’re impractical and needlessly expensive, but I decided this year to pick her up a modest, reasonably priced bouquet.

In addition to that, I also picked up two birthday cards for Diana. Actually, to be more precise, I picked up one proper birthday card, and a little something extra to break up the monotony of the standard, “Happy Birthday, I love you” proceedings. I guess you could say I have something of an intimacy problem. That’s what my therapist tells me, anyway — which is total bullcrap, because I know for a fact that I don’t have any problems with intimacy. I also don’t have a therapist.

Anyway, if you knew anything about what I do, then you might already know that I have a track record of pissing off my girlfriend by giving her cheeky, insincere, “decoy cards” before I calm her down by presenting her the real thing. What can I say? We’re nothing but animals and savages without our traditions. This year, I was especially amused by my own efforts on Diana’s decoy birthday card, and I decided to share it with the rest of you.

“Please Get Well,” it pleads.

I’m counting on you to pull through, my love.

Yeah, I know, I’m a jerk. Again, for the record: I did also give Diana a real birthday card with a heartfelt, handwritten message, but that’s not the kind of stuff that people come here to read. If it helps my case at all, Diana did smack me around for two minutes before I gave her the real thing. Sincerity is for suckers, am I right?

Happy Birthday, Diana! You know I love you.

Love is in the air, my friends. This February, my chest swells with gratitude and gladness for having found the love of my life — the one girl with whom I want to share every Valentine’s Day for the remainder of my living days. So I guess I’m no stranger to love these days. What a wonderful thing to be able to say. I consider myself lucky to have found a girlfriend as kind, as loving, and as supportive as Diana. Yet luck had very little do with keeping us together for the past seven years. If you’ll forgive me for my presumption, I’d like to share with you some insights into my relationship so that others out there might also reach the peak of romantic bliss, just as I have. True, there are happy couples all over the globe flourishing in a variety of different ways, but there is only one true way to be as happy as Diana and KZ. This one goes out to all of the lovestruck gentlemen of the world who find themselves in need of some romantic advice.

• Rule #1: Never be complacent.

  Relationships require more than mere passion and raw emotions. A healthy relationship requires effort, commitment, selflessness, and reciprocity. All of these requirements amount to a very tall order, but it’s a profoundly rewarding thing when you and your partner manage to get things right. In short, never stop trying.





• Rule #2: It’s okay to daydream when the conversations get dull.

  Let’s face it: women like to talk a whole lot more than men do. Every strong relationship should be built upon a foundation of good communication, but sometimes the temptation to daydream is just too enticing to resist when your girl spends 30 minutes describing the tedious minutia of her uneventful day. Go on and drift off. It’s okay. You deserve a mental holiday every now and then. It’s not like you won’t hear her tell you those stories again a minimum of twenty times.

  Sure, you may occasionally get in trouble when your woman realizes that you aren’t paying attention to her, but the risks are far outweighed by the benefits of daydreaming. For one thing, daydreaming keeps your mind sharp if you do it correctly. Chicks dig a man with a sharp mind, and a strong sense of imagination. Daydreaming also goes a long way to keep you sane when conversations press on the limits of your patience. But the best thing about daydreaming during a boring conversation is that you’ll always have something new to learn about the next time you decide to pay attention. Don’t feel guilty for allowing your mind to wander. Embrace the discovery.





• Rule #3: Show her all of the best aspects of your personality, but also hide nothing.

  Never stop dating your girl even long after you two have moved beyond the awkward dating phase. It’s all too easy to grow complacent in a long-term relationship, but try to put your best foot forward as much as you can so that she will always see the best that you have to offer. Having said that, it’s also important to understand that your less admirable qualities are bound to show through on occasion, so don’t treat them like a dirty secret. By all means, always try to show her your best, but also be honest about who you are.

  Consider the case of Mouthy. I always do what I can to show Diana the very best of me, and she adores me for it because I kick so much ass. Despite that fact, Diana also understands that I’m a human being with my own weaknesses, vulnerabilities, and brittle frailties. I express the essence of those lesser qualities through Mouthy, a hexagonal hand puppet whom I create out of paper chopstick covers every time I take Diana out to eat at an Asian restaurant.

  

  Mouthy wants so desperately to make friends with Diana. Unfortunately, Diana spurns Mouthy’s every attempt to strike up a conversation. Invariably, Diana always finds a way to wrestle Mouthy away from me, and she’ll shred him to pieces before my grieving eyes. Given that Mouthy is made of paper, and given that Diana has demonstrated an alarming propensity for destroying him, Mouthy is the living embodiment of weakness, vulnerability, and brittle frailty. Mouthy’s fragile weaknesses mirror my own. His suffering is my suffering. I do what I can to show Diana my very best, but I also accept the weaknesses of my own constitution.

  

  It’s interesting to note that Diana can so callously destroy a part of me without showing an ounce of remorse. That’s the stuff of psychopaths, man. This aspect of Diana appears to be one of her own character faults. Even so, Rule #3 is a two way street, and so I choose to love Diana anyway despite her moral frailty. That’s just the way true love works.

  Diana loves me for who I am. For better or worse, she accepts all of the things that make me KZ. Diana loves me in spite of Mouthy. Diana loves me because of Mouthy. All you need is a little emotional honesty to make things work.

  
  
  

• Rule #4: Keep the fires burning by inserting a little mystery into the mix.

  The specter of boredom is an unfortunate reality for even the most loving and compatible of couples. Over time, long-term relationships define themselves on dedication and stability rather than impulsiveness and excitement. But who’s to say that the fires of passion are destined to die?

  

  The best way to prevent familiarity from breeding contempt is to spice up your days with a little mystery. This goes a long way to keeping your girl interested and emotionally engaged. Using myself as an example, I have recently formed the habit of arbitrarily abbreviating my sentences so that I only say the first letter of a number of strategic words. Diana finds this practice of mine mystifying, yet mysterious — confusing, yet completely irresistible. Here’s a portion of a conversation that I had with Diana sometime last week.

  Diana: Guess what, Kevin. I reached level 15 on my Smurfs game.

  Kevin: Oh yeah, great. That totally justifies the way you monopolize my iPhone all the time.

  Diana: Yes, it does. See, I can harvest all kinds of cool crops, like peas and strawberries. And sometimes Papa Smurf will send me on missions where I have to go out and look for lost smurfs. There’s also mini-games and Smurfette!

  Kevin: Yeah, yeah, GFY.

  Diana: GFY? What does that … hey, screw you! You “go fuck yourself”.

  Kevin: Whoa, that’s not what GFY means. It stands for, “good for you”.

  Diana: God damnit, I fucking hate it when you turn everything into an acronym. Why don’t you talk like a person and use actual words?

  Kevin: First of all, GFY is not an acronym. An acronym is an abbreviation made up of initial letters which form a pronounceable word. Secondly…

  Diana: I don’t give a shit. I’m just sick of having to decode all of your sentences.

  Kevin: Yeah, yeah. GFY.

  Insert some mystery, keep her guessing, and keep things spicy. She’ll thank you for it in the long run.

  
  
  

• Rule #5: Create no-win situations to remind her of what she has.

  Sometimes the best way to remind your girl that you’re the best choice for her is to confront her with a lighthearted, no-win situation. By stripping away the possibilities for choice from a strategic number of situations, you are gently guiding your girl toward the understanding that you are in possession of the key to a number of life’s hidden truths, which is totally hot. Again, using myself as an example, consider this conversation that Diana and I recently had about our Netflix instant queue.

  

  Diana: What do you want to watch tonight, Kevin? Battlestar Galactica or Desperate Housewives?

  Kevin: You mean B-Star G or Desperate H-Dub?

  Diana: Fine. Do you want to watch B-Star G or Desperate H-Dub?

  Kevin: What the hell are you talking about? Why are you abbreviating your words like that? You mean Battlestar Galactica or Desperate Housewives?

  Diana: You are such a dick, you know that?

  Kevin: I know a lot of things, Diana. You know what else I know? I know that I love you.

  Diana: Yeah, right. My fucking hero.

  I don’t mean to brag or anything, but apparently, I am Diana’s hero. It’s only taken her a handful of no-win situations to realize this fact.

  
  
  

• Rule #6: A well-placed “I love you” can go a very long way.

  As exemplified in Rule #5, saying “I love you” at precisely the right time can disarm your girl, and remind her of how much you mean to her. “I love you” is a wonderfully magical statement. It has the power to enchant her in the midst of a romantic moment, or to melt her heart in the middle of a heated fight.

  

  You should also consider the value of “I love you” for its ability to make you look like the sympathetic party while recalling the events of a lovers’ quarrel. Case in point, here is a continuation of the conversation that I quoted in Rule #5.

  Kevin: I know a lot of things, Diana. You know what else I know? I know that I love you.

  Diana: Yeah, right. My fucking hero.

  Kevin: I truly mean it. I love you, Diana.

  Diana: Fuck you.

  See what I mean? Who’s the bad guy from that particular exchange? Just three simple words transform your everyday, awesome KZ, into a tragically stoic martyr of love. The utterance of that simple phrase at precisely the right moment has made me out to look like a modern-day Casanova. I’m a KZ-nova, if you will. Don’t you desperately want to be like me, now?

  
  
  

• Rule #7: Resist proposing marriage for a minimum of seven years.

  This method seems to have worked for me. I imagine you will be able to employ the same strategy with similar success. Your girl may give you grief for not proposing to her sooner, but she will also respect your resistance, as this will be interpreted as a display of manliness and cavalier strength. Chicks dig manly men of a rebellious nature almost as much as they dig abusive douchebags who treat women like crap. Show her your strong, principled, masculine side without venturing into the realm of douchebaggery, and you’ll be golden.

  

  
  
  

• Rule #8: Fantasy and role-play are great tools for spicing up the bedroom.

  Sometimes keeping it real is overrated. Sometimes it’s more fun to indulge in a little fantasy before bed. Head over to Diana’s Awesome Blog at www.KZSucksAss.com to read all about Rule #8.

  

  
  
  

• Rule #9: Complimenting your girl while she’s getting dressed is a great excuse to cop a feel.

  Try this one the next time you enter the room while your girl is getting dressed. “Hey, honey, have you lost weight?” As soon as she looks down to examine her body, reach out and cop a free feel. Whether your girl believes in the sincerity of your statement after the fact is irrelevant for two reasons: (1) Even if it was just for a brief moment, you raised her personal sense of body image and self esteem; and (2) You got to cop a free feel during the exchange. In either event, it’s a win-win situation. It’s fun to desire, and fun to be desired.

  
  
  

• Rule #10: If you are as insufferably annoying to your girl as I am to Diana, then be sure to thank her this Valentine’s Day for putting up with your ridiculous shit.

  Diana may swear like a sailor, but she has the patience of a saint. I’m lucky that Diana tolerates me in spite all of my self-indulgent, juvenile antics. Diana, I am the happiest that I’ve ever been in life because I have you by my side. Every moment and every day with you is a reason to celebrate.

  

  I love you, Diana. Sincerely, I do.

  
  
  
  

You see, fellas? That’s how it’s done. Cap it all off with a brief display of tender sincerity, and she’ll eat it right up, and let you get away with murder. Ain’t love grand?

Happy Valentine’s Day, everybody.

If I were a comic book super villain, my origin story would probably begin sometime around December 1991. I was just a nine-year-old kid back then, but there came a day many Decembers ago when I formed the presence of mind to reliably differentiate fiction from fact. I thought things through during that Christmas season, and I came to the conclusion that Santa Claus is a fraud. All these years later, I’m still not ready to forgive Santa for never having existed.

No Virginia, there is no Santa Claus. This is a truth that every adult in your life has known, yet they’ve all been bullied into silence by some bizarre social norm which requires adults to deceive naive little children for as many Decembers as possible. It’s okay to grieve, child. A part of your innocence and imagination has just been shattered, and you’re left with the unsettling revelation that not only does Santa Claus not exist, but also with the knowledge that the adults you’ve known have been lying to you your entire life. You asked them in earnest to tell you the simple truth about Santa Claus, and they repaid your sincerity with whimsical double-talk and bald-faced lies. Yes, Virginia, it’s okay to cry. Adults are condescending, deceitful pricks.

Fuck Santa Claus, man. From the moment your child discovers Superman from watching television, you begin warning her that there is no such thing as the super power of flight, because you can’t bear the thought of your kid jumping off a roof with a blanket tied around her neck. When your child starts playing video games for the first time, you start reminding her that there is no such thing as a “Reset” button in real life, because every choice and action has a consequence. When your child sees you doing household cleaning chores around the house, and she then asks why you don’t just clean things up by waving a wand like Harry Potter, you sit your kid down and explain to her that magic isn’t real, and that good things come to people who work hard. Make-believe is awesome, but we place boundaries on our children’s imaginations all the time so that they don’t grow up to become ignorant people who wallow in self-delusion.

It’s not my intention to degrade the value of childhood innocence. I just happen to think that the tradition of lying to our children about Santa Claus is the biggest crock of shit of the Holiday season. Maybe I was an abnormal child growing up, but I genuinely felt embarrassed and betrayed once I realized that my parents and teachers had been lying to me about Santa Claus my entire life, and all because they figured it was “for my own good”. At the age of nine, I learned one of the shittiest lessons that a kid could ever learn: “In the end, you can trust nobody else except yourself.” Merry Fucking Christmas, overly-sensitive, nine-year-old KZ.

A couple years have passed since 1991, and I’ve come to terms with the fact that Santa Claus makes for a pretty decent mascot during the Christmas season. The myth of Jolly Old Saint Nick is a fun tale to tell, but why do so many of us consider it a child’s entitlement to be deceived every December? Some might argue that belief in the Santa Claus myth helps stimulate our children’s imaginations, and that it promotes a festive atmosphere filled with fun for the kids. I don’t deny the truth of that argument, but I do have to question its merit.

Christmas has so much more to offer than Santa Claus — so much more than the mere crassness of all that materialism and bribery for good behavior. For Christian parents, Christmas is a time to remember Jesus, and to celebrate all of the values that Jesus held in the highest esteem: love, kindness, friendship, tolerance, and faith not only in God, but faith in the common humanity that binds us to our families, friends, neighbors, and even to our enemies. Even if you’re not a Christian parent, and yet you happen to celebrate Christmas in your own secular or ecumenical way, wouldn’t your children benefit more from an emphasis on the value to be found in the season’s spirit of love, kindness, and peace, versus an emphasis on a silly story about a fat judgmental magic man who trespasses on private properties without remorse, and who spends the majority of his time stuffing his face and judging everybody?

Christmas is the time of year when we celebrate that lofty promise of peace on earth, and good will toward men. I know, that’s some corny shit. I don’t care if it’s corny, though. Every December, I look toward the stars, and I convince myself to believe — if only for a moment — that one day in the future before the end, humanity will finally get things right. I guess you could accuse me of hypocrisy for speaking out against delusions and lies, all the while I place my belief in impossible things. There’s probably some truth to that criticism. But hey, you know what? At least my delusion doesn’t make lame excuses to get your children to sit on its lap. That’s the creepiest shit ever.

In closing, Santa Claus can go F himself in the A.

Merry Christmas, kids.

Go on and read it. There’s a good chance you’ll enjoy it even if your name isn’t Joie.

J to the P, the B-Day Supreme
(By KZ, Dawn to the Spence, & D-Pad)

Joie! Joie! She’s a joy to behold
Joie is super awesome
Even though she’s getting old

But not as old as Helen Hunt
I mean have you seen her lately?
She’s not aging so gracefully
Joie is aging better than Double-H
Joie gets old tastefully

Even Joie’s name is super awesome
even with its excess of vowels
Just don’t get too old on us, Super J
And lose control of your bowels
…in the middle of dinner at OSF

Happy birthday, Joie. Go ahead and frame that poem so you can hang it on a wall or something. I wouldn’t blame you for getting caught up in the awesomeness of it all.

“Inside thoughts” are the kind of ideas that are probably best kept to yourself. They are the mental processes that fuel those off-colored remarks which jeopardize careers, end friendships, get you punched, earn you sideways glances, and make you want to die the moment you vocalize them into words. I’m talking about the kind of thoughts that recklessly escape your mouth like a drenched and agitated cat bolting away from an involuntary bath. I’m talking about those moments in life when you silence a room because you’ve said too much, and much too loudly. “Of course there’s a way,” you proudly proclaim. “Haven’t you ever heard of glory holes?” Try that line out if you enjoy awkward moments marked by a horrified silence. I’ve been there.

A staggering variety of messed up shit pops into my head on a daily basis. On the whole, my inner sense of discretion filters out most of those inside thoughts from my blog entries, and when I engage in polite conversation. Sometimes though, on occasions like today, the best way to stay sane is to let loose, and to unleash a deluge of inside thoughts onto a hapless crowd of onlookers.

Assuming I still have your attention, let’s get started with the indiscretions.

• 

  My girlfriend, Diana, is an animal lover. She never fails to comment on the tragedy of roadkill when she spots a dead animal in the center of the road. “Poor possum!” she’ll cry. The sight of a dead animal is never a pleasant thing, but I never let things like that get me down. I always assume the possum had it coming. He was probably embezzling money from his employers down at the possum insurance agency. He must have also been a lousy drunk — the kind of douche who would come home sloshed every night after work wearing his brown fedora and his tiny maroon necktie without a collared shirt, and who would spit on the cold plate of dinner that had been lovingly set aside for him, all before beating his possum wife in a savage, drunken rage. Fuck that possum, man. He totally got what was coming to him.

• Assuming there is such a thing as an afterlife, and assuming that Heaven and Hell actually exist, how can we be so sure that Hell is the ghoulishly terrible place that everybody makes it out to be? Heaven is where the virtuous people go, and Hell is the final destination for the dregs of humanity — the non-believers and the sinners. Most religious traditions would scare us into believing that Hell is a place of infinite agony designed to punish people for their unrepented sins. But what’s in it for the Devil? Why would he kick your ass in the afterlife for pissing off God? Doesn’t the Devil get his kicks from defying the will of God? I’m not saying that I have any desire to go to Hell, but who’s to say that, once you got there, you wouldn’t be greeted by a throng of high fives, defiant AC/DC music, kick-ass beach parties, and and an endless buffet line full of pizza, beer, and devil’s food cake?
• Speaking of wicked people, is it wrong that I see Adolf Hitler’s mustache on the back of my cat’s leg? Her name is Madam Beasley Meowington, but I like to call her Hitler Foot.
  
• This next inside thought isn’t a very private one since I’ve talked about it before among a number of my friends. I think it’s still worth mentioning here in this post since most people call for my immediate crucifixion once they hear me admit to it. Here goes.
  

  I’ve never understood the hype over Jerry Seinfeld. I don’t think he’s very funny. He’s a clever guy, and his observational humor can be pretty insightful at times, but neither his sitcom nor his stand-up routines have ever made me laugh. Yes, I’ve seen Curb Your Enthusiasm. Yes, I think that show is pretty damned funny. That’s probably because the show has very little to do with Jerry Seinfeld. Yes Joie, I know. You and I can no longer be friends now that I have declared these thoughts publicly in writing. I’m just not a stickler for a tickler.

• During a recent conversation, a friend of mine remarked, “I could never work in an animal shelter because I couldn’t stand to see an animal put to sleep.” My mind immediately went to a dark place, and I started to giggle. I pictured my friend working as an animal shelter volunteer, happily playing with an exuberant little puppy inside one of the socializing rooms. The play session is interrupted when a solemn man with a stern face enters the room. He is brandishing a pistol in an unconcealed holster. “Ma’am,” he says, “could you please turn around for a moment?” My friend complies and turns around. There is a moment of silence, followed suddenly and abruptly by a loud pop. The next sound my friend hears is the door slamming shut.

  This might be a good time to remind you that inside thoughts reside in a place where good taste goes to die.

• One of my favorite weekend activities is playing paintball. I make no claims to being a bad-ass, or to being any good at the sport. I just happen to find the game incredibly fun.
  

  In the dozen-or-so times that I’ve gone out to play, it’s always been on a recreational field full of novices and newbies, just like me. Often times, you encounter a good number of young preteen kids on those “rec ball” fields. I think it’s awesome to see young kids playing the sport. It wasn’t until I hit my late twenties when I finally mustered the courage to play paintball. Those little kids have a lot of heart, and a lot of guts. I really do admire them.

  Having said that, I have to admit that a very small part of me derives a perverse pleasure from lighting up those young kids with paint. I don’t enjoy it because I’m a bully. I enjoy it because little kids make for excellent target practice. They’re quick, and they’re small, and they’re usually more agile than the average opponent. Also, they usually have a lot more stamina than me because I’m a squishy, aging slob. There are few moments in life that are more satisfying than those times when you snap out from behind a bunker, shoot off a string of paint, and then you see your opponent’s hand rise in the air as he calls himself out. The victory is only made that much sweeter when you realize that the arm being raised belongs to a ten-year-old kid. Good game, junior.

I’d better cool it right here with the inside thoughts before I alienate anybody with good taste who might still be reading this post. I’m starting to feel a little exposed right now, so this is probably the ideal time to stop. Thank you for your patience, gentle reader, and for playing your part in this dance of indiscreet madness.

It all started with Bob Marley’s “No Woman, No Cry”. I was flipping around the stations when I landed on that particular song. Once I recognized the tune, I drew my hand away to reach back for the steering wheel, and I started to sing softly to myself. I freaking love that song. Diana dislikes Bob Marley, and I know it. “Fuck it,” I thought to myself. “She already vetoed that 2Pac song because she hates rap. I’m going to ride this one out until Diana starts to bitch.” It didn’t take her long. As I recall, it took her twenty seconds.

“Ugh, I hate Bob Marley,” Diana grumbled, and she started to poke the radio dial.

“Jesus,” I said, “how can you hate Bob Marley so much, that you’ll never let me enjoy one of his songs from start to finish? Is he really that bad?”

“I just don’t like Bob Marley.”

“Goddamn, Diana. You’re so white. Why don’t you go listen to some White Zombie? Or how about some White Town? Remember them? ‘I could never be your woman’? Man, that’s a good song. I bet you like that song, too. You know, because you’re so freaking white.”

Diana is a Caucasian broad. Sometimes the arguments get racial. They just have to. It’s all in good fun, though. Honest.

“Why don’t you shut the hell up, China?” Diana retorted.

See? Things just got racial again. It’s just what we do.

“You know, Diana, I’d accuse you of being a Barry White fan if I thought Barry White were white enough for you. Alas, he doesn’t quite make the cut.”

At this point, Diana stopped acknowledging me. During the six-plus years that Diana and I have been dating, I have come to understand this silent gesture of hers as an invitation to volley more of my incessant, insufferable bullshit. Diana sure has a funny way of encouraging discourse. She’s lucky that she found a guy who can read between the lines.

“Hey Diana, what are you looking for on the radio? Something by the White Stripes, perhaps? Maybe a ditty by the Plain White T’s?”

Eventually, Diana stopped the radio dial on the classic rock station. Typical, huh?

I paused a moment to listen to the music. It was some 1980s rock and roll bullcrap — inadequate, though distressingly memorable in a bad kind of way. This was one of those songs that I had heard many times before, but I’d never bothered to identify the title or the artist.

“Who is this?” I asked. “Fucking Whitesnake or something? It would be just like you to pass up Bob Marley for Whitesnake.”

Diana had finally had enough. “Give me your phone,” she demanded, and she shoved her upturned palm right beneath my chin.

One of the more useful apps on the iPhone is Shazam, a program that allows you to identify the title and the artist of a song that is currently playing. Implicitly, Diana was asking me to hand her my phone so that she could tag the song. I reached into my pocket and obliged her.

Diana fiddled with my phone for about thirty seconds. Then, in a voice that was just barely audible, I heard her hiss, “Oh, fuck you.”

It was Whitesnake. Of course it was! Some days, you just win without even trying.