He Was Gone Before Autumn Came

So, as I've mentioned, I've had some dental nightmares lately. In fact, my dentist - I guess because he was tired of me destroying his exam chair by digging my fingers into the armrests and leaving a pool of sweat in the seat every time I came in for a checkup - referred me to what I can only call a Dentist For Pussies, where they actually offer you a general anesthetic for basic dental work. This brand of insanity is just the thing I'd been looking for in a dentist (and, really, in any kind of intra-species contact), so I made an appointment. How bad could it be, right? Turns out it could be $17,000 worth of bad, because that's what they wanted to charge me for the dental work I needed. Oh, and they only accept money up front, so it's not like I could just go in and tell them to bill my insurance. I tell you, I don't know who's got 17 grand to throw away on their teeth, but if I was going to spend that kind of bank on my mouth, it would be to surgically attach a breast to it. So I look forward to a long life filled with pain and unnecessary suffering (which is pretty much how I'd pictured it going since I was 12 anyway) unless I can con somebody in one of those European nations with socialized medicine into marrying me. Not France, though - I see no point in having perfect teeth if I have to spend my time using them to argue about post-structuralism at every meal. Not to mention the fact that they have the worst TV programs in the industrialized world - which is saying something, as anyone who's ever spent time in Mexico can attest. Also, they seem incapable of producing a decent rock band. But then, so does everybody else at this point. Who cares? I don't even know what the hell I'm talking about at this point.

People, May 5, 2008

While I understand that celebrities work hard for their cash, I find it obscene what they spend their money on: million-dollar cars, $100,000 weekend-long birthday parties, shopping sprees and mansions - the list is endless. Bravo to Brad and Angelina for donating their time as well as millions of dollars to charitable organizations. They are what's right in Hollywood.
Sandra F. Schillfarth
Nottingham, Md.

"Do I hear $5,000 for this mint-condition Cambodian baby?
$5,000 to the lovely woman in the yellow dress!"

Yo Schillfarth,
When you say "They're what's right in Hollywood", I assume you're excluding the Tomb Raider films, as well as Alexander and Ocean's Thirteen and Mr. and Mrs. Smith and the rest of the unbelievably shitty movies they've made. On the other hand, those very shitty movies are what's allowed them to continue their philanthropic work, so maybe we should all go buy them on DVD - our suffering at having to watch them is nothing compared to the suffering Brad and Angelina can alleviate as the world's first real-life superhero couple. It's not like they're going to spend the money on mansions or shopping sprees! Oh, no. Why, these two are so unprepossessing that Brad comes over to my place to play poker every Wednesday, which is when we drink PBR and discuss the most effective methods for ending poverty within two generations. It's amazing - he treats you just like he's on the same level as you, even though he obviously doesn't suffer from halitosis or bouts of crippling depression! And you're right - he works hard for his cash, unlike us lazy assholes who don't have jobs in the entertainment industry, yet he still finds the reserves of inner strength to adopt babies at the rate of 1.887 a day and smell like a bouquet of roses at all times! I don't really know Angelina (I only fucked her once), but to hear Brad talk about her, she's an even more stupendous specimen. For instance, did you know she once froze time just to save a pigeon from flying into a window? And she can shoot lasers from her eyes. But she only does it to perform eye surgery on the myopic - she never uses her power as a weapon. She could, though. We're all here only through her grace. Remember that the next time you start talking shit about the animation in Beowulf. You are insignificant, and if you can't show the proper respect, the rich and famous are well within their rights to eat you and your family in a decadent cannibalistic orgy. It's called survival of the fittest. Read up on it (it's in the Bible, I think).

Interrupting my train of thought - lines of longitude and latitude,
John

No wonder Berlin Zoo bear Knut is having the blues. Wild animals belong in the wild, not in an unnatural environment where thousands of screaming fans stand around gawking and applauding. Animals have their own agendas. Knut isn't addicted to fame, he just wants a life free of human interference.
Timothy J. Verret
Austin, Texas

Timothy,
Sounds like we'd better keep Knut away from Courtney Love, then. Tell you what: You alert the proper authorities, and I'll sit here and pretend to give half a shit about some fucking bear.

World shut your mouth,
John

Entertainment Weekly, April 4, 2008

Bless you for featuring Stephen Malkmus, one of the most talented musicians out there ("Slanted and Enchanted"). America, go buy the first three Pavement records: You'll thank me later.
Luke Wienecke
Annapolis, Md.

Yes, thanks, EW! A Stephen Malkmus article in 2008! I can't wait for your Sleater-Kinney feature in 2047. I suggest you name the piece "Call The Doctor" ('cause it's one of their album titles, dicks!), and then underneath the headline, you can add: "...Because these ladies are on fire!". But, being Entertainment Weekly, I probably don't need to give you writing advice. Not for free, anyway.

p.s. America, don't prove your stupidity by buying the first three Pavement records. This is the '90s - you can download them for nothing! Just type "Pavement Bittorrent" into Google or go over to Isohunt. We're in a recession, you know.

Secret decoder ring codes, arteries, shopping nodes!,
John

Literature For Assholes

Mein freunds,

Looks like I'm going to have a hard time updating until I get these book projects into some kind of shape I'll be happy with. So expect updates every other day or so until I'm satisfied with my other work. I'll keep posting, but it may be kinda free-form for a short spell. Which is code for "I'll be posting random shit totally unrelated to this blog's actual purpose because I've got files and files of insane bullshit on my computer that's never going to get published anyway so I'll use this blog as a dumping ground for it". You're welcome! Today, I give you a short story I wrote a couple years or so ago (and also posted on an old blog). And, contrary to what you might think, I was totally sober at the time. I think I'll title this one "Sheep Bleatin' At The Town Meetin'" because it fits as well as anything else. Enjoy.

Chapter the First: Cuba Gooding, Jr. vs. the Low-Fat Milk Lobby

My father was a stupid and corpulent man. This is in no way germane to the rest of the story, but it seems like a Dickensian opening line, or what I imagine would qualify as Dickensian, seeing as how I've never read any of his worthless pap. But I digress. Let's begin anew:

Chapter the First: But Daddy, That's My Rectum!

I'd gotten his name from my sister, who'd used his services in the past - in fact, shortly before the panicked phone call I’d just received from her in which she confided, among other things, that her left ventricle had evolved into a miniature rendering plant and her belief that Paul Newman had begun substituting hydrocyanic acid for his salad dressing.

"You know - to kill us. It's tasteless and odorless, see."

"No it isn't", I belched (hamburger). "It tastes like almonds."

"Sure, that's what he wants you to think," she whispered ominously. It was my fondest memory of her (which only illustrates how much I loathed her), and also the last time I'd ever speak to her alive.

She'd told me his name was Crazy-Ass Hat Man, which I'd assumed to be the feverish imaginings of her drug-addled brain until I arrived at the door to his office and noted the inscription:

Crazy-Ass Hat Man
Private Investigator
Please Refrain from Staring at the Aforementioned Crazy-Ass Hat

I turned the knob. While I was at it, I grabbed his door handle and twisted it, too. Ahahaha! See what I did there? It's called "poetic license", fuckers.

I entered and approached the secretary, who sat like a lump of shit behind her worm-eaten desk. She introduced herself telepathically as Mrs. Aureola Plopbottom, then motioned for me to head toward her boss’s inner office, a task which I accomplished chiefly by using my feet. When I walked in, he was on the phone, in the middle of a conversation.

“…Because sometimes daddy’s balls hurt, Jimmy!”, he wheezed. He noticed me and hung up without saying goodbye.

I stood there for a moment, allowing my enzymes to catalyze whatever bullshit chemical reactions they needed to catalyze, when I noticed it: On his head sat a large hat in the shape of a flaccid penis. I can't be sure, because the door had admonished me not to stare, but it seemed the hat was made of actual flesh - the wrinkles, the foreskin - all were far too detailed to be the work of a mere craftsman, even a Filipino.

As I intentionally looked him in the eye, the penis hat spit out, from the pee-hole in its head, an ornately wrapped toffee - which I would later discover, in the privacy of my own tool shed, was an exquisite confectionery delight.

"What the fuck do you want, bitch?", he purred, and I knew from that moment forward that I would end up falling in love with him.

"Well, sir," I cooed, "I'd like to retain your services. I need you to investigate something for me."

"No shit, Sherlock," he growled, then grew somber, then giddy, then obstreperous, then noisome.

"Well, what is it?" He clucked. "I'm due for my morning urinalysis, boy."

"I need you to..to..." Dare I say it out loud? Dare I even dream it? I must have grappled with this quandary for seconds – nay, minutes – nay, seconds – before arriving at an emphatic (and mildly flamboyant) “Yes!” to both questions.

"I need you to find out why my wife is mad at me." Finally, I’d given voice to the inner demons that had been driving me half-mad for nearly eighteen excruciating minutes! A feeling of sweet release swept over me, which, I must confess, had rather undesirable consequences when it came to my bowels (which was true of most situations). Nevertheless, now I had made concrete my anguish; put my crippling fears out into the world; given birth to my dilemma through the metaphorical vaginal canal that was my mind.

"Well, dipshit, why don't you ask her?" He spewed.

Why didn’t I ask her? What, was I a detective now? How should I be expected to intuitively ascertain the arcane methods employed by licensed investigators? If I had thought to ask her, maybe I'd be the one sitting behind an affordable yet functional desk from IKEA with a huge cock on my head. He continued:

"I'm not a goddamn mind reader, son."

"And I'm not a moray eel", I retorted, secretly gleeful at my display of Wildean cleverness. Though, as I would discover on my deathbed years later in Borneo, I was part moray eel, on my maternal grandfather's side.

"Then fuck you, boy", he shot back - literally; he'd pulled a revolver from his desk drawer and fired it straight at my chimp-like nostrils.

Chapter Deux: A Sale of Two Titties

Thanks to my debilitating harelip, I was prone to occasional (every 36.8 seconds) sneezing fits; as it happened, I suffered from one of these precisely at the moment Crazy-Ass Hat Man fired his gun, and I discharged my nasal contents with such force - and yet goodwill - that the bullet was diverted from its target (my chimp-like nostrils) and was instead sent rocketing out the open window, from which point it eventually ended up striking a Saab mechanic in Lexington, KY, killing him instantly (or, more accurately, killing him a second time, as it is a firmly established fact that residents of Kentucky already exist in a state of walking death).

Of course, I didn't actually see this happen; when he pulled the trigger, I instinctively thrust my hands up to cover my life-giving eyebrows. But I was able to deduce what had happened with the aid of a $1.98 slide rule and a box of Extra-Moldy Cracker Jacks. And really, it was the only logical explanation. Especially for that hick mechanic dying.

When I removed my hands from my face, I was titillated to see that we were no longer in his office; we now sat across from each other in the booth of a late 19th century ice cream parlor, decorated in the style of which Mary J. Blige was so fond. Also, his hat had now taken the form of a visual representation of ennui (or perhaps it was malaise; the whole thing was a bit impressionistic, if you ask me).

This was the picture that came up when I typed "ennui" into the Google Image search.

Somewhere in the distance, a lone seagull farted.

A waiter - who was, from all available evidence, either on drugs or Haitian (as if there’s a difference) – roller-skated up to our table, a method of locomotion I found somewhat peculiar as the floor was covered in thick shag carpeting.

"So, what can I get you two buck-toothed dingleberries?", he asked, adding, "Our special today is giant turtle face, which is $395 a plate."

"Hm", Crazy-Ass pondered. "How is that served?"

"Well," the waiter replied, visibly annoyed, "first the staff takes turns peeing on it, then we throw it into a kiln and incinerate it, after which we scrape the ashes into a bowl of apple cider, which we leave outside for the neighborhood rats."

"I'll take it!" Hat Man ejaculated.

"Well," I piped up, "I guess I'll have the sloppy puppet, please."

”Fucking homo," the waiter hissed. It was apparent to anybody with a functioning liver that he hadn’t been breastfed as an infant. I attempted to mollify him by steering the conversation to a more neutral topic.

"You know, I was thinking of moving to Laos," I opened.

"Yeah, I'm sure you'll really fit in there, you vomitous pig", he parried, and then dropped to all fours and rooted around the plush carpet, oinking and grunting and occasionally surfacing with a truffle poised on his upper lip. After two hours of this behavior, he rose to his rollerskates and calmly glided to the kitchen to give the chef our order.

Ass Hat regarded me as one would regard a testicle sandwich (which is to say: with tender longing), then blurted, "Who are you again?"

I found I had no answer for this query. It was such a complex issue, who a person is: was it personality that defined the self, or level of consciousness/self-awareness, or genetic makeup, or body odor? It was indeed a question that had stumped philosophers and theologians for decades. Also, I couldn't remember my name.

"It doesn't matter", he opined, and then reached up and pulled the zipper located on his forehead, the rubber mask that I’d taken for his face falling amongst the truffles, his true identity revealed in a most shocking and yet hackneyed fashion.

Chapter Four – Fuck Chapter Three!

To my surprise and tumescence, Crazy-Ass Hat Man was, in reality, my wife, who we'll call Keith, both to shield her against identity theft and as an homage to David Cassidy, whom most of us remember for his portrayal of Keith Richards, guitar player for the Bay City Rollers. I quite understandably shat myself when confronted with this alarming new twist (figuratively, of course; and also, to a greater extent, literally). Then, unable to think of anything better to do, I fainted.

When I awoke, I was on a farm - or, more accurately, lying on my back in a pasture on a farm, right underneath a donkey who had chosen that moment to empty its bladder (or whatever bladder-like organ it is that the hybrid freaks possess). Ah, but that’s fate for you, O Best Beloved - so whimsical, and yet, in other respects, such a shrewish whore. I thought it had been reasonable to assume that the days of donkeys urinating on my face had ended after that glorious summer at camp in ‘84, but I should have remembered the old witticism: never assume, because it makes a stupid fucking dick out of you and me.

I arose and took in my surroundings: basically a whole lot of jack shit punctuated here and there by a rickety old house or a cow or a particularly unpoetic blade of grass. On the dirt driveway leading to the manservants' quarters I spotted Keith in a Laura Ingalls Wilder bonnet and leopard-skin leotard. She was waving frantically to me, which I immediately recognized as the universal signal to amble up to her as leisurely as possible. When I got within earshot, she screeched:

"Goliath, come a-quick, for I hath been tainted and befouled!"

"My poor, dear pork rind! Rest assured I shall move heaven and earth to ease your undeserved suffering!" I emoted. Well, what I really said was, "What the fuck are you babbling about?" But I'm sure she was able to read the tender concern that was lurking between the lines.

She thrust her hands at me, thumbs upraised, and bawled, "What are these?"

"Those are your thumbs, you dumb bitch," I mewed. I made sure to modulate the tone of my voice on the last word so that it would be obvious I used the term as a gender-neutral insult, lest she accuse me of misogyny when we appeared on Montel next week.

"They're monstrous, simply monstrous!", she wailed; then, abruptly, her retarded tears ceased flowing, and she gazed at me with a mix of wonderment and horror and bulimia. "Goliath, right beneath thine lower lip, I do spy a hornet's nest a-brewin'!"

I glanced down and noted that, indeed, a hornet's nest had burst through my skin; hornets buzzed about my face, the wind from their incessant flapping wings tickling my sensitive nose hairs in a not unpleasant manner.

"Don't worry", I admonished, "I'll just go out to the barn. I've got a collection of spare chins in there."

I turned to walk away, the hornets dancing a sublime ballet in front of me, grouping together to form symbols such as exclamation points and direction arrows - just like in old Warner Bros. Cartoons from the 1700s - when I heard a pitiful squeak arising from the ground behind me. I turned sharply like a fat man in need of a toilet and saw there in the dirt a baked potato (no chives) wearing Keith’s bonnet and leotard. One of its pores gaped open and it spoke to me in a high-pitched nasal whine not unlike Michael Stipe's during the excruciating verses of "Everybody Hurts".

"Goliath, I beseech thee, don't go into the barn! Look what it's doing to me! My hips have swollen; and furthermore, I done been transmogrified into a tater!"

I could only pucker my body’s numerous sphincters in disgust at this development. How could we hope to appear on the distinguished Mr. Williams's talk show with her in such a state? And how would she share the driving duties on our road trips to Bogota? I stared down blankly at her while the hornets erupting from my chin made a giant question mark before flying off en masse towards the barn. Like the lone, forlorn pickle left in the briny jar, I wearily followed them.

"You fool!" I heard from behind me; I twirled around and was confronted with Hat Man once again. This time his hat was in the form of a leprechaun-sized Karl Marx sitting on a toadstool and obsessively licking his fingers. The mini-Marx lifted his head to glare at me, then removed his hands from his mouth and held them up for me to see: no thumbs.

"You won't find what you're looking for in the barn, I'm afraid", Hat Man proclaimed triumphantly.

"And why is that?" I bleated. I caught a whiff of something that reminded me of my childhood, but I couldn't summon the specific memory to which it was attached.

"Because there is no barn", he cackled; I turned to look, and fuck me in the ear with a fish stick if he wasn't right.

"And furthermore", he continued with jovial hostility, "None of this is actually happening."

"And why is that?" I bleated yet again (for I had run out of alternate descriptive forms of speech at this point). It was as if a highly accelerated version of Nietzsche's concept of the Eternal Return was playing itself out in my speech patterns, except for the fact that there were actually no similarities between the two whatsoever.

"Because you don't exist, and you never have", he beamed.

I had to think about it for a moment, and I was forced to admit it sure did explain a lot.

And Here It Is...Again...And It's Called...

Entertainment Weekly, March 7, 2008

Diablo Cody voiced the opinion of all twenty- and thirtysomethings who squealed when news of a possible New Kids on the Block reunion broke out (Binge Thinking). People can mock all they want, but the five boys from Beantown still have a place in many hearts.
Jennifer Santos
San Francisco

Constipation: It's not just for poor people anymore

Jen,
I don't know exactly what opinion Ms. Cody voiced, but if it spoke for grown-ass adults who squealed at the mention of a washed-up boy band reunion, I imagine it was something along the lines of, "Please forcibly sterilize us, for we are far too lame and hollow to be allowed to propagate our genes". I ask you: WTF happened to the generation who sneered at the Baby Boomers' pathetic attempts to relive their youths by paying ridiculous amounts of cash to attend concerts by irrelevant old bores like The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan 30 years after they should have rightfully been banned from coming within 50 feet of recording equipment? Oh, right - they ended up paying ridiculous amounts of cash to see the Pixies reunion tour. Have you ever heard the expression "Nostalgia is the sign of a dying culture"? Neither have I, but it sure would seem to explain the State of the Nation today. I only pray this isn't merely the tip of the iceberg - I don't think I could stomach a resurgence of "Frankie Say Relax!" t-shirts or Bono constantly spouting off about oppressive conditions in the Third World (oh, wait - that never actually stopped). In fact, I'm going to do my part to save our country by going home and tearing down all my Leif Garrett posters off the walls right now! I'm kidding, of course - I'll never get rid of those posters. He may be troubled, but he's beautiful (his fave color is blue! ♥ Sigh ♥).

In any event, people will indeed mock all they want. And trust me, they'll definitely want. Still, it will all be worth it when you've spent your $300 for a ticket and Jordan looks right at you when he sings "I'll Be Loving You (Forever)". So, you've got that to look forward to. Followed by years of increasingly painful decay and eventual death. So it all evens out.

They shifted the statues for harboring ghosts,
John


People, April 14, 2008

Patrick Swayze has love, support and prayers on his side.
Sandy Sailer
Crown Point, Ind.

On further reflection, perhaps I should have eaten that last taco.

Sandy,
Those are indeed great things to have on your side. It's just too bad that pancreatic cancer has a damn-near 100% mortality rate on its side. But hey, if Oprah and The Secret have taught us one thing, it's that by merely visualizing himself without cancer, Mr. Swayze can easily rid himself of the disease. And if he can't, why, that just means he wants to have pancreatic cancer, right? Because if he didn't want to suffer, surely a benevolent God would reward his Positive Mental Attitude and devotion by granting him a full remission, no? I mean, otherwise, praying wouldn't be worth a clump of damp shit, would it? Still, if it's all the same to you, I'll wait to see how this one plays out before running off to join the Christian Scientists. I'm kind of a Negative Nelly that way.

I might've fucked your missus but I never fucked your daughter,
John

I had the pleasure of meeting Patrick when my daughter performed in a recital at his mother's dance school. He was backstage telling all the little girls how pretty they looked in their costumes and wishing them luck. He is the quintessential gentleman and clearly a devoted husband. We are all praying for him to beat this disease.
Maureen Reider
Simi Valley, Calif.

Maureen,
See, whenever I go to dance recitals and tell little girls how pretty they look, I'm lucky to escape without a beating or a trip to the local jail. Fucking celebrities - the world is their oyster! Their supple, pre-teen oyster.

Anyway, I'm not quite sure, but are you implying that if he wasn't the quintessential gentleman and a devoted husband you wouldn't be praying for him to beat the disease? What if he committed a single indiscretion - say, while staying at a Holiday Inn in San Antonio while filming Father Hood? Because come on, he was lonely and he'd started out with the best intentions, just chatting by the pool, but there was an undeniable chemistry, and she was so genuinely interested in him, not like all the other starfuckers he'd met on location - it was a moment of weakness, a single crumbling of his resolve; we're all flawed, but you can't hold it against him forever, can you? He doesn't deserve to contract cancer because of it, for God's sake! Christ, Maureen, show a little compassion now and then. It will help to clear up your complexion. Your karmic complexion, I mean. Obviously, persons who have achieved Buddha Nature, such as ourselves, are unconcerned with temporal beauty. Speaking of which, can I get your daughter's cell phone number? You don't need to worry - I'm only concerned with her spiritual development. Thanks so much!

p.s. Sorry - when I wrote "spiritual", I actually meant to type "breast". That mistake always got me in trouble with the nuns at catechism, too. And I don't mean the sexual fantasy kind of nun trouble, either! OK, I do.

You are a vapor trail in a deep blue sky,
John

Ack Ack Ack

Wow, what a sorry sack of shit I've been after promising the resumption of daily updates. Well, it hasn't been a great few days for it - I had some Adventures In Dentistry (after a chunk of my tooth suddenly just fell out while I was walking from work to get some coffee), and this book (2 books, actually) that I'm working on isn't nearly as easy as I thought it would be. So, why bother keeping my promise now? Instead of a real post, I'll provide a link to my old comic strip blog, Chicken Shack, which I started a year or so ago and promptly gave up due to the fact that I was the only one on Earth who found it amusing. So now, because I'm such a giver, I'm sharing it with you! Please to enjoy.

I'll post a real entry tomorrow if it kills me (which it may very well do). Thanks for the comments and e-mails once again - I read them, really, but it's hard to respond when you're basically in agreement with me. It's the ones who write pissed-off diatribes and wish injury upon me that really inspire me - I guess hatred is what sustains me. Speaking of comments, the second comment on this entry made me laugh (follow the link). Who says I can't read people? Yet my Dr. Philesque self-help television program still eludes me. Fuck it all!

Thanks for being patient.

Mooooooo

Hi-de-ho, mes freres,

Sorry for the vacation - I'm working on a book with a friend (who's a bona fide published author, so it's not just some pipe dream like every other creative endeavor I've been involved in) and needed some time to devote to that, but for now I'm back to (hopefully) daily updates. Of course, if we end up getting published, you can kiss my sweet ass goodbye - I'm all for the free exchange of ideas, but I'm even more for the financially compensated exchange of ideas. Say what you will about my leftist ideals, but it's hard to build up a stockpile of Vicodin under Communism.

Shout-outs: After pissing myself laughing at some of the entries in this book, I found that one of my favorite diarists featured in it has her own blog. It actually functions as a pretty good yin to my yang, except it's really more like two versions of the same yin. Whatever. There may be two sides to every story, but one of them is usually full of shit anyway.

On to reader mail! I was all a-twitter when I received another e-mail from one of the People correspondents (from this post). Here it is in its entirety, copied and pasted directly as it came to me, with my bitch-slap response immediately following:

Reguarding a comment to People Magazine about Jacob Hanna

First off, I find it funny how you say we have no life writing a comment into People or any other magazine when you write on this website, and what you say is not even intellectual! Do you want your five minutes of fame, or are you so miserable that you have to pick apart other people? I suggest unless you have anything worth blogging about, something of INTELLECUTUAL interest, then I would save the rest of your brain cells.

Michelle Booe,

Michelle,
Hi! I'm glad you find my blog funny - that's why I write it! Personally, I don't see what's so humorous about me saying you have no life, but that kind of thing's subjective, so I'll file it under "reasonable people can disagree". I'm just happy to have brought you some joy. If any of the People letter writers could use it, it's you.

You're right that what I write "is not even intellectual", and fo' shizzle I'm deeply ashamed of it. Imagine writing a blog about tabloid letters and somehow failing to make it intellectual! Just like everything else I've ever attempted, it should have been a slam-dunk, yet I managed to fuck it up. Damn, I must be D-U-M stupid. Why, if the exploits of Fergie and Celine Dion's degenerate spawn don't lend themselves to discussions of Wittgenstein or Situationist analysis, I'll eat my own farts! Oops - there I go again with my lowest common denominator scatological jokes! Maybe if I cut out all the "fucks" and aimed for wit instead of essentially obvious insults I could be seen as an INTELLECTUAL like Perez Hilton or that site with the photos of the fucking baby animals or all the other really thoughtful blogs out there. I'll tell you what: just for you and your fellow geniuses, here's a joke that's sure to get a chuckle if not an outright guffaw:

So the police pulled over Werner Heisenberg for speeding. One of the officers went up to his car and had him roll down his window and said, "Sir, do you know how fast you were going?"

"Yes," Heisenberg replied, "but I don't know where I am."

Get it? That's gold, Jerry! Gold! Sadly, that's the extent of my non-fart-joke repertoire.

I must also ask, while I've got you here, why you're only allotting me 5 minutes of fame. That's only 33.333% of the fame Andy Warhol guaranteed in his Constitutional amendment. Has our culture accelerated so rapidly that our basic human rights have been abridged to such a degree? And let's face it, if you want to become famous, there's no better path to it than starting a blog. I should be bathing in $55 bills right now, but instead my time in the sun's already passed! If I wasn't so miserable I had to pick apart other people before, I sure am now.

Finally, I do indeed wish I could have something worth blogging about, but as you've now doubt guessed by now, I'm lazy and superficial and must ride the coattails of real writers such as yourself if I'm ever to achieve any kind of sense of self-worth. It's a sorry motherfucking state of affairs, but it beats sitting around drooling into my lap every hour of the day. Unfortunately, at my age it's pretty much impossible to save brain cells, since, as I'm sure a being of your mental stature is aware, those cells are going to die due to apoptosis anyway. Maybe if I'd started this when I was seven things could have been different. Alas, there's no future for me now but to slowly devolve into a shuddering mass of misfiring neurons and massive incontinence. Such is the way of all flesh.

p.s. I realize I'm not an intellectual, but I'm pretty sure there's no "u" in "regarding". Also, when you place a comma after your name, it usually denotes there's something to follow. I do hope you didn't slip out of your chair while trying to finish your e-mail and get a concussion or something.

Entertainment Weekly, March 7, 2008

How do sex talk and man baiting constitute a feminist movement? If that were the case, The Golden Girls paved the way long before the shallow women of Sex and the City trotted through New York.
Jesse Morrison
Memphis

Jesse,
First of all, never bring up The Golden Girls in any discussion of sex. I thought they covered that kind of thing in freshman psychology (or when the good lord handed out common sense). Fact: the elderly are physically repulsive and (mercifully) incapable of any activity more strenuous than opening a bottle of pills with their mottled, arthritic hands or napping in inappropriate locations, so nobody, including them, wants to entertain the notion of anybody over 50 engaging in any form of erotic revelry. To illustrate this (though why this should be necessary is a mystery worthy of Chandler) I'm going to give you an example from my own life: once, when I was a wee lad staying with my grandparents for the weekend, I heard this exchange while passing outside their bedroom door:

Grandma: But don't you like it when I fondle your balls?
Grandpa: You know I do, Hazel. It's just that right now you're fondling my sagging man-bosom.

It all went downhill from there (I stayed outside their room listening for the next hour-and-a-half), in every possible sense. So exercise some judgment and keep Rue McClanahan out of these matters. And all other matters, while you're at it. She was always such a bitch to poor, sweet Rose.

Secondly, if feminists want to talk about sex and bait men, who are you to question them? If it wasn't for such brave feminists, I probably wouldn't have been able to feel up half the chicks I did in my teens. If Sex and The City has taught us one thing, it's that being a modern woman means being able to be just as big a douchebag as any frat-boy, and you can take away that freedom when you pry it from my cold, dead hand. If you know what I mean.

Said there's no returning from this chartered trip away,
John

L. to R.: Vince Neil, Tommy Lee, Nikki Sixx, Some Whore

Lipstick Jungle and Cashmere Mafia stole everything from Sex and the City, except one must-have accessory: great writers.
David Belenky
West Hollywood

David,
I can't tell you how happy I am to see that you live in West Hollywood, because I always find it supremely satisfying when all the requirements for a stereotype are fulfilled. Now then: I'm willing to compromise on your point: The writers for SATC were "great" when compared to the writers for Lipstick Jungle and Cashmere Mafia. But then, I'm a great writer compared to those people - and for that matter, so are you. Kinda puts things in perspective, doesn't it? I guess what I'm saying is: You really watch a lot of shitty television.

I love you from the bottom of my pencil case,
John

Sorry, all!

No updating 'til Wednesday or Thursday this week - I've got a bunch of extra-curricular shit going on. But after that, I'll go back to daily posts. I'll even try to do some extra entries on the weekend to make up for it. See you in a couple days.

My Utter Exhaustion Manifested In Blog Form

People, April 21, 2008

It's about time someone reached out to Britney. Kudos to Mel Gibson and wife Robyn for stepping up and helping this troubled young woman find her way back. This relationship is a healthy starting point for someone who once captured so many hearts. Britney Spears will be back, thanks to people like the Gibsons.
Stacie Mollman
Park Falls, Wis.

Now that she's grown her hair back, she no longer reminds me of
those evil concentration camp prisoners!

Stacie,
Indeed, because if there's one name that instantly springs to mind when most people think "mental stability", it's Mel Gibson. And though "Mel and Britney" was the least successful Ben & Jerry's flavor ever test-marketed (plain vanilla with cubes of frozen tequila and chunks of caramel-covered shame), I'm sure Gibson's Close Personal Friend Jesus Christ will see to it that Mel and Britney the motivational speakers will get their message across to a suitably impressive mass audience once this inspirational story plays out to its inevitable happy conclusion. Because nothing sells tabloids like respectable sobriety. Now if only we could get Danny Bonaduce to become Amy Winehouse's sponsor, every single major problem on Earth would be solved, and we'd finally be able to usher in that Age of Aquarius those stupid fucking hippies were always warbling about.

There's a cat in my alleyway dreaming of birds that are blue,
John

I feel an apology's in order: I've been phoning it in all week, and this entry is the weakest yet. I'm hoping that if I get some sleep tonight, perhaps I'll stop half-assing it. Pray for me. Pray for us all.

Entertainment Weekly, Jan. 11, 2008

Will Smith is rightfully on the "50 Smartest People in Hollywood" list (#968) because he's been able to top his musical success with an incredible acting career.
John Perez
Simi Valley, Calif.

"Anybody know if batshit crazy is contagious?"

J.P.,
Yep, Will Smith is definitely a genius - why, he was able to top the brilliance of "Parents Just Don't Understand" with his subtly nuanced portrayal (of himself) on the Chekovian dissection of modern family dynamics that was The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. And then to follow that up with his more recent "mature" material, such as "Gettin' Jiggy Wit' It" and Bad Boys II - few artists have the intelligence and depth necessary to pull off such a feat. The Fat Boys almost managed it, but they were never able to find a project that came near the stark beauty of Disorderlies. And let us not even speak of Kid 'n' Play, surely the most Kafkaesque of rappers-turned-actors, doomed to obscurity, their singular vision hopefully acknowledged by some future generation. I wish I could see the rest of the list - I imagine it must include such MENSA candidates as Paris Hilton, for managing to stumble, Forrest Gump-like, into opportunity after opportunity without actually ever doing anything, and R. Kelly, for steadfastly refusing to believe he's the punchline to his own joke - a joke he doesn't even realize he's telling. Maybe even Steve Irwin, for being smart enough to shuffle off this mortal coil before having to witness the utterly embarrassing freakshow that has become his daughter's "career". Damn! If only I could bring myself to read beyond the letters page, I wouldn't have to stay awake nights torturing myself with such hypotheticals. Now if you'll kindly excuse me, I should probably go masturbate before I throw the whole universe out of whack (get it? Me make pun! Ah, fuck it.).

Dirt behind the daydream,
John

Very Short Entry Today - I'm Going Home Early (Why? None of your fuckin' beeswax)

Entertainment Weekly, Jan. 11, 2008

You were on the mark when you said Linda Evangelista would be an America's Next Top Model judge worth waking up for (News & Notes, #968)! She's $10,000 of amazing!
Anjela Price
San Diego

"Patent the process for isolating radium? That would be antithetical to the true spirit of science!"

Anj,
OMG LOL! She so totally is $10,000 of amazing! Maybe even, like, $11,000! Giiiiirl, every time I tune into that show now, I think, "Damn, EW was hella on the mark when they wrote that!", cuz I'm all like, "This is a judge worth waking up for, for real!", then I let out a little squeal, you know how I do, cuz damn, y'all, I just get so excited when I read something in literature and shit that so awesomely encapturates my own most innermost thoughts and feelings about the world but that I couldn't really enunciate on my own! It's like, yeah, we really are all connected, cuz we're all thinking and feeling the same things deep down even if we can't always put it into proper speech and whatnot cuz we didn't all have the beneficiary of going to journalistic school to be able to put things in such a succinct manner and henceforth. But whatevs - look at me, getting all emo and stuff over a TV show! No, but really though, nowadays when I watch America's Next Top Model, that quote's always in my head, and it adds a whole new dimension to my enjoyability of the show, so when it comes time for the final judge-a-thon thingy (why do they always cut to a commercial right when they're about to announce who's going home? It drives me so crazy!), and Linda Evangelista comes on, I always catch a big happy smile sneaking across my face, and I nod and say to myself, "That's right, EW, you called it once again, cuz this chick is da bomb-diggity of all time!". Then my boyfriend usually comes home and beats me.

I'm haunted by the freakish size of Nancy Reagan's head,
John

This Is My Happening And It Freaks Me Out!

Entertainment Weekly, March 28, 2008

I appreciated the wonderful feature on Rent ("One Show Glory"). I've seen it more than 100 times over 10 years. You can call me a fanatic, but I feel inspired by its message, and "Rentheads" like me are counting down to the first revival.
Sandra Budiansky
Hudson, Mass.

Rent: The next best thing to actually living in poverty and dying of AIDS

Oh Sandy ba-ay-by,
More than 100 times? I'm not going to call you a fanatic - that wouldn't even make my top 10 list of descriptors for people who'd seen a hundred different shitty musicals, much less the same one 100 times - but I am going to ask you if I can borrow some money. Obviously, you must be hemorrhaging discretionary income out your ass if you can not only afford to see a Broadway production once a month but also make the roughly380-mile round-trip drive to New York for every show. Shit, I can barely afford to go to the fridge for a soda once I've sat down on the couch, and that's just across the room! I don't know about you, but where I live a gallon of gas is roughly the same price as a gallon of dodo blood (and only slightly less than a gallon of bottled water). So how about a couple thousand for a new friend? Please? I'll paint your toenails. C'mon - I'm a little cash-poor at the moment.

Oh, and I love the term "Rentheads" - how did you come up with it? Maybe you should try writing a musical - you've proven you've got just as much originality and creativity as anybody else working in the business. It's always refreshing to see individuals striving to separate themselves from the herd by coming up with ingenious monikers like "Rentheads" or "Deadheads" or "Dittoheads" or "The Manson Family". Nobody will ever mistake you for one of the faceless masses again! Brava, Sandra! Brava.

In Cyberland we only drink Diet Coke,
John

This was a fitting tribute to Jonathan Larson, whose work continues to remind us that "the opposite of war...[is] creation."
Tina Kazan
Lombard, Ill.

My dearest,
Actually, Tina, I'm pretty sure the opposite of war is "peace". If you've got a dictionary of synonyms and antonyms - i.e., a brain with a language-processing region - handy, you'll see it agrees with my take on the subject. The opposite of destruction is creation, but surely we can both agree that war involves much more than mere destruction, such as rape, and profiteering, and putting bumper stickers on cars, and flushing the economy down the fucking crapper. Take it from me, Tina - never take notes on word meanings from guys who write "rock operas"; they tend to have little familiarity with the mechanics of everyday reality. But they do make dandy paperweights! From each according to his ability, etc. etc.

Birthday party, cheesecake, jellybean, boom!,
John

People, Feb. 4, 2008

Why was so much space given to Hillary Clinton's campaign? I personally had all I could stomach of the Clintons when Bill was in office. I'm a businesswoman and wouldn't vote for Hillary ever.
Joleen Wallace
Hickry, N.C.

"And now, Senator Obama, I have a question for you:
Did you ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight?"

Joleen,
Yeah, I can't imagine what would be noteworthy about Hillary Clinton's campaign. I guess nobody in Malibu had a nipple piercing for them to report on that week. So they were stuck writing a piece on the first viable female candidate for President of the United States, who also happened to be the First Lady the last time this country had any semblance of prosperity (or dignity) (or Constitutional rights). Of course, I'm sure the fact that she's got a multi-million dollar PR machine behind her had nothing to do with it, either - everybody knows People decides who it's going to feature in its hallowed pages based strictly on their merit as human beings. That's why they've had so many Gandhi covers!

Oh, but I see you further clarify that you had all of the Clintons you could stomach from '92-2000. That's what I get for not reading the whole letter before responding. Well, jeez, Joleen, maybe if you'd alerted the media sooner that you, personally, were sick of Hillary they could have saved the countless man-hours they spent covering her and focused on something more important to you, personally, such as Giuliani's presidential run. Were you aware that Rudy was the mayor of New York City during the attacks on the World Trade Center? Don't feel bad - most people weren't, precisely because so many of the pinko news organizations in this country decided it would be more titillating to go with the chick/black dude angle. Someday, though, Giuliani will get to tell his story - the truth cannot stay hidden in a democracy. Especially one that condones wiretapping without warrants.

I'm thrilled to hear you're a businesswoman (though what in the name of fuck that has to do with voting for Hillary I haven't the foggiest), because I've been looking for an answer to a burning question: Is it all right to haggle over price after the blowjob has already been received, or is that just bad form? Somebody should really write a rule book for such situations. Or maybe even a Broadway musical! Though now that I think about it, I guess The Lion King covered the topic somewhat tangentially, having been scored by Elton John and all.

I wish you luck with a capital "F",
John

Are They Putting Stupid In The Water?

A-hey hey,

Thanks again for all the e-mails and comments. I'll try to answer some more this weekend if I have time (I won't). Anyway, just wanted to do another shout-out to a friend of mine who's started an online store for her stationery/crafts projects - I added her to my links (she's the first one), so check out her stuff. And I know you can afford it if you've got the leisure time to sit around reading this cavalcade of idiocy, so she'd better not report back to me that she didn't make any sales. Come on! 10% of each purchase goes to children's charities (not true). Anyway, it's your life - if you want to keep the soulless chains like Wal-Mart and the dope-dealing, pet-molesting Big Crafts cabal in business, it's your conscience you've got to live with. I merely point the way to a better tomorrow and cry as the world ignores my advice.

Hope everyone has a good weekend. Enough love. Now, as the prophet said, it is time for hate.

Entertainment Weekly, March 21, 2008

Thanks for featuring the Jonas Brothers ("The Three Mouseketeers")! "It's about time" EW recognized them. Their YouTube videos are hilarious.
Meri Piro
South Salem, N.Y.

The Jonas Brothers: No moppets as lovable
as we would ever date-rape you!

Meri,
The sad thing is, those videos aren't supposed to be funny. But then, neither was your letter, I'm sure (though it gave me quite the chuckle to think of anyone over the age of 12 sitting down to compose a letter about these freaks). But then again, who gives a shit? I'm pretty sure that, just by virtue of my being a male over 30 years old, merely typing out the words "Jonas Brothers" on my keyboard gives the FBI sufficient cause to bust in through the windows and search my hard drive for kiddie porn, so why don't we change the subject? As I mentioned in yesterday's post, there are many topics that make for more fascinating discussion than neutered teen singing groups or celebrities with cancer. As I also mentioned yesterday, one of those subjects is peanut butter, which children and adults the world over consider delightful and nourishing. Cereally, Meri, have you ever seen a peanut? They're hard and oval, somewhat similar in consistency to pebbles that have been buffed smooth from sitting in a lake bed for centuries. And yet, nearly 2,000 years ago (the 1800s), somebody came up with the idea to make the damned things spreadable. And guess what? They did! That's fucking genius, if you ask me, and I mean actual genius, not like when people casually toss around the term to refer to shitheads like Jim Morrison or Jerry Garcia. They even made both a creamy variety and a chunky variety! Do you realize what that means? For the chunky, the crazy bastards had to rig it so that not every molecule of the peanut was mashed into paste, but they also had to ensure that the peanut chunks left in the mix wouldn't be so large that you'd choke to death every time you got stoned and dipped a Hershey's bar in the jar for a snack. How do they do that? I have no idea, and neither does anybody else. As far as I know, they have a team of Keebler elves working 'round-the-clock to carve up the peanuts into regulation-sized morsels with their wee pickaxes and miniature jeweler's tools. All I can say for sure is: There's something magical involved. And that magic translates to a taste sensation unlike any other. It's like there's a party in your mouth, except without any of the undignified sexual connotations you probably think of when you hear that phrase. Trust me, Meri - once you try peanut butter, you'll forget all about innocuous boy bands and enter a real garden of earthly delights. Now begone, wench, afore I lose my patience with your tomfoolery and give you a walloping!

p.s. If any peanut butter company execs want to use the preceding in their ad campaigns, you can have it for a cool £5,000 (that's pounds, not dollars - I don't deal in currency that's likely to be worthless in a year or two) in unmarked bills (I don't know why this is desirable, but it's what the kidnappers always ask for in movies, so it must be cool), but if I see even a fragment of it in your literature (and I subscribe to Peanut Butter Industry Press Releases Weekly), I'll sue your asses back to the Bronze Age. And that was not a good age for peanut butter, my friends. I'm totally fucking serious, assholes. Don't test me. You'll be sorry. Oh yes, you will be sorry.
Jesus loves you!

Don't shoot someone tomorrow that you can shoot today,
John

Will Ferrell has played a basketball player, an ice-skater, and a NASCAR driver ("A Man for All Seasons"). What's next: a hedge clipper?
Sam Chambers
Moundsville, W. Va.

If They Mated: Phil Spector and a Chia Pet

Sam,
*sigh*
Yes, next is a hedge clipper. Good one. Or at least it would have been a good one if a hedge clipper had anything in common with professional athletes. Instead, you had to fuck up the punchline by vomiting up some non sequitur that probably seemed like the pinnacle of wit when you first uttered it to your drunken friends as you all huddled around the engine block of your Dodge Ram or whatever it is you do to pass the time there in Moundsville (awesome name, by the way - are your neighboring cities Lumpy Meadows and Faintly-Nugget-Shaped-Protrusions Township? Because they damn well should be). But I have to tell you, you may have wanted to try it out on somebody sober in the cold light of day before sending it in for publication, because I guarantee you're never going to get another date after this travesty. Way to inadvertently ruin your own life, maaaaan. I'm a little sad to even be associated with you tangentially. Man, what were you thinking? Stick to knock-knock jokes if you want to retain any kind of credibility whatsoever. I mean, people will still think you're a stupid fool, but at least they'll know you didn't actually write the things. Dude. Not cool. Not cool. I'm just going to go over here now, before somebody thinks we're together. I'm sorry it's got to be this way. We'll always be bros, but I need to be in my own space for a while. Thanks for understanding. I love you, but I'm not in love with you. You know the drill.

You in your autumn sweater,
John

Short entry today - there's free beer at work!

And now, as promised, the thrilling Raven Symone letter!

People, April 7, 2008

It's great that Raven (Symone) wants to be a role model for thick and fabulous girls. However, as a role model, I was disappointed to see her list tanning beds as one of her favorite things. We don't want a country full of self-confident young women with skin cancer.
Jennifer Bartel
Highland Park, Ill.

"Satan? I give him praise daily!"

Jennifer,
Speak for yourself! A country full of self-confident young women with skin cancer is my personal vision of paradise. I'm frankly sick of all the whiny, depressed young women with skin cancer this nation's saddled with now. It's always "me, me, me" with those chicks. "Don't poke it! It itches!" or "Do you think this will metastasize?" or "Please, tell my father I forgive bleeaaarggh (*thump!*; sound of flatlining EKG)". Seriously, there's more to life than just having cancer. I'm not blathering incessantly about how much I love peanut butter or whatever every time we get together, am I? No, because that would be cretinous, and I was raised to observe the social niceties that allow us, as a society, to get through each day without taking a sniper rifle to the top of a water tower and opening fire on the eminently shootable crowds below. Even though, and I think we can all agree here, peanut butter is fucking delicious, and certainly more worthy of conversation than your rather banal squamous cell carcinoma. Amputate a limb, and then maybe I'll be impressed.

What were we talking about again? Oh, right. If you ask me, the real issue here is why the fuck does Raven Symone think she needs to go to a tanning bed in the first place? You don't see me going down to the Clorox factory and asking them to make me even more pale and pasty, do you? Look, I'm not trying to get into a big racial brouhaha here - in my eyes, every race is filled with about 90% stupid jackasses - but I always thought that one of the few benefits of being an African-American in our society was that you didn't have to do dumb-ass shit like go to tanning salons. Jeez, next thing you know, comfortably middle-class suburban white kids are going to start deluding themselves into thinking they "identify" with gangsta rap. People, can't we just accept each other for who we are? When your name is Morgan Chatsworth III and you're chugging down Main Street blaring Bushwick Bill from the Bose speakers in your ugly yellow Hummer, nobody is going to think you paid for it from your illegal activities when you were rolling with the Crips. That would be as flat-out crazy as a black entertainer starring in a movie with friggin' Donnie Osmond. I pray it never comes to that. Life is hard enough for the white man in this world. Seacrest out!

If it's a temporary lull why'm I bored right out of my skull?,
John

I had a Raven Symone letter I was going to answer along with this one, but I'm tired, y'all. In fact, this entry's probably kind of shitty because of that, but who cares? It's still better than Dan Brown.

People, April 7, 2008

Why do we continue to glorify this woman (Madonna)? She has spent almost her entire career objectifying and demeaning women. She has set a bad example for countless young people who have viewed the world from her skewed perspective. It is not okay to show women in bondage under the guise of entertainment. It is not okay to promote an image of women solely as sexual beings devoid of real human qualities. Now all of a sudden she has children, so she's Madonna of Assisi? Oh, please. She's made her fortune by selling her gender down the river and frankly, that's not okay.
Carol Faubert
Woodstock, Ga.

Graduates of the Tom Cruise kissing course

Carol,
I swear to God, I'm beginning to get the impression that everyone who reads People is some crotchety old bag in their late hundreds who can't abide the idea that all the potential gentlemen callers out there want to fuck women whose withered and unappetizing nipples don't get caught in their stockings when they get dressed (and who then go on to blame the women for this fact). Tell me, who should we be glorifying? You? Martha Raye? Believe it or not, Madonna actually recorded these things called "songs" that were then played in discotheques (akin to your "speakeasies") and on the radio, and a certain segment of the population decided they enjoyed them. She also made several moving pictures (the medium that replaced your beloved stereopticon), which no segment of the population decided they enjoyed. Even so, she's sold millions of albums (which is what they used to reproduce sound on after wax cylinders proved inefficient), many of them to teenage girls, who I'm betting weren't moved to purchase said albums simply because Maddy showed some cleavage on the covers. In fact, I doubt many guys bought her albums for that reason either, because by the '80s you could see cleavage about a zillion times a day, due to the fact that women were no longer required to wear petticoats and girdles and overbust corsets and Regency-style dresses. Instead, they just threw on whatever comfortable, loose-fitting crap they had lying around, such as Esprit sweaters, and saved many young boys the expense of those X-ray specs older generations were forced to buy from the back of comic books. Thank you, Gloria Steinem!

But on to your specific points. Maybe you can explain to me how she spent her career objectifying and demeaning women. Did she put up seed money for the Girls Gone Wild franchise? Spend her free time yelling to female pedestrians that they could stand to lose some weight? And what exactly is the "bad example" she set for "countless young people"? That if you're ambitious and become a wildly successful artist, maybe one day you'll become one of the few woman record executives in a male-dominated field? What a stupid bitch. Can't she see how far back she's setting the Women's Movement with these thoughtless acts? She and Oprah (who, I might point out, talks about sex way more than Madonna) ought to be forced to hand in their genitalia and be declared enemies of their gender.

Also, Carol, somebody must have ripped a page out of my Rolodex, because this is the first I've heard that you were the official arbiter of what's "okay". As far as I knew before you straightened me out, it was perfectly fine to show women in bondage for entertainment purposes. In fact, I was under the impression that certain women were allowed to make up their own minds and decide they enjoyed bondage, but I guess I must have been brainwashed by the libruhl mediuh. I'd also like to say that if we didn't look at each other solely as sexual beings every once in a while, none of us would be here. Come on, Carol, haven't you ever let the analytical/self-censoring part of your brain take a break and thought "Man, right now I just totally want to fuck"? I mean, you don't want to get a reputation as a dead lay, do you? So why don't you cut Madonna some slack? She's only trying to ensure the perpetuation of the species. And sadly, dirty, filthy sex is the only method we have of doing so at this point in time. I know, it troubles my soul, too. But who am I to argue with biological destiny? Dirty, filthy sex it must be!

One last thing: What the hell did you mean with your "Madonna of Assisi" line? I assume that was a reference to Saint Francis of Assisi, but if you were looking for saintly allusions to refer to Madonna, why didn't you simply say "the original Madonna"? It took me about 2 friggin' seconds to make the connection, and I'm not nearly the know-it-all you seem to be. It would have fit the situation perfectly, and you could have avoided looking like a dumb-ass (there was no Madonna of Assisi, fool! Hellooo.). Oh, well. I certainly won't be the one to point out your lapse in judgment. I'm all about spreading the love. If you know what I mean (and I'm pretty sure you don't).

She's not a girl who misses much,
John

Sweet Merciful Crap

Entertainment Weekly, Feb. 15, 2008

To me, reading is one of life's great pleasures. While the Kindle may be functional, it doesn't have the artfulness of books or the accessibility of the library.
Marsha Lakes
Bend, Ore.

Marsha, Marsha, Marsha!,
Do you live in the library? Because unless you do, I fail to see how it's more accessible than a Kindle, which is portable and wireless, for Christ's sake. Don't get me wrong - the public library system is one of the few examples of the egalitarian principles this country was founded upon to be put into practice, and you won't hear me badmouthing it. But the only people who consider the library "accessible" in this newfangled age of the internet are the homeless (who spend their time in the library mainly to, ironically, surf the internet). For the rest of us, it's become a place we're reluctantly willing to walk to because we're too cheap to pay retail and/or too jittery to shoplift from Barnes & Noble (Those cashiers' eyes are on you like a hawk!).

Another difference between the library and a Kindle, in case you're compiling a list, is that while they both provide you with a large number of publications, the Kindle's stock is far less likely to include terminally boring crap like An Illustrated History of Chimney Sweeps or How To Repair VCRs for Fun and Profit! or the fiction of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Plus, you can't pull a public library out of your purse and whack some guy across the face with it when he's feeling on your booty down at the club. On the other hand, you can't tell your parents you're going down to the Kindle to study when you need an excuse to go dry-hump your boyfriend while his parents are out of town, either. So let's just concede that, when it comes to inappropriate groping, they both have their selling points.

You lost me with the "artfulness" of books, though. They're just words printed on some form of paper, which has pretty much been the way the written word has been disseminated since we stopped painting shit on cave walls. If you ask me, it's high time those eggheads in Silicon Valley came up with some technology to make reading cool. Like if they could find a way to transmit the data directly into your brain via some kind of psychedelic laser beam or something, preferably zapped into your head from a big gun strapped to the back of a flying dolphin. That shit would be fuckin' rad, yo! Motherfucking flying dolphins. Also, the dolphins would be ATMs. And they would occasionally fight ninja zombies. Man, why can't science ever do something to make life more enjoyable? This world sucks.

I'll say it like it's unrehearsed but I said it in the bathroom first,
John

People, Feb. 22, 2008

In 1999, my husband and I went to Sydney and, while there, took in the Heath Ledger movie Two Hands. It was a quirky, fast, and furious film that left us completely amused - and instantly smitten with Ledger. I was in NYC when the news broke of his death. I was stunned like everyone else and felt a deep connection to Ledger that stemmed from my memory of watching Two Hands.
Jennifer Barnes
Long Beach, Calif.

I wasn't just a Heath Ledger fan. As an aspiring actor, I was invested in his career. When I saw 10 Things I Hate About You, I said, "He's one to watch." And I did. I reveled in his Brokeback Mountain performance. I bragged about "my boy" stepping into the Joker's iconic shoes. It's strange to feel so tied to someone you've never met - my thoughts are with those who truly knew him.
Jeremy Gardner
Norwalk, Conn.

By cracky, that corn dog be looking damn tasty!

Jeremy,
You're right, it is strange to feel so tied to someone you've never met. Maybe you should pass that little nugget of wisdom along to your fellow People reader Jennifer. The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem. Unfortunately, there are about 200 much more difficult steps after that, which is why most people remain fucked up. I'm not saying I don't have faith that the two of you won't be able to overcome your disturbing Heath Ledger obsession. I'm not saying I do have faith in it, either. But mostly, I'm not saying I do.

I don't really understand why you were invested in his career just because you're an "aspiring" actor. I mean, I'm an aspiring millionaire, but you don't see me stalking Donald Trump. Well, you do, but mainly because I'm hypnotized by his enchanting scent. Anyway, what does your playing a tree in some Connecticut dinner theater production of The Wind in the Willows have to do with being "invested" in Heath's career? Are you equally invested in Ruth Buzzi's career, or David Hasselhoff's career? Of course not - nobody is, including their agents. Anybody who's reading this with half the brain God gave a dingo knows you're not enamored of the craft, but of the celebrity. And now that the guy's pulled a James Dean, all you drama queens are coming out of the woodwork to try to insinuate yourselves into the tragedy. And quite idiotically, too, I might add. Let us dissect:

Do you expect us to believe you said "He's one to watch" after viewing him in a teen comedy? I didn't think anybody but People staff writers spoke like that in real life, but maybe things are different in Norwalk. And by "different", I mean "unspeakably retarded". Did you really "revel" in his Brokeback performance? Tell me, what was it like? Did you feel drunk on the nectar of life? Did you toast the projectionist? Did you wait until everybody left the theater and then stand up and do the slow clap non-ironically? And who on Earth did you brag to when he got the part in the new Batman film? Strangers in line at Wendy's? Because I'm finding it difficult to imagine you having any friends if you're going around calling a world-famous movie star "your boy" as if you grew up together and he finally broke out of the stultifying environment you'd both always dreamed of escaping. Anyway, shouldn't he have been the one with bragging rights? Like, say, "Hey, I just landed the role of the Joker - and I'm stoked as hell not to be that crazy bastard Jeremy Gardner!"? So many questions.

As for you, Jennifer: You know what? Fuck it. I'm getting off work. Why don't you read over your own letter, then you can write me an essay about why it's so lame. Believe me, it shouldn't be hard at all.

I just found out the name of your best friend,
John