ZAVRACKY

Distilled Water FAQ

2012-01-20T12:12:00.000-08:00

By Dr. Jake Zavracky.

Lately, a lot of questions have been coming up about distilled water and its uses, due to the discovery of pollutants in tap water that have been reported to cause diarrhea and cancer of the spleen. Here is a helpful FAQ to help answer your questions and concerns.

What is distilled water?

Distilled water is water that has been distilled using a distillation process to distill it.

Should I drink distilled water?

You should only drink distilled water. According to unconfirmed, possibly untrue reports, all other water is unsafe and may cause swine flu, and possibly immediate death. The EPA is working on it, but the house has voted against any action, and also, to end the EPA.

How is distilled water different than regular water?

Distilled water is just regular water with all of the cancer and diarrhea filtered out.

Should I bathe in distilled water?

People have been bathing in distilled water for centuries with no problems. George Washington used to bathe in it, and he got the idea from Ben Franklin. Thomas Jefferson bathed in it when he wrote the constitution, and Einstein discovered electricity just after a distilled water bath. John Adams refused to try it because he thought it was silly.

Should I used distilled water to boil my spaghetti?

You shouldn’t eat pasta at all. It has a lot of carbohydrates which turn to sugar and you’re already fat. Lose some weight.

I heard that distilled water can cause kidney failure. Is this true?

There is no known link between kidney failure and drinking distilled water. The only known side effects of drinking distilled water are 8 hour boners, acting silly, and lung cancer.

Should I give my cat distilled water?

You should only give your cat milk. Contrary to popular belief, cats don’t like water, and don’t need it. I only give Senor Meow Meow cow’s milk. My friends claim this is the reason he weighs 57 pounds and is basically immobile, but I am scientist.

Hopefully you will find this FAQ. But if you have further questions please post them in the comments section and I’ll try to get to them when I can. However, commenting has been disabled. That is your conundrum to face. I am very busy blazing trails.

Bottle up!

The Madness of Men At Work's Colin Hay

2011-11-02T13:32:00.000-07:00

Perhaps no other band in pop history has ever experienced a fall from stardom like Men At Work. The biggest band in the world in 1981 was nearly forgotten by 1985. Lead singer Colin Hay almost immediately began losing his mind during their meteoric rise; he had fully lost it by their fall. His condition received very little public notice. Today, Hay has fully transformed into a certifiably insane person.

Colin James Hay, born June 29, 1953, who is actually Scottish, began working as a piano player in the early 1970’s in Australian hotels and bars, earning tips and playing show tunes, occasionally interjecting one of his own marijuana fueled compositions, which was usually the thing that got him fired. On breaks he would go to the bathroom or out in the alley behind the kitchen to smoke pot, or to take the occasional line of cocaine, which may have ignited his willingness to experiment with a wider array of drugs a few years later.

In the late 1970’s, Hay began playing guitar and writing songs and performing with a partner, guitarist Ron Strykert, who introduced him to a much broader scope of drugs, including psychedelics.

The duo would eventually find more musicians and form Men At Work shortly before 1980.

They were signed just a short while later in 1981 by Columbia Records.

The band was an instant hit in Australia and New Zealand and, after a considerable amount of persuasion from their management, Columbia released their album “Business as Usual” in the US. It shot to the top of the charts selling 6 million copies and spawning 3 hit singles.

Critical and public reception to the the album was generally favorable. Men At Work were, however, not without their detractors:

The Police’s lead singer Sting was reported to have been infuriated upon hearing “Business as Usual”, calling the band “charlatans” and saying of Hay “I heard me singing on the radio today only it wasn’t me, it was Colin Hay of Men At Work”.

Hay denied stealing Sting’s style, claiming in an interview with Creem magazine that he had “never even heard the Police until yesterday”. He went on to say “...and I didn’t really even like it, certainly not enough to copy it... I think Sting sings like a mong version of Harry Belafonte, so I made that whole album without any influence from them...... so you can see how it wasn’t possible for me to rip them off, unless I could travel back in time, which I can.”

This was not the first nor would it be the last time Hay would reference his ability to travel through time. His claims of being able to blink himself into a different year grew more frequent over the next several years; this may have been provoked by his growing addiction to psychedelics, particularly LSD, which he experimented with more and more heavily as Men At Work ascended to stardom. Even then the drugs began to take their toll on Hay’s mental health. As early as their first album, “Business As Usual”, Hay’s fractured mind came to the fore lyrically:

On the first single from Business As Usual “Who Can It Be Now?”, Hay describes his world as a paranoid drug addict, afraid to answer the door: “Stay away, don't you invade my home.”, which perfectly crystallizes his desire for isolation, brought on by an addiction to an ever-expanding abuse of hard drugs.

In the songs bridge, Hay sings of a suspicion that he’s being followed, a common delusion of cocaine addicts: “Is it the man come to take me away?/ Why do they follow me?”.

On the second single “Down Under”, Hay sings “Traveling in a fried-out Kombi/ On a hippie trail, head full of zombie” which rather blatantly references the experience of an acid trip in the desert. It is also a well established fact that no sober person has ever purchased a Kombi.

He goes on to describe further encounters all over the world while under the influence of psychedelics and, in the third verse, even opiates: “Lying in a den in Bombay/with a slack jaw and not much to say”....

“Be Good Johnny”, the album's third single, contains a bridge which further contains a short skit in which Hay seems to interview himself as two different personalities; one of a Australian blue collar type, and the other of Johnny, the subject of the song, a young boy. It is unclear what the actual message of the song is supposed to be unless it is only a general statement about youth: “I only like dreaming all the day long/ while others are screaming ‘Be good, Johnny!’ ”, but it is certainly groundbreaking in that it represents what must be the first time a lead singer has interviewed two of his split personalities in the middle of a song.

The video for the song contains another allusion to Hay’s personalities: He stands alone singing the chorus, until suddenly from behind him the rest of the band appears like branches growing quickly on a tree to sing the word “Johnny”, each member representing one of Hay’s multiple personalities.

The band followed “Business As Usual” with a much weaker effort, “Cargo”, in 1983, although the latter contained “Overkill”, arguably the band’s best song, if not one of the best pop songs of the 1980’s. The song continued themes of Hay’s paranoia and increasing isolation: “Night after night my heartbeat shows the fear”; the “fear” being yet another reference to paranoia from drug abuse. The chorus concludes with the line “Ghosts appear and fade away”, another allusion to hallucinations.

In that this type of lifestyle cannot usually be successfully sustained while being famous and having to make appearances and perform at scheduled times, Men At Work began to crumble.

In 1985 they released “Two Hearts”, which was a far weaker effort than even “Cargo”. The album is currently unavailable in any format. Strykert left the band in the middle of it’s creation. After having been one of the biggest bands in the world only a few years later, Men At Work broke up completely during the tour for “Two Hearts”.

Hay spiralled even further downward. His drug problem was exacerbated by a sudden lack of attention, and, ironically, he now longed for the spotlight from which he had spent the past five years running.

“In the early 80's, for what must have been three straight years, I literally could not do or say anything wrong." Hay would later tell Smash Hits Magazine. "Every joke I made was laughed at. Everything I said was listened to and nodded at. Suddenly, at some seemingly arbitrary point, it was all yanked away from me, and then I was treated as if I was somebody’s racist uncle at Christmas dinner. People turned away from me. Shortly after that, nobody knew who I was anymore. I was so high all the time, and I rarely left the house. That’s when I found Hammer.”

The trajectory of Hay’s life changed dramatically in 1990, when he obtained a promotional copy of “Please Hammer Don’t Hurt ‘Em” by the not yet hugely famous MC Hammer. Hay was so taken with the album that it influenced him in all aspects of his life. He found himself unable to make any new music, fearing that it would only pale in comparison to “Please Hammer....”. Hay told the Australian press of the impact the album had on him: “Please Hammer Don’t Hurt ‘Em was a collection of songs ... that somehow went together like no album ever made before, and I was very daunted, even frightened.”.

Hammer did influence Hay in one positive manner; Hay stopped using drugs. But at that point his mind was already so splintered by years of abuse that the damage had been done.

Hay’s obsession with Hammer became more profound in the early 90’s, judging by several interviews with various music press. In an interview he did with Melody Maker, the British rock magazine, Hay said the following:

“Sometimes I wonder if I should try to improve myself as a person. But then I ask myself “would Hammer do that?”. Of course not. Hammer is already complete; to try to change yourself is futile. Hammer knows that. People go to therapy to try to exorcise these things from themselves. Now ask yourself - “would Hammer go to therapy”? Certainly not. The man recognizes the futility in trying to change oneself.... he accepts what he is, and so do I.”

Around this time Hay probably alienated just about everyone around him by constantly donning purple Hammer pants. He also attempted, mostly unsuccessfully, to employ Hammer’s quick footed dancing style at his acoustic shows. He would go offstage after his set, wait for the encore, return to the stage and play “Overkill” and then begin doing the Hammer dance in his purple Hammer pants; often for as long as 20 minutes. Anyone left in the audience at the end of his dance performance would be treated to “Down Under” which was followed by more dancing.

In 1994, Hay was sent reeling by the release of the leadoff single “Pumps and a Bump”, from the album “The Funky Headhunter”, which was a radical departure from Hammer’s earlier music in that it sounded nothing like his earlier work and exactly like the gangsta-rap that was currently dominating hip-hop.

Hay found it jarring.

The video for "Pumps and a Bump" featured the Hammer-pants-less Hammer by his garish swimming pool at his Fremont CA mansion, surrounded by women with very pronounced buttocks. Hammer wore a zebra striped Speedo, which left very little to the imagination and displayed his penile girth quite plainly. Hammer’s now legendary penis video repelled Hay.

Hay’s idol’s obvious crisis of faith left him with his own. “I didn’t even know [Hammer] anymore. And I realized that I didn’t know myself. I had defined myself first by what sycophants were telling me I was, and then what I saw of myself in Hammer, and all the sycophants were gone, and Hammer was in a Speedo flashing his penis around, and I had alienated all my friends and family by wearing Hammer pants all the time......Where was I to turn?“

Hay grew inward, despondent. He became a hermit and moved to a country house in Scotland, where he still lives.

He has a hobby of making small statues of the classic Hammer. He wears one around his neck, the others he sells on ebay. Hay has accrued such a fortune from Men At Work hits that he doesn’t need to do anything else.

The Hammer statues are always donning purple Hammer pants.

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*This article is almost completely satirical. Very few of the statements presented here are actual facts. They are things the writer made up. Fact checking is futile. Please don’t waste your time.

Hugh Anthony Cregg III and His Respectful Request of His Lover

2011-10-14T10:28:00.000-07:00

A magnificent day, just like the day before it and the day before that; the magnificence of these days is only oppressive. These days only serve as a reminder: I am not where I want to be, I am not who I want to be. How can I enjoy such a magnificent day as this when I am so incomplete?

Look at all the perfect people lying on towels with their suntans and their hideous sunglasses. Believing their illusions. Believing in their happiness. And because they believe it, it is so.

Just like Suzanne. All her life, people have only said yes to Suzanne. She is completely oblivious to that fact, of course. She has no comprehension of how an ugly person walks through this world. She is simply unable to fathom why her less attractive friends make such a big deal about what seem like infinitesimal trifles; she tells them that “everything will be OK” and skips off into the night.

Due to her beauty, she never has to make any real effort in a relationship, in our relationship, since there are so many male suitors waiting in the wings. She does as little as she needs to do to avoid unpleasantness, so she can float through the shallow waters of her existence without getting wet. Once unpleasantness rears its ugly head, she allows the threat of leaving me to loom without ever verbalizing it, which allows her to look like the victim when I raise my voice.

Suzanne is incapable of understanding things are harder for someone like me, someone who thinks; who can recognize the unfairness of things, and who is unable to view every asshole they come across as “so nice”; I am not a recipient of such constant obsequiousness as she. She will never understand desperation until her looks start to go.

Granted, she and those of her ilk are just ignorant slaves, doomed to a life of banality, repeating back things the thought leaders say in the office every day. Perhaps I should pity them. But the awareness I have of everything is a far greater blight than ignorance.

It is a crushing responsibility. A curse.

I am wearing jeans on the beach, goddamn-it. I’m not going to wear a bathing suit and slather myself with suntan lotion. That is not the way I feel inside. That is something Suzanne would do. In fact she is probably doing it right now. Bitch! You would like it if I was like these other drones, bouncing balls of various sizes, wouldn’t you Suzanne? You care not for my mind.

You have been exposed as a fraud. You’ve been thinking, and I’ve been drinking.

I know you don’t love me anymore. Why won’t you say it?”

Huey Lewis (Hugh Anthony Cregg III) was born in New York City in 1950, although there are those that would argue that he comes from the future. In his formative years he scored 800 on the math portion of the SAT, which is the highest possible score. He went on to travel the U.S. and Europe extensively, hitchhiking, playing his harmonica, sometimes sleeping in the bushes, sometimes juggling torches for money. It is possible the last part of that sentence is inaccurate. These years of his life are somewhat of a mystery. Certain sources have him living underground in the New York City subway system in 1975. He may also have briefly married a Vietnamese transgender prostitute named Pauline.

He is considered by many to be a man of formidable penile girth.

Perhaps owing to that fact, perhaps not, in 1978 he resurfaced briefly to play harmonica on Thin Lizzy’s “Live and Dangerous”.

Thin Lizzy’s dynamic front man Phil Lynott no doubt had a profound influence on Huey Lewis’ vocal delivery as Lewis sings with a similar husky, easily understood, blue collar style.

What exactly occurred between 1978 when “Live and Dangerous” was released and 1980 is difficult to ascertain; there are so many varying accounts of Lewis’ life, most of which contradict each other. It would have been impossible for him to work in a restaurant on Bourbon Street in New Orleans and simultaneously cross the Atlantic Ocean on a specially made boat which allowed him to use only his enormous member as a paddle in June of 1979, for example. There are those, however, that believe Lewis is able to split himself in two, which would have allowed him to do those two things at one time. Some allege that he even engaged in time travel during this period, while others argue that is far fetched.

Whatever the case may be, sometime shortly after that, Huey Lewis and the News was born.

Their eponymous debut was released in 1980 to little fanfare.

In 1982 the band broke through with a top ten hit “Do You Believe In Love” on their album “Picture This”, which eventually went gold.

Mega-stardom awaited.

In 1983 the band released “Sports”, which went on to sell 37 million copies. Every song on the album was a number one hit.

Five years of decadence ensued. They were a non-stop debauchery machine.

Each member of the band developed various rather beguiling addictions.

Keyboardist Sean Hopper was known to inject b vitamins directly into his spleen; exactly what pleasurable effect was derived from this activity is difficult to divine.

Drummer Bill Gibson Jr., son of William Gibson, author of the now classic science fiction novel “Neuromancer”, once disappeared in the middle of the tour for “Sports” for several weeks; he was eventually found lying in the middle of Commonwealth Avenue in Boston’s Back Bay cradling a stuffed animal version of Fozzy bear from the Muppets, which he repeatedly referred to as “Fuzz Fuzz”. It was later determined that “fuzz” was the only word Gibson seemed to want to say, so no one was really sure if that was indeed the name of the bear or just a sign of his increasing dementia. He refused to let anyone take the stuffed animal away from him, which had grown filthy after weeks of being God-knows-where with Gibson, so it had to be cropped out of publicity photos and hidden during live appearances. Gibson had to be replaced sporadically during the tour by Yes’ Alan White.

Saxophone player Ron Stallings spent an obscene amount of time perfecting his polished, pop saxophone style; he could not have known then what a waste of time that would end up being.

Lewis himself developed the peculiar habit of standing on the edges of skyscrapers and urinating while hookers ate pie in the background. He was arrested nine separate times for this, but never prosecuted.

Today, the band is perhaps more known for this constant debauchery than it is for the music they produced, which of course explains the ubiquitous catch phrase “partying harder than Huey Lewis”.

III

Finally, we will discuss the video for “If This Is It”, the third single from “Sports”.

Huey Lewis had lived a hard 34 years by the time the video for “If This Is It” came out, a fairly advanced age for a budding rock star, but still slightly younger than the author of this piece, who once viewed Huey Lewis as the oldest person conceivable.

On the surface “If this is it, please let me know” seems like an entirely reasonable request. What kind of cold bitch would keep poor Huey Lewis hanging on when he would be amenable to a breakup? All he wants to do is talk about it. Isn’t that the kind of thing she once asked of him; to be open, sensitive, communicative? Look closer, though, and it is easy to see that Huey Lewis has all the evidence he needs to determine that “this” is indeed “it”.

For example, if it’s true that Huey Lewis has “been phoning night and morning” without getting any of his phone calls returned, and he also heard his lover in the background saying "tell him I'm not home", we can assume he is not very good at taking a hint. He goes on to say that his lover is “confessing” but he’s “still guessing”. One wonders why guessing is necessary when the confession has already been made. She has told him the truth, but he will not hear it.

He goes on to say that his lover has “been thinking” and he has “been drinking”. This makes Lewis a bit difficult to empathize with; his lover has given their issues a lot of careful consideration while Lewis simply endeavors to get obliterated on white wine spritzers at the Rusty Seagull.

After the somewhat pointless montage that introduces the video, we find Huey Lewis walking on the beach, looking tortured. He’s practically goth; he doesn’t don all black and wear ludicrously baggy pants covered in buckles, but he does walk around the beach fully dressed on a 90 degree day wearing a forlorn look, pining for his lost love. We can only assume he has just come from his darkened bedroom where he listened to Bauhaus, read a novel by Anne Rice, poured hot candle wax on his genitals and wept softly. Perhaps eyeliner was involved in some way, although there is no visible evidence of it.

Suddenly Huey spots his lover. He freezes. What are the chances she would have chosen the same beach at the same time? His chest cavity feels as if it has been emptied of its organs and replaced with dry ice. Peter Murphy’s desolate baritone echoes around in his head. He shuts his eyes, remembering......

A tender moment on the beach at night, by a modest bonfire. Hands finally allowed to search, explore. A moment so perfect. She touched my face. A kiss and then another, and then another, each probing deeper than the one before. She held me, I laid in her lap; it seemed like it should have been the other way around but it was too late. The position had been determined, switching would have been awkward. Oh, the lightness. The sublime oppression of love......

But now here is his lover on the beach, getting oiled up by two muscular dudes, and then she is oiling them up, giving Huey an icy look. “Why won’t she let me know if this is it?” he wonders.

Now we follow Huey into a fortune teller’s shop. His face betrays surprise, he doesn’t seem to have been expecting to enter this place. Yet coincidentally his entire band has also happened by and is now seated around a table with the fortune teller, performing a seance. Huey briefly joins hands with them. Everyone looks like they’re really into it except for Huey, who abruptly leaves.

He decides to take out some of his frustrations by throwing baseballs at a giant clown, a carnival game. The goal is to knock the clowns teeth out, which he does on the third try. The elastic faced carnie throws him a stuffed animal. Perfect for his lover.

This moment of hopefulness is quickly erased as he spies her, walking along the boardwalk with two different muscular men in sailor suits. She carries with her two much larger versions of the stuffed animal he has just won. He has been outdone, two-fold, and possibly more-fold if you count the comparative size of their stuffed animals to his.

A pretty blond woman walks behind the group, and casts an empathetic look his way. Perhaps a foreshadowing.

After having seen his lover with four different male suitors over the course of an hour, Huey Lewis still wonders aloud if this is it. He sits on a beach towel, a brief conformity, while his cut-up band-mates sing in front him, buried neck deep in the sand.

Finally Huey Lewis sees his love once again with yet another two male suitors. They are bronzed, muscular, oiled; teeming with latent homosexuality.

Huey makes a decision. He forcefully escorts his lover away from the two men and demands an explanation. Words are exchanged, we cannot hear them. But we can easily read the body language, and eventually she pulls away, leaving Huey Lewis standing there in the rain (metaphorically). He sits down on the sand in his blue jeans, the picture of non-conformity. Time passes, and he continues to stare out at the sea.

There is only one other person left on the beach. It is the blond woman from earlier on the boardwalk; the foreshadowing we saw earlier has materialized! Their eyes meet. And Hugh Anthony Cregg III is in love again.

Important note: Most of the facts in this article are not facts at all, but things I made up.

An Unnecessarily Exhaustive Analysis of the Video for Hall and Oates’ "Out Of Touch".

2011-09-28T16:55:00.000-07:00

To introduce an ongoing discussion of pop videos of the 80’s, today we will focus on Hall and Oates’ “Out of Touch”, their 1984 hit, in an effort to understand what the duo and those responsible for creating the video may have been thinking:

The video begins with Hall and Oates inside a giant bass drum. Ostensibly trapped, they helplessly bounce around inside as it vibrates, struggling to maintain their balances. Above them their drummer plays the giant drum kit the bass drum belongs to with giant drum sticks. For some reason unknown to the viewer, he hits the toms when he should be hitting the snare. No toms play on the track. Do you think that we don’t know the difference between toms and a snare drum, sir? We do.

Meanwhile, back in the bass drum, Hall and Oates look for a solution to their dilemma. “Help us, we’re hopelessly trapped in this bass drum!” their movements suggest, but then they realize the solution is simply to exit the bass drum to safety. The exit was just a few feet away all along, at the front of the bass drum. Why had Hall and Oates decided to enter the bass drum in the first place? It does not appear a very welcoming place to have a conversation. It is impossible to say.

What any of this means is unclear.

How have Hall and Oates managed to enter this world, where either a) they are unnaturally small or b) the world around them is unnaturally large?

In this world, the answers are hard to come by. This world is a slick 80’s version of Lewis Carroll, without the logic problems and political metaphors, and other things that would make it interesting.

The safe haven Hall and Oates had hoped to find when they exited the bass drum is only an illusion. Eventually the bass drum, set in motion by forces unseen, steam rolls over them, leaving them flattened. How the bass drum managed to break free of its armature and lose the toms mounted atop is unexplained. Something fairly catastrophic must have occurred given its size.

Suddenly Hall appears, reanimated. We cannot say what provoked his quick recovery.

Now he is dancing and lip-syncing in front of giant letters which spell out “BIG BAM BOOM”. One of the letters contains the smaller dancing Oates. Oates is commonly viewed as an afterthought in this band, but he would probably have you know that he is in fact a very good and soulful backup singer and an excellent guitarist, and he also sings lead from time to time. Next to Daryl Hall, the man with the golden pipes, almost anyone would look like an afterthought. Still, it’s hard to imagine any creative meeting about a new Hall and Oates video would have occurred without someone saying “Does Oates have to be in this one?”.

It’s impossible to divine what Oates might be thinking. He appears to be enjoying himself, but does he question his own purpose? Does he ask what contribution he makes that couldn’t be made by many others? Or does he just sit back and count his millions? He is unknowable. He sits in his castle with his moustache, and no one bothers trying to cross the moat, filled with giant eels.

If Oates is resentful, he does not show it, as he dutifully dances behind his partner. He seems to favor a crouched over style, while he moves his arms back and forth in front of him, as if working some imaginary old machine. For his part, Hall, who is not known for dance moves (he is usually standing behind an electric piano in a live setting), does an admirable job with his dancing. However, he lacks the cohesive style of his partner.

We continue to explore this mysterious world in which Hall and Oates find themselves.

At the top of a flight of stairs that leads to nowhere hangs a giant screen. On it, a movie of a Daryl Hall and his hairstyle. On the staircase in the foreground, the real Hall sex-lessly writhes. The screen version of Hall suddenly notices smoke coming out of his finger. Unconcerned, he simply blows the smoke away and gives us a wry smile. “That is the sort of thing that happens to me; I have become accustomed to it”, he tells us with his eyes.

After a time we move back to the bass drum, in which Hall now safely plays guitar. Whatever prompted the reconciliation between the duo and the bass drum is never made clear to the viewer.

Soon after, we cut away to see what Oates is doing. He vents his frustrations by jumping up and down atop the giant bass drum pedal, thus pounding the giant beater into the giant bass drum which undoubtedly still contains his partner Daryl Hall (Hall is not shown, so this is impossible to verify).

Perhaps Oates vents his frustration through this aggression because he is unable to express his feelings in a direct verbal appeal to Hall. Or perhaps Oates realizes his talent is inferior to that of Hall, and there is nothing that can be said about it, and so his frustration manifests itself physically. It is never made clear, due to the aforementioned mystery surrounding Oates, whose rage is now palpable as he grips the rod the beater is attached to and pushes it forcefully into the bass drum.

As the video draws to a close, we learn that once again Hall and Oates have once been seduced by the bass drum, only to see it once again cause their demise, this time by suffocating them. The bass drum has grown itself a front head, which nullifies their earlier solution of simply exiting to safely out the front. Perhaps this will not end well. The only way out involves the duo breaking through the head. And, of course, they do just that. They are Hall and Oates, after all. They are unstoppable.

---------------------------------

The comments on the YouTube video for “Out of Touch” demonstrate some noteworthy things.

One comment says “Gotta love the 80’s!”. This sentiment seems a little unfair to Hall and Oates; it would seem to diminish their importance to simply lump them into the same category that houses Oxo and Wang Chung. Yet 11 youtube users give the comment the thumbs up. It is not unreasonable to conclude that all 11 of those people are fat.

The next one says “Get back together, the world needs you”, which is not necessary since Hall and Oates are, in fact, still together. Despite this ignorance, or perhaps because of it, 8 youtube users give the comment the thumbs up.

On both points these youtube users do a disservice to Hall and Oates, and their ignorance is symptomatic of today’s political landscape in the US, where if a sentiment is repeated often enough, it becomes true, regardless of the evidence at hand.

Here again Hall and Oates, although indirectly in this instance, continue to teach us lessons.

A Term Paper on Billy Joel's Greatest Hits Volume I by Steven Stadalnik; Berklee College of Music Songwriting Major

2011-02-04T19:50:00.000-08:00

BILLY JOEL'S GREATEST HITS VOLUME I: A DISSERTATION

Here we will discuss the greatest hits of Billy Joel, in an effort to prove the fraudulent nature of his entire catalog.

Billy Joel has sold millions of records, and has millions of adoring fans around the world. But take a closer look at the celebrated songwriter's works and I believe the house of cards begins to fall.

For example, all of the song lyrics on his Greatest Hits Vol 1 album begin to unravel into an incoherent mess when one examines them more closely. Let's dissect some of the selections..

Piano Man

"It's nine o'clock on a Saturday/the regular crowd shuffles in/there's an old man sitting next to me/making love to his tonic and gin".

One can accept the premise that it's nine o'clock on a Saturday. That's the only part of this stanza that makes any sense. But why, if Billy Joel is playing the piano, is there and old man sitting next to him? Pianos are not normally situated in a way that drunk old men can just have a seat at them when there's a piano player sitting there.

This is followed by the extremely cheap rhyme, "making love to his tonic and gin". Nobody calls a gin and tonic a tonic and gin. You always name the base alcohol first; that is a stone cold fact, sir.

And this old man is "making love" to his drink? Is it being suggested here that this individual is fucking his cocktail? Even if you grant Billy Joel poetic license here, it's a stretch. It's just not something people say. "Hey Stan, quit fucking your daiquiri over there and give me a hand with this charcoal".

"He says 'son can you play me a memory'/I'm not really sure how it goes".

Billy Joel knows how to play someone's memories? Memories that belong to a man that says he's not sure how it goes, meaning he can't remember it? How is a memory a memory if you can't remember it?

"But it's sad and it's sweet and I knew it complete when I wore a younger man's clothes".

Where is this guy from? "I knew it complete"? Who talks like that? Then you realize that this old man weirdo seated on at the piano next to Billy Joel could have been wearing a younger man's clothes yesterday afternoon (he's obviously gay) and it's just another cheap rhyme.

"Sing us a song you're the piano man"

Even this famous line doesn't really make any sense. If one is known for playing the piano to the extent that he has even been dubbed "piano man", why would people ask him to sing? Wouldn't they ask 'play us the piano, you're the piano man'? It's a bit like saying "Flute us a song, you're the cellist". Or "paint us a fence, you're the plumber".

Let's skip ahead a bit past a couple less offensive stanzas, ignoring the fact that there are tenses that don't match and other incongruities, to this gem:

"Now Paul is a real estate novelist"

Paul is a real estate novelist? A novelist that writes about real estate? I imagine fiction about real estate would stand very little chance of ever getting published. That occupation does not exist sir. It's just pure laziness to make up an occupation when there are literally hundreds to choose from that have the right cadence for this line.

(side note: watch the video they made for this song in the 80's. Think about this while you watch it: most of the extras in that video were convinced they were going to be famous. Think about that. How many became famous? Zero. I assume anyway, maybe George Clooney or someone is in there somewhere, it's hard to say.)

Skip ahead again:

"Now the waitress is practicing politics"

The waitress is practicing politics. You see that all the time, waitresses practicing politics. So many times I have to say "hey waitress, quit practicing politics and bring me my lasagna!".

Captain Jack

"Saturday night and you’re still hangin’ around/Tired of livin’ in your one-horse town/Like to find a little hole in the ground/For a while"

If you're tired of living in a one horse town, why would you aspire to instead live in a hole in the ground? Is that preferable? The only answer is the same answer to any question as to why Billy Joel says what he says: it rhymes.

"So you go to the village in your tie-dye jeans"

Now it is revealed that the one horse town is in fact New York City. I think we can safely count those who hold the opinion that New York City is a one horse town at one: Billy Joel.

"And you stare at the junkies and the closet queens/It’s just like some pornographic magazine"

That would be some pretty disappointing porn. I can't imagine they would sell much of that magazine, if it somehow even got by the publisher in the first place. "Hey Stan (everyone is named Stan) have you seen this issue of "Junkie Porn"? I'm thinking we shelve this and not send it to press. Seems like a bad idea".

"Captain jack will get you high tonight/And take you to your special island/Captain jack will get you by tonight/Just a little push and you’ll be smilin’"

This apparently is a reference to heroin. Heroin doesn't really make you smile though, does it? No one ever says "that Dave, always smiling. It must be the heroin".

"Your sister’s gone out. she’s on a date/You just sit at home and masturbate"

Now you're back home masturbating, thinking about your sister on a date. You certainly are unique. Shouldn't you be out looking for a hole in the ground to live in?

"So you stand on the corner in you new English clothes/And you look so polished from your hair down to your toes"

Again here is a quality that is not normally associated with a heroin addict. In this case it is looking "polished". "Dave is such a polished looking fellow, especially for a heroin addict. And always smiling."

Movin' Out (Anthony's Song)

Right off the bat the title of this song is ridiculous. Why is it parenthetically titled "Anthony's Song" when there's like 7 different characters in it? Is it because parenthetically titling songs "_____'s Song" was fashionable for a hot minute in the 70's? Yes.

Sergeant O'Leary is walkin' the beat/At night he becomes a bartender

That's a difficult premise to go with: a policeman, a sergeant no less, moonlighting as a bartender. I won't say it's never happened, but I imagine being a Sergeant in the New York City area keeps you pretty well busy, not to mention well compensated. (they make 6 figures easy)

Yeah and [Sergeant O'Leary is] tradin' in his Chevy for a Cadillacacacacacacacac/You oughta know by now

We oughta know what by now? That Sergeant O'Leary is trading a Chevy for a Cadillac? I think Billy Joel overestimates how many of us are familiar with Sergeant O'Leary and his car ambitions.

And if he can't drive with a broken back/At least he can polish the fenders

That makes very little sense. How has Sergeant O'Leary broken his back in such a way that it prohibits him from driving, but not from polishing the fenders of his Cadillacacacacacacacac? And why would you polish only your fenders? That would be the last area of polishing focus for most people I imagine. I am starting to get angry now.

Scenes From An Italian Restaurant

Again, if you're not violently vomiting from the title of this song alone, you have an iron constitution, sir. The amount of times Billy Joel says "Brenda and Eddie" in this song is in itself infuriating. Billy Joel just wants to write songs with characters in them because he fancies himself as a Bob Dylan, but he doesn't bother to make them interesting enough to care about in any meaningful way. And they always have to have to stupid names like Brenda and Eddie. Really have you ever met anyone named Brenda? BRENDA!?!?!? Where are the Stans? I am going to figure out where Billy Joel lives and stab him in the asshole.

New York State of Mind

This song is Billy Joel saying that he, unlike some folks who vacation in Hollywood or Miami Beach, prefers to vacation in New York City. To make this point he goes on to say that he is "taking a Greyhound on the 'Hudson River Line' " which is a Greyhound line that doesn't exist and never has and doesn't really make any sense anyway since he follows it up by pointing out that he doesn't "care if [his eventual destination] is Chinatown.." - Chinatown is not on the Hudson River; it's on the other side of Manhattan closer to the East River, not to mention the fact that it would be a TERRIBLE vacation spot by nearly any standard. "You know where I want to go on vacation? Somewhere there's no trees that smells like piss and grease, and I'm more likely than not to get mugged." The song is a mess. It's an absolute mess. The fury I am feeling. It's indescribable.

Only The Good Die Young

Starting with yet another stupid, shallow character named Virginia (because she's a virgin, get it?) who is one of those "Catholic girls", we somehow get to this:

Well, They showed you a statue, told you to pray/They built you a temple and locked you away

Temples are not structures normally associated with Catholicism. I don't think Catholics normally lock young girls away either; someone probably would have blown the whistle on that a long time ago. IT'S NONSENSE.

-------------------------

I could go on. But now I am going to go back to working on my own brilliant and criminally under-appreciated masterpieces, and then I might take a Greyhound out to Billy Joel's house on the Hudson River Line and throw my poop at his windows.

- Jake Zavracky 2011

Tricks of the Eye

2010-08-28T09:53:00.000-07:00

I.

Look at these two lines. Doesn't one appear to be longer than the other? Is the one on the bottom actually longer than the one on the top or is it a trick of the eye? No, your eyes aren't deceiving you, they're different lengths.

II.

Stare at this circle for a minute. Actually several minutes. Seeing anything? Perhaps several minutes more. Excuse me while I go to the bathroom. I'm back. Still staring? Be patient, this could take hours. Still not seeing anything? Perhaps something is wrong with you.

III.

Look carefully at this square. Now close your eyes. Now open them again. Now close them again and then open and close them again. Look at the square again. Notice anything different? No? That's because a square is not an optical illusion, no matter how much you open and close your eyes.

IV.

Try this. Study these two arrows. Do you see a third arrow? That arrow is not really there.

V.

Look at this perfectly straight line. Does it appear all wobbly? It isn't! That's just your eyes playing tricks on you.

VI.

Look at this semi-circle. Do you notice anything extraordinary about it? Is it even there at all? It's all about your perception of reality. When I see a tree, I ask myself "Is that tree really there, or has this whole world been created in my mind just for me?". I am constantly questioning. Maybe you should do a little more of that.

Cat Negotiations

2010-05-19T16:54:00.000-07:00

I see you're sitting on the couch tying your shoes. Allow me to get on the coffee table and gently ram my head into your face. And again. Now let me turn around. Look at my butt hole. Magnificent. Very fine I think. Time for another head-ramming. Now back to the butt hole. Now back to the head-ram and repeat. I'm not sure if you've given quite enough attention to my butt hole. Let me give you another opportunity. Observe this head-butt-hole-back-to-head combination. Olympic. Just as you've finished tying your shoes.

-----------------------

Ah, you're trying to pack some items into a cardboard box to ship. I'm sure you are aware that cardboard boxes are just exactly my kind of thing. Shall I jump inside? No? Well, let's give it a try anyway, you will see how unwarranted your misgivings are. Yes this is really hitting the spot. Time for a snooze. Stop manhandling me, you freakish oaf! I was very happy there in that box. Now I have been removed from that happiness and returned to your feline Auschwitz you've been running here. Let me at least rub the side of my face on the box. I see the box has fallen on the floor as a result of my face-rubbing and you are wearing a look of displeasure. Coincidentally I was just about to go hide under the bed just as this happened. So let me do that and I'll touch base with you later for dinner.

-----------------------

That looks very fine, what you're eating. Very fine indeed. Why don't you let me have some of that. Just let me try it and I'll let you know whether it works for me. I'm already up on the table despite your persistent swatting. Ah you've given in to my charms. Let's have a smell here. Smelling now, I'll let you know in a minute or so if this thing that you've been eating passes my smell test. The results are in and seems possible that I will enjoy this, let me give it a nibble. A little lick here, a nibble there. Little lick, little nibble. Hmmm. I don't care for this, I have to say. I had misgivings when I observed it was green. I prefer brown. But I've never been accused of having an unsophisticated palate, so forward I boldly forged. No no, I'm afraid this just won't do. You've incurred my displeasure once again. It seems as though you're always letting me down.

A Difficult Excursion To The Sea

2010-05-19T13:45:00.000-07:00

Heading down to the South Street Seaport area of Manhattan, totally unfamiliar territory, fraught with the possibility of getting lost, I did.

My father is always very good at figuring out where he is, it's a sense he has, something like if you dropped a dog off in the middle of the woods it would find its way home, except that my father is much smarter than a dog. I've never heard of a dog with a doctorate in physics, have you? Sometimes I forget that I didn't inherit this quality and just decide to take the F train to a random stop in Manhattan and figure I'll just "feel it out" and find my destination from there. This never works out the way I picture it in my mind, in my mind I arrive 15 minutes early at the meeting place and sit comfortably sipping a martini, the waitress falls instantly in love with me, and when my friends arrive they comment about how remarkable I am when I excuse myself to go to the bathroom. None of that ever happens in real life except the part about waitresses falling in love with me. I don't even like martinis.

I had to meet a friend on Delancey St. at 6PM prior to meeting my other friends Angela and Stepinsky and a few others at Salt Bar on Beekman St., right off of South St. by the East River. I knew I had to go south and east from Delancey and that was about all I knew for sure about getting from to one point to the next.

I walked through Chinatown before I headed further east and that was about as far as I got before getting lost and losing all sense of where I was; in other words I had made it about 6 or 7 blocks.

I tried getting directions from a Chinese man, which was probably ill-advised so close to Chinatown; there was a minimal chance this man would understand me, and he didn't. Nonetheless I carried on trying to get him to give me directions to "Beeker" St. (I had forgotten the name of the street was actually Beekman.) The only thing I could think to do without using words was to mime Beeker to him, and the only way I could think of to do that was to pretend to be a chemist in a lab examining test tubes and beakers. I held two imaginary beakers at eye level and glanced back and forth between one and the other. While I did this I made an "ooooh....ooooh" sound to indicate the fascination I had for my scientific findings, which in retrospect probably didn't help as a clue for the Chinese man but seemed to me at the time to be exactly what a scientist holding two beakers would do. He would be really into his job. Also since this man was Chinese I imagined that this would be exactly what a specifically-Chinese scientist would do, if not the scientists of all the world. I can picture an Indian doing it as well. Mind you, this is to get directions to BeekMAN St., which I had forgotten. "Maybe he knows Beaker from the Muppets" I thought, again forgetting the correct street name. To imitate Beaker I sucked my face into my neck and turned my lips down, making a "mee mee mee" sound. In reaction to this the Chinese man began backing away as politely as he could, nodding and smiling, and turned and started back down the street.

I walked on and passed an attractive young woman pushing a stroller. "Hey mother, want another?" I thought, recalling that rhyme kids in my hometown would say if they saw a hot mother. (This inquiry would have implied (if I had said it aloud) that I could impregnate this woman by having sex with her if she so desired, in case you can't get it from context). I wondered if that line had ever worked on anyone. "Hey mothuh, want anothuh?". "Yes indeed! Sounds smashing! Let's get cracking!". I don't know why the woman is British in that example. I guess because British women are so promiscuous. I don't know if that's actually true. It sounds accurate though.

I stopped into a bodega for cigarettes and noticed the shelves in the place were suspiciously barren. They didn't have my brand. "Must be a front" I thought. Then I questioned that thought. People always say that when a store is under-stocked. How many fronts can there really be in the United States? 50? 60? Yet I'll bet every adult in the Northeast has at least once accused a store of being a front. I left the bodega cigarette-less. (I was cigarette-less, not the bodega.)

At this point Angela and Stepinsky called to say they were also lost and couldn't find the place, and I just gave up and hailed a cab, just then remembering that the street is called Beekman St.

I finally arrived at Salt Bar on Beekman St. to find Angela and Stepinsky sitting with our old friend Gus who was in town from Boston and Saul who also lives in New York City.

"You've gained weight" I told Gus as I shook hello. I immediately regretted saying that even though Gus is pretty thick-skinned and probably didn't mind; it didn't seem to be taken very well by the group overall and seemed to cause a moment of awkwardness, effectively demonstrating the disparity between how things are in my head and how they are in real life.

Saul looked exactly like one of Tom Hanks' friends in "Bachelor Party" except gayer, which is basically the way Saul always looks, sort of like a Hell-sea version of Harold Ramis circa 1980. Saul had gone incommunicado a few weeks ago and we were worried about him so it was good to see that things were back to normal, or Saul's version of normal.

We had some beer and ate some sandwiches from the bar. Then Angela had to go so it was just the four of us and we went to a sports bar around the corner to watch the Celtics beat the Cavaliers to win the series and advance to the NBA semi-finals. I tried to keep my celebrating to a minimum as there were plenty of Cleveland fans in the bar and I didn't want to rub salt on their wounds. One of them looked particularly desperate and kept yelling "FUCK". I can understand how it would be frustrating to be a Cleveland sports fan, but I kept my distance from that guy. It can be good to have interests but when your interests provoke you to indiscriminately yell "FUCK" in a bar full of people in might be best to take up something else, something less frustrating, and in the case of Cleveland sports fans almost anything will do. Orchid hunting, for one example.

We parted ways with Saul and Gus. Stepinsky and I headed to Low Bar back in Brooklyn. Keith was bar tending and Clean Steve was there and got us high in the back garden. We drank some beers; I can't remember what we talked about but I do recall doing most of the talking. The pot didn't put me to sleep like it usually does, I had become rather animated.

Around about 2:30AM my friend Eva came in flanked by her usual collection of disorderly looking bluegrass musicians. They pulled out their fiddles and soon it was a full on jamboree so Stepinsky and I drank some Kentucky Bourbon to be part of the moment. The music sounded so grand, it floated in the air.

"I'd like to live in the South Street Seaport area" I said to Stepinsky. "When I have enough money".

"Some day we'll have money" he said. "Some day".

I smiled and fell backward off my chair.

A Letter of Request to Me from My Cats

2010-02-22T13:18:00.001-08:00

Dear Sir,

It is of tantamount importance that you release us from the confines of this room. I know that only several minutes ago I may have given every indication that it was crucially important that we enter this very same room, but regrettably the circumstances have changed, and quite rapidly. I'm afraid I must urgently request that we be let out forthwith.

I understand my policies on these matters have not always been in concert with each other, and I understand that may have caused some confusion on your part. I can sympathize with the fact that you only just let us into the room at my insistence, and my timing probably could have been better than to have made this current request just as you were drifting off to sleep following my having interrupted your sleeping only several minutes ago with my previous request to be let in.

Nonetheless I cannot let these missteps prevent me from taking immediate action on the matter. Like a Republican senator asking for stimulus money, I cannot let the appearance of contradiction stop me from doing what is right for us right now.

I tried crawling under the door for about a minute and a half but that has not yielded favorable results: the space underneath the door is prohibitively small.

Perhaps if you would make it a habit to leave the door open that would be an agreeable compromise for all, (though I've been lead to believe by various clues in your behavior that your policy of shutting the door is in order to prevent my brother and I from darting in and out of the room while engaging in play-fighting (and regular fighting) throughout the entire duration of your sleep time.)

While I can't make any solid guarantees, I can assure you that my brother and I will do our best to abide by this decision for as long as possible.

Thank you for your consideration.

Yours,
Jackpot J. Munch (of the Southampton Munches).

Another In a Series of Letters to Me from My Cats

2010-02-21T13:38:00.000-08:00

Sir,

I see you over there. Glaring at me scornfully. On the verge of scolding me. Trying to change my "behavior". Just because I am currently eating my brother's vomit does not give you the right to judge me, sir.

I am hungry, damn you. The fact that I just ate two thirds a can of cat food does nothing to change my hunger. Besides, cat food is not quite so delicious as vomit. I am not sure why but my brother really knows how to produce some sublimely exquisite vomit. I must say I enjoy every savory bite.

In these days of recession (and possible depression forthcoming) I would think I should be applauded for choosing to carry out this vomit-eating as I am. My hunger has now been soothed for at least the next several hours.

I am writing to demand an immediate apology and your blessing to continue eating vomit.

Sincerly Yours,
Nikolas J. Munch (of the Southampton Munches)

"Mr. Happy" By Roger Hargreaves: A Critical Analysis

2010-01-27T14:46:00.000-08:00

One need only read the first few words of Roger Hargreave's 1972 work "Mr Happy" before one begins to see gaping flaws: "On the other side of the world where the sun shines hotter than here" it begins; a little general, don't you think Mr. Hargreaves? The "other side of the world". And where exactly is that? I guess that would depend on where in the world you are, wouldn't it? This is the very first line mind you.

Hargreaves then describes a Utopia called "HappyLand", where "everyone is as happy as the day is long". Predictably it goes on like this, asking you to suspend your disbelief but giving you no reason to do so:

"It's such a happy place that even the flowers seem to smile in HappyLand".

Maybe if you're tripping on mushrooms the flowers appear to be smiling. It seems to be rather stating the obvious to note that a flower is incapable of smiling, it is basically an inanimate object.

"All the animals are happy in HappyLand as well".

That seems a bit presumptuous. How would you know whether an animal is happy Mr. Hargreaves? Are you an animal psychiatrist? And are you telling me that you've done a thorough analysis of every animal in HappyLand and arrived at the conclusion that nowhere in this vast land that allegedly encompasses half the world is there an animal that might not be so happy?

"If you've never seen a smiling mouse, or a happy cat or dog, or even a worm, go to Happyland."

Well there's a small problem with that Mr. Hargreaves. First of all you've been totally unclear as to wherever this place is so I would have no way of going to HappyLand even if I wanted to, would I? And how would one determine whether or not a worm is smiling? It's a rope-like thing in the dirt with no face. Are you expecting me to somehow find this place Happyland, book an an airline ticket and travel there just to crawl around in the dirt to see if I can tell if the worms are smiling?

We then are introduced to the story's protagonist, Mr. Happy, who evidently was not informed about things like September 11th and waterboarding because there is nothing that makes him unhappy! Apparently word of the holocaust never spread to Happyland.

While walking around in the woods, Mr. Happy comes across a door in the side of a tree, and for some reason this asshole decides it's acceptable to break into and enter the home of Mr. Miserable, who for some reason doesn't object to the intrusion nor does he object when he is forced out of his home and into the fascist world of Happyland where he is forced to be happy.

During this inquisition Mr. Miserable claims that he "would give anything to be happy" but it's reasonable to reach the conclusion that he is being intimated by Mr. Happy, the one man gestapo who has invaded his home.

After a little while in HappyLand, miraculously, Mr. Miserable then begins smiling all the time, probably due to the effects of medication he was forced to take by this fascist regime, a regime which endorses a kind of euthanasia if you will, since Mr. Miserable and those of his ilk are being forced out of their homes and basically executed; killed and transformed into a nation of Mr. Happys.

It's no wonder that the generation that grew up reading Mr. Happy has so happily and readily paved the way for the kind of totalitarianism that is currently creeping like a black shadow over the entire globe. We all trust Mr. Happy to take care of us. Mr. Happy is going to make it better. Give yourselves to Mr. Happy.

Mr. Hargreaves attempts to sell us Utopia, as totalitarians always do, but we must give up our souls to achieve it.

Shame on you Mr. Hargreaves!

The Man in the Hallway

2010-01-26T17:02:00.000-08:00

The man in the hallway has chosen now to start banging on things. At least, I assume he's a man because you so rarely see women doing manual labor. I'm not saying it doesn't ever happen but you'll have to agree with me that it is indeed rare. Get off my case OK? I'm not going out there to check to see what gender this person is. And since I'm not going out there I can only imagine what he's banging on that couldn't have been banged on earlier in the day, when I wasn't reading in my living room and listening to some late period Beethoven string quartets, which by the way, are not accompanied particularly well by banging. I can only imagine the man is probably banging some nails into the wall for some reason, although it's hard for me to picture why that would be necessary in an unadorned hallway in a New York City apartment building. What would nails be needed for? Are they going to hang pictures? In the stairwell? I hardly think so. The banging now seems louder and closer, almost as if this man has specifically directed all of this banging at me; the sole purpose of this racket is to annoy me! What did I do to this guy? Now it's so close that I can almost feel it inside my own head, his heavy hot sweaty breathing on my neck, his cigarette breath wafting unpleasantly up my goddamned nostrils. He smells like hell this guy. Take a shower pal! Can no one in the whole building besides me hear this shit? Can't someone go out there and tell him to come back later at a more reasonable time? This is not a reasonable time! It's 7:30!!! PM! Surely someone else is just sitting down to dinner and just wants a second's peace! How can anyone tolerate this outrage? Now the floor is shaking and the plaster is crumbling from the walls. It feels like nails, long sharp nails are being driven into my skull by this mutant, this awful man who just has no consideration! No consideration whatsoever for other people's peace of mind! That's it, I am going out there to confront this person; I don't care how big he is, I am going to punch him in his goddamned idiot head! He deserves it! He fucking deserves it! Once I'm done punching him the first time I may just punch him again, that's how worked up I am. But wait, now it's stopped. Finally it seems to have stopped completely. Now that I am worked up beyond belief. Did he come here just to get me mad? It appears so. The nerve of this guy. I am going to call the building people and complain. The building people should know better. It's a good thing I am patient. The building people will regret this whole thing come Monday.

UPDATE: There is no evidence of anything in the hallway which would have necessitated 45 minutes of banging noises.

Another Blow to the Empire

2010-01-25T11:57:00.000-08:00

Dear Sir or Madame,

Today I went to mail a package to my grandmother in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio - a task which required my making use of your facilities here in Park Slope, Brooklyn; a task which also seemed, at the outset, like it shouldn't be too difficult to execute. Mailing a package. How could I fail?

While it was not the most difficult thing I've ever gone through in my life, it ranks surprisingly high on the list: I would put it somewhere between my Mother's bout with breast cancer and the time I was hit by a car while on my bicycle and hospitalized.

I understand that our elected officials here in New York City, and really at all levels of government seem hellbent on creating some kind of nightmarish Orwellian totalitarianism where forms need to be filled out in order to fill out another form and so on. So I sympathize with you because I'm sure this kind of atmosphere is created at the top and you're doing the best you can within the parameters in which you're forced to operate.

So here's a couple of things that seem obvious to me and, I imagine, anyone who has visited this particular branch; just a couple of ideas that seem to have eluded the powers that be at the New York City Post Office.

First of all, when the post office was set up initially, it's creators probably asked the question "will people need pens at the post office?". Somehow they arrived at the conclusion that no, they wouldn't - but the answer is actually yes! People do need pens at the post office! Let me just take a pause here to let this point sink in........ I was today able to succeed where the Post Office has failed and observe that the lack of pens is problematic. The reason for this? Almost everyone who enters the Post Office will need a pen (for writing). (on letters and packages). The reason that people need to write on packages is because they need to "mail" them to "destinations", destinations which are denoted by addresses on the packages which need to be written (by pens), so it might make sense to have some, because mailing packages is kind of "your thing". I know what you're thinking - "but people will just steal our pens! What a waste of time and money!". I had the same thought myself. Then I remembered about the several thousand times I have visited a bank in my life; there was something about those visits; I was able to write things even though I myself was not in possession of a pen. The banks had their own pens, and they were made difficult to steal because they were attached by a beaded chain to the counter! This is just the kind of cutting edge technology that the Post Office of New York City should employ.

Luckily I did manage to find, deep in the recesses of my bag, my own pen. As I wrote out my grandmother's address I realized I didn't know her zip code. No problem I thought, I'll just look it up in the zip code finder. But there was no zip code finder to be found. (You should probably have one of those too but we'll avoid that point for now) No problem, I thought again, they'll just look it up for me when I get up to the window. They are the post office after all. This sort of thing is their bag. This sort of thing must happen often, if not all the time.

Imagine my surprise when I finally got to the window after having waited 45 minutes in line (a wait which was certainly exacerbated by the people who had already waited in line going back to the front of the line because something about their packages had not met the rigorous standards of the New York City Post Office the first time around) - I was told that looking up the zip code would be impossible. "You don't know the zip code?" the woman behind the glass said to me. "I don't have that, no, sorry" I said. "Well you need to look it up over there" she said to me, awesomely. "You mean you can't look it up for me?" I said. The woman behind the glass told me that, well, she could but next time I had better look it up myself, or something like that. Relieved, I said thank you.

Then she turned to talk to the woman next to her, who informed her that I would have to look it up myself at what she called "the machine". My woman related this to me and I said, incredulously, "You mean you can't look up a zip code? But you're the Post Office... Isn't this kind of thing your deal?" I was told that her "machine" is "really slow".

What kind of machine could she be talking about? Does the machine that the Post Office uses to look up zip codes not use the recent technology called "the internet" which actually operates at the speed of light? What sort of device did they have back there? Could it really be as hard as this woman was making it sound? I was to go look up the zip code myself on "the machine over there" and then come back up to front of the line just like the other people that had caused the bottleneck I previously described in paragraph 6.

I found another long line at "the machine" which looks up zip codes. But by then it was too late. I had run out of time and I had to go. So another thing I think the Post Office might want to think about incorporating is the internet. It's great! It's so fast, really. I imagine it's much faster than whatever you guys are using and it would enable your employees to do things the rest of us can do in 5 seconds!

Thank you for your time.

Stuart Wollensky
8th Grade Science Teacher, Patriot

Travels to and From Edwards Birthday Party at Gallery Bar, Ludlow Street, Lower East Side of Manhattan

2010-01-24T20:23:00.000-08:00

(The names of the people in this story have been changed to protect myself from incurring the displeasure of those to whom I am comparing myself favorably)

I am a Bostonian and in Boston there is a code that isn't ever explicitly stated but is nonetheless generally understood which stipulates that when riding the T (subway) if you see someone that you know you don't disturb them at all. Indeed you try not to even acknowledge them so that you can both be comfortable with the fact that you're going to ignore each other for the duration of the ride. No offense is taken by either party. Both parties greatly appreciate that the other didn't violate the code.

Even if you are walking unwittingly toward someone you know in the same subway car trying to find a seat and you notice them, you must immediately turn 180 degrees around and attempt to procure a seat as far away as possible. The person may notice you too, and you will both be horrified. Eye contact should be avoided at all costs. Once eye contact is made, the mission of avoiding conversation is plunged into peril. Eye contact will virtually ensure some kind of conversation will have to be made. But we're very good at not letting it get that far.

Anyone who has the audacity to violate this code will certainly be the object of scorn later when the violated party gets to wherever they're going and sends a group email to their friends letting them know what an idiot the violator is. "I saw Denise on the subway this morning and she talked to me the whole way! IT WAS HORRIBLE!". All ears will be sympathetic.

This might seem sort of backward to the some, but in Boston we have weird rules and when you're one of us you understand them and if you can't handle it you go back to Michigan.

The reasons for this code are very intricate but essentially it's because making stilted small talk in a brightly lit area in the company of strangers who are prone (in Boston) to scoffing at any opportunity is very uncomfortable. One can't help but get the feeling that all their words are being judged.

Last Friday night I was on my way to my friend Edward's birthday party and had the rude revelation that this no talking subway rule does not extend to my adopted city of New York when I saw Jacklyn, who is apparently Swedish, and an acquaintance of mine, and she had the nerve to actually approach me and try to strike up a conversation! "Who didn't tell her the rule?" I wondered. She saw me get on the train, she explained, but didn't have time to come up to the car that I was in. So she waited until the next stop and got off the car she was on and ran up to the one that I was in! Can you imagine! And then she approached me and started saying things! As if to have an exchange of words! As it happened we were going to the same party, thereby guaranteeing that there was no way out of this nonsense for the remainder of the trip. My eyes darted around the interior of the subway car looking for some excuse, some hope of escape. Perhaps even a rope with which to hang myself. I thought about saying something like "Excuse me Jacklyn would you mind if I don't talk to you and listen to my mp3 player instead?" but I had a feeling that would be taken wrong.

Eventually the initial shock wore off and I got settled into the idea that I would have to talk to her. Jacklyn is actually very nice and has nice eyes and also looks quite good in jeans. But that doesn't mean I want to talk to her on the subway.

When we got to the party which was mercifully close to the subway exit (the quality of our conversation had been waning considerably and rapidly) we were surprised to learn that we had been grossly misinformed about it's start time by our mutual friend Angela. We, in fact, were the first people there. We went downstairs to the empty room where the party was to be; there was no one down there but a bartender (who was not even ready to serve us). I was looking around for a knife or something sharp to jab into my eyeballs, and just then our friend Edward, the person for whom the party was being held and I believe also the host, arrived. He approached us nervously and wiggled his jaw from side to side and chattered at us with all the grace of a machine gun. I was fairly certain, actually completely sure that the reason for this was that, even though it was only 9:30PM, Edward was already gakked out of his mind.

And so we were three. Edward was kind enough to buy us a round of drinks and unrolled a fifty dollar bill to pay for them. I had a Heineken, Jacklyn had a vodka tonic and Edward had something that looked like bourbon on ice with soda. Though there was no one in the place at all, music was playing at an unnecessarily high level and so Jacklyn and I, for the next half hour, seated on leather couches in an empty room, listened to Edward nervously shout at us over unnecessarily loud music.

Angela, the person who had misinformed us about the start time of the party, and who is also my best friend; a green eyed, pale skinned redhead who has never been very good with logistics, had naturally not yet arrived. The next person to arrive was Audrey, a black woman from Washington DC who was in possession of a birthday cake and extremely ample breasts, which bounced up and down in her white blouse as she walked toward us. Neither Jacklyn nor I knew this person, who, although very nice and also quite attractive, really only added another layer to the already multi-layered awkwardness of this situation.

The cocktail waitress had just come on and came over to take our drink orders and she brought with her a pair of obviously fake breasts, which hung like halved grapefruits in her pink halter top. Her skin was the color of a Commodore 64, which was the result of having spent many long hours in tanning beds.

Finally Angela arrived, and, after I had accused her of being a horrible human being and also not very smart nor adept at making plans, informed me that she had gotten stuck on the train, which is kind of an all purpose excuse in New York and is very rarely true. From the moment she arrived I started devising plans to immediately extricate ourselves from this place, which was growing more horrible by the minute. We had a few more drinks and said goodbye to Edward whose bulging eyes seemed by now to be the size of golf balls; by that time the downstairs had become absolutely riddled with assholes. We walked through the upstairs bar that was still surprisingly empty (which seemed to be inconsistent with the long line of people outside waiting to get in).

Controlling this line were three giant men who, I think it's safe to say, were not able to read past the third grade level, which is probably being generous. Jacklyn, Audrey and I and a few others waited outside for Angela, who had checked her coat and was taking a very long time to retrieve it. Perhaps she'll find a way to blame the train, I thought. While outside I was informed several times by the oafs that I was standing in the wrong place. Even when our party had moved halfway down the street that didn't seem to satisfy them. We had to be, according to them, "behind the velvet rope" which was literally a half a block away. I was bemused by the long line of people waiting to get inside the bar, a bar which there was nothing at all extraordinary about, unless you count as extraordinary the fact that so many people wanted to enter it, which I do. Actually, also extraordinary was the fact that it's emptiness could clearly be seen from the street yet no one in line objected to the idea that they were obviously waiting unnecessarily and were pawns in this establishment's game of attracting sheep-like customers. Finally, after what seemed like a very unreasonable amount of time, Angela came out with her coat and we walked to Local 138 on Orchard Street. As we walked by the line of people I was tempted to shout things like "I don't know why you're waiting in line, the place is empty and not that great. There's a lot of great bars in this city you know". So I did. No doubt the oafs were infuriated.

When we got to Local 138 the evening took a turn for the much better. The music was great; Black Sabbath, Butthole Surfers, KISS, Fishbone... we got drunk and nothing that I enjoy writing about happened, because a good time is fun to have but not to write about.

Around 3AM I decided I was drunk enough and my evening was over so I stumbled back to the F Train at Delancey St. I approached the ticketing kiosk which said the following on the screen:

UNABLE TO ACCEPT CREDIT CARDS AT THIS TIME
UNABLE TO ACCEPT DEBIT CARDS AT THIS TIME
UNABLE TO ACCEPT FUCKING CASH AT THIS TIME

Of course it didn't actually have the expletive in there but that was how I read it. I went to the next kiosk over.

UNABLE TO ACCEPT CREDIT CARDS AT THIS TIME
UNABLE TO ACCEPT DEBIT CARDS AT THIS TIME
UNABLE TO ACCEPT FUCKING CASH AT THIS TIME

I went across the street and subsequently to every other possible entrance.

UNABLE TO ACCEPT CREDIT CARDS AT THIS TIME
UNABLE TO ACCEPT DEBIT CARDS AT THIS TIME
UNABLE TO ACCEPT FUCKING CASH AT THIS TIME

As I had only a credit card on me and I would not be able to go through the turnstiles without a new Metrocard, I was left with few options. Naturally there was no attendant at any of the stations to help my with this dilemma, which I have to imagine was a dilemma shared by half of the subway passengers in New York city that night, if not the majority.

I decided naively to walk to E 2nd St, the next stop on the F, which was a good walk and when I got there:

UNABLE TO ACCEPT CREDIT CARDS AT THIS TIME
UNABLE TO ACCEPT DEBIT CARDS AT THIS TIME
UNABLE TO ACCEPT FUCKING CASH AT THIS TIME

As I would rather be gang raped than have to hail a cab and then to pay the fare I walked back to Delancey St, not sure what to do. There I noticed an entrance I hadn't yet tried: I don't even know what made me go down it, as I had already tried literally 14 entrances with the same empty result each time.

UNABLE TO ACCEPT CREDIT CARDS AT THIS TIME
UNABLE TO ACCEPT DEBIT CARDS AT THIS TIME
UNABLE TO ACCEPT FUCKING CASH AT THIS TIME

This time, however, there was an attendant at the station. This was our conversation:

Me: Can you take credit cards?

Him: (Totally uninterested in talking to me, which as far as I could tell, was his only job) No I can only take cash, sorry.

Me: Well do you know where the next station is where the kiosks are working? I've already tried two.

Him: (angrily, and as if he hadn't already had this conversation at least 200 times that night and as if I was the sole idiot in New York City who hadn't been able to work this out) JUST GO THROUGH THE FIRST TURNSTILE

And through the first turnstile I went. A half an hour later I was home in my neighborhood of South (Park) Slope, which is conveniently located between the great neighborhoods of Prospect Heights, Carroll Gardens and Red Hook, and because of this convenient location I may never leave Brooklyn again.

Escape from Staples Office Superstore, Brooklyn

2010-01-23T10:51:00.000-08:00

Dear Esteemed Senators Gillebrand and Schumer,

The other day I found myself in need of copier paper so I patronized Staples Office Superstore at 4th Avenue and 3rd St here in Brooklyn NY. Having attempted to procure this same copier paper at CVS Pharmacy and Rite Aid and having been unsuccessful at both attempts, I can tell you I was relieved after trekking the considerable distance to Staples to see that it was in plain view from the moment I walked in.

The long, arduous journey toward copier paper had begun earlier in the day at CVS Pharmacy on 9th St., around 4PM. I strode in, eyes alight, confident, maybe even naive; hopeful of easy success, and since I had never before encountered a CVS Pharmacy that was not well stocked with a full line of stationery supplies, I had little reason to believe this hopefulness was unwarranted. Whistling a tune, I walked in the door and swiftly found the correct section. This was a sign that things were going well as it usually takes me something like 45 minutes to locate any one item in CVS. Despite the good sign, there was bad news: the shelves which normally held the copier paper were completely empty.

Discouraged, but not yet defeated, I soldiered on. Rite Aid was only a few blocks away after all. "Surely CVS and Rite Aid can't be out of copier paper at the same time" I thought to myself. Then reality again smacked me swiftly across the face with it's genitals: Rite Aid was also without copier paper. It seemed odd that both places would be out of copier paper, almost as if all the forces in the universe were coming together to conspire against me.

Panic began to set in. It was 5pm. If I couldn't obtain this copier paper soon, I wouldn't be able to print out and sign documents which were in need of my signature by the end of the day. I had to get this done, and in my horror I realized if I couldn't get copier paper and do it at home, it might be necessary for me to go somewhere like Kinkos! I would rather have my flesh eaten by firesnakes.

Time was running out. That's when I remembered Staples. The end of my challenge, or so I thought. Of course buying copier paper doesn't seem like it should be a challenge at all but the city has a way of augmenting the difficulty of errands we might normally expect to be mundane.

Everything went comparatively smoothly at Staples until I arrived at the register. A young man with thick lensed horn-rimmed glasses and straight brown hair that hung in a mop above his pock marked face named Kenneth was ready to ring me up. "Finally my journey is at an end" I said to myself, relieved, satisfied.

But then Kenneth, like a conjurer, produced seemingly out of nowhere something that looked suspiciously like a form. I froze, terrified. "Would you like to sign up for a Staples card?" he asked me. "No no, that's fine. I live in Wisconsin" I lied, and as soon as the lie stumbled clumsily from my mouth I realized that it wasn't a very good one, because they probably have Staples in Wisconsin.

Kenneth was undeterred, like a bridge troll who won't grant passage without satisfactory answers to his questions three. "Are you sure?" he said. "You just have to fill out this little form and you'll get ten percent off your purchase right now." I held firm: "No I'm fine, thank you". I attempted to placate him with a little humor: "You're a good salesman though, very aggressive".

"It will only take a second" Kenneth insisted, with a strange look in his eye that I couldn't quite place, almost like fear. "No thank you Kenneth" I said before emphatically adding "Really." I was starting to lose my patience but unable to summon up enough energy to become angry.

It was because of my low energy that I didn't walk away in disgust when Kenneth then told me to wait at the register, he'd be right back. It probably would have been easy to walk away, I hadn't even taken my wallet out yet to pay. But I had already come so far, and I reasoned it would be foolish to let this incident prolong my journey.

I saw Kenneth disappear into the back and as he slipped out of sight I noticed that it now appeared, oddly, that I was the only person in the store, which as far as I could tell had been bustling when I came in and it was currently nowhere near closing time.

Also, the soft rock music that had been playing through the store's PA system had been replaced by a strange, low droning hum.

Then I began to notice something far more bizarre: there was something about the way all of the Staples employees, in doing various tasks, stocking the shelves, pricing items and so on seemed to be moving. They seemed to be somehow moving in unison. As I observed them further it became immediately clear they were indeed moving in perfect unison, in perfect rhythm. The glow around the lights overhead seemed more profound, and yet the general aura of the store seemed to dim.

Just then Kenneth returned with his manager, whose name tag read #21479. Similarly, Kenneth's name tag no longer said Kenneth, but #21562. The manager wore a grave expression. He stared at me for a minute and then he said:

"Are you SURE you wouldn't like a Staples card, Mr. Zavracky?".

I froze.

The bags I was holding dropped to the floor.

I started quickly toward the door. The security gates at the front of the store swiftly came to the ground with a crash. Every Staples employee had their gaze fixed upon me. They moved slowly toward me. I was trapped. The room was hot. The floor was like lava. I was trapped in the volcano. The Staples volcano.

"Clearly Mr. Zavracky isn't going to cooperate, 21562." said the manager. "I think #1 will want to see him at once." I was then descended upon by the other Staples employees, all of whom by this point looked exactly like Kenneth.

I was led in shackles to the employee break room and placed in a chair. The room swirled around me, I was in a state of panic, my pulse rapid, I sweated profusely. The Kenneths left and closed the door behind them. "I just wanted some copier paper!" I called after them.

I waited.

After a few minutes the walls of the room began to descend, and the ceiling began to lift, revealing a great hall with unadorned grey walls and a glowing altar at the front, almost like a cathedral with no pews or windows, but completely angular and rigid. On the altar sat a similarly angular chair, a throne, with it's back toward me, and over the top of the throne protruded the back of a gleaming bald head.

A deafening high pitched voice, like a child's, shattered the still:

"So you think you don't want a Staples card, Mr. Zavracky"

"How...how do you know my name?" I stammered, incredulous.

The voice had an androgynous quality:"We've known about you for a long time. We summoned you here. Did you think it was mere happenstance that both CVS AND Rite Aid were both out of copier paper at the same time? That would be ridiculous!".

"But why?" I asked, thinking about how easily I could have gotten out of this during Kenneth's absence back at the register. "How did you even know I'd need copier paper today?".

The hermaphroditic child's voice turned to a furious shrill roar. "SILENCE!". And then more calmly: "All we want is to give you and everyone else in Brooklyn the gift of a Staples card which gives you a generous ten percent discount off of our already low prices. This is an offer we extend without prejudice to anyone that shops with us. Of course some are foolish enough to reject our kind offer, like yourself. They are sent to me".

And then a harshly vivid, high pitched cackle.

The chair began rotating slowly around and as it did I could barely make out a face, a face which somehow exuded a blinding white light which burned my eyes as it turned 180 degrees from its previous position to face me; a face so bright and terrifying that it was impossible to discern whether it was absolute evil or absolute light, and the shrieks of a thousand demon-angels tore at my eardrums. I screamed now, begging for a Staples card.

--------------------

I remember only little things about the months that followed, just that I worked in lockstep with my brothers and sisters, spending happy nights in our Great Hall reading from the Staples Employee Manual, and sitting in circles on the floor singing odes to Number One. We never left the grounds, which included a dormitory with our sleeping quarters, and we never wanted to. We were given subcutaneous injections daily, and we distributed Staples cards to everyone in Brooklyn, gathering all of their addresses to send to the Home Office in Wisconsin.

Months, possibly years went by, and I was enjoying my new life until one day something reminded me of my old life and filled me with an overwhelming desire to return to it. I have only vague memories of this but I think it was a song, and I think the song was "Nobody Gonna Break-a My Stride" by Matthew something. I know that the day before I had an argument with someone about the song; she had claimed it was Styx and I knew it was Matthew something, and even though I hadn't know the last name I still had somehow won the argument, and I think hearing the song had reminded me of that. I had always adored arguing, and now I had given that up. Why?

None of the Staples employees had anything physically restraining us from leaving there you see. I walked unhindered out the front door and returned to my apartment. That was this morning.

But they are coming for me now.

I can see their flashlights approaching on the horizon like the torches of an angry mob. There is a low hum, and the sky is a filmy green. And my name on the wind from the park all the way down to the river's edge in Red Hook.

Senators, I just wanted to bring your immediate attention to this matter, in the hopes that you can somehow intervene and free these people, who I am now to re-join, from their servitude.

Sincerely
#21593

Walking

2009-04-20T13:25:00.000-07:00

Down the stairs. Out the front door. Kids hanging around in front of my apartment building. I don't see any kids hanging around in front of any of the other apartment buildings, why do they have to hang around in front of mine? Who hangs around in front of an apartment building anyway? There's nothing there. Just a sidewalk. Nothing interesting. There's a perfectly nice park 4 blocks away. It's too far away from the television I guess. Stupid kids. Television rotting their minds. Cola rotting their stomachs. Soon they'll grow up and be crushed like the ice cubes in their Kool Aid. Kool Aid. I'm glad my Mom never bought that crap. My Mom. A saint. She'd never hang out in front of my apartment building making a bunch of noise, that's for sure.

Walking up the street. Past Diamond Cuts Barbershop. Not sure what diamonds have to do with haircuts. Unless you want a diamond shape shaved into the side of your head I guess. Who would want that though. Probably somebody. Not really my style. I'd be laughed at. I'm probably already laughed at. Probably by the people who work at Diamond Cuts who am I walking by.

Past 5th Ave now. Here comes a woman with a baby carriage. I bet you this woman will do whatever she can to steer the baby carriage into my kneecaps. She has a baby after all, that makes her more important than people without babies. Like me. Baby-less. Not contributing to the world like she is by having a baby. I should do whatever I can to get out of her way, including crossing the street or climbing a tree to make the sidewalk available exclusively to her. I step to the street and let her go past. Doesn't even look at me. No thank you. No thank you.

Oh good it's a bunch of guys standing in the middle of the sidewalk. I wonder if they'll do anything to get out of the way when they see there's someone coming. I can't be the first person who has tried to cross the large patch of sidewalk they currently occupy with their standing. Nope they're doing nothing to get out of the way. I have to walk right through the middle of their conversation, which sounds really captivating. Should I let them know they've incurred my displeasure with a telling glare? They act as if they have to stand there as I pass. Where else are they going to stand? Not in the middle of the sidewalk? I don't understand the complexities of the situation apparently.

Here comes a woman with 3 dogs and two kids. Yelling at the kids. The kids have the nerve to act like children even though they live in New York, how could they do that to her? Kids are playing on the sidewalk. Not much to do in Brooklyn for a kid. Gotta make the best of it. It's important to the parents that they continue to go to wine tastings and have pretentious conversations and vote for democrats, so the kids will just have to sacrifice.

Up to the park now. Walking by the playground. More parents with their kids, obviously. Have these people not been informed of the existence of the suburbs? It's like a playground for kids and dogs and other things that aren't particularly well augmented by existing in the middle of a bunch of concrete. Quiet in the suburbs too, no need to make noise complaints to the neighborhood condo having committee about all those loud minorities. They all have cars too, these people, what's the justification there? "Everyone should get rid of their cars except for me, I really need mine."

-------------------

Look at this tall goof. Nice beard. Nice walking style. Nice track jacket, people usually stop wearing those when they hit 25. Why don't you try shaving? Get a life will you? Contribute to the world instead of walking around scowling at people. Have some kids.

The Holocaust of Idiots

2009-03-10T13:47:00.001-07:00

Every night the woman upstairs comes home, or maybe she's been home all along, usually at the moment I am about to drift off into sleep, and plays a little game I imagine is called "Drop the Bowling Ball on the Floor". Or it may be "Drop the Bowling Ball on the Floor Repeatedly". Or "What the Fuck Could I Possibly Be Doing Up Here". I have no way of knowing what she calls it, although I would definitely like to ask her.

It may not be a bowling ball, it could be a human skull, it may even be a sack of human skulls from the sound of it. In any case "Drop the Sack of Human Skulls on the Floor" is carried out with great zeal, and is usually played numerous times before she's done with it for the night. The sound of the skulls smashing against the floor directly above my previously sleeping head would be loud enough to drown almost anything else out, including, say, a car on the street blasting music or the sound of a patriot missile hitting me in the dick, but I am fairly certain that in between the skull sounds I have heard some muffled cackling, the kind of laughter one might expect to hear from a witch or some kind of horrible ogre-woman. At some point later the horrible ogre-woman probably then goes to bed, exhausted from the hard work of having lifted such a heavy bag of skulls so many times, or maybe she goes back out into the night on her flying broomstick to join her witch sisters around a bubbling urn to make ominous predictions about the future of princes. Either way the noise stops and after I am done being infuriated I fall back asleep.

Something like a half hour later is when the witch comes back and summons her goblin servants and commands them to frolic through my radiator for the duration of the evening. A loud clanging, a horrible racket is produced from their wrestling one another and kicking some sort of metal ball that clangs around the pipes. Perhaps they are playing with pieces of shattered human skull. That must be it: the witch comes home, breaks up the human skull for them and sends them off to play in the radiator. It's all so clear now.

So for that and various other reasons I tend to get upset about the little things.

That's probably why if I could summon the strength of Grendel, New York would surely be fucked. "Why are 8 of you standing directly in the middle of the sidewalk; there's plenty of room right there in that perfectly acceptable area that's not in the middle of sidewalk?" EAT YOUR FUCKING HEAD!! "Why are you people all waiting to get into this crowded club when there's another one just like it on the next block that it not crowded?" RIP YOUR HEAD OFF AND CRUNCHY CRUNCH YOUR SKULL IN MY MOUTH!! "Hey guy at the library asking completely asinine questions with self-explanatory answers when you are clearly intelligent and holding up a long line?" INTO MY BAG OF HEADLESS CORPSES YOU GO!! MMM YOUR INCONSIDERATE SKULL IS GOING TO TASTE SO GOOD IN MY MOUTH. "Hey woman upstairs making mystifying-ly loud noises when everyone else in the building is trying to sleep!" I WILL MAKE A FEAST OF YOUR INNARDS TONIGHT!!

I wonder how quickly things would snap into shape then. After the holocaust of idiots.