Remembering Mary.

Remembering HST:
July 18, 1037 – February 20, 2005

N.P.: “Lawyers, Guns, and Money” – Warren Zevon

Mgmt: Dude…it’s Tuesday.  You need to post something.
Me: I’m working on stuff.
Mgmt: Be that as it may, you need to post something.
Me: I got jokes.
Mgmt: Not jokes.
Me: Well, which is it: do I need to post something or not.
Mgmt: Something not jokes.
Me: Fuck yourself.  How do you stop a toddler from drowning in the summer.
Mgmt: We’re not doing this.
Me: You drown him in the spring.  When my best friend dies, he wants his ashes pressed into a record.
Mgmt:  ….
Me: That is his vinyl request.  What do you call getting gonorrhea from a handicapped person?
Mgmt: ….
Me: Slow clap.  Hello?
Mgmt:  I’m here.
Me:  What did Bruce Willis say when he got a vasectomy?
Mgmt:  Goddammit.
Me:  Snippy-kai-yay, motherfucker.
Mgmt:  That’s not even funny.
Me:  No argument there.  What do you call a pedophile pirate?
Mgmt:  Oh no.
Me:  Arrrrrr Kelly.
Mgmt:  [barely stifles a snicker]
Me:   Did you know you can’t laugh loudly in Hawaii?
Mgmt:  You are the worst client we’ve ever had.
Me:  It has to be “a low ha.”
Mgmt:  By far, the worst.
Me:  What’s the difference between a slice of pizza and a dead man?
Mgmt:  This qualifies as actual abuse.  You’ve put yourself in a very actionable position.
Me:  A slice of pizza can’t feed a whole family.
Mgmt:  Jesus.
Me:  What do you call a virgin from Oregon?
Mgmt:  I love Oregon.
Me:  An orphan.  Hashtag fuck Oregon.  What do you call a horny square?
Mgmt:  Okay, I’m going to go.  Post something.
Me:  An erect-angle.
Mgmt:  Promise me you’ll post something.
Me:  I promise.

N.P.: “Some People Call Me” – Jason Bieler and the Baron Von Bielski Orchestra

Fuckin’ Monday, dear reader.  Time for some bad jokes.  Here goes:
What’s the difference between a jeweler and a prison guard?  One watches cells, and one sells watches.  No?  K.
What’s the difference between an epileptic oyster fisherman and a prostitute with diarrhea?  One shucks between fits and one shits between fucks.  Okay, c’mon…that was funny.  No?  Fine.
What do you call a girl who’s tired of talking about the environment?  Regretta Thunberg.  Still no?  Fuck you.
What do tofu and dildoes have in common?  They’re both meat substitutes.
What do you call two AI systems that are in love with each other?  Members of the (Chat)LGBT community.
What do you call a sleep-walking nun?  A roaming Catholic.  Okay, I get it if you didn’t get that one.
How does a computer get drunk?  It takes screenshots.
That one kinda sucked.  Admittedly.
Who does Jesus ask if he wants to get a loan?  The profits.
Okay…that one was pure suck.
Just found out my grandpa is addicted to Viagra.  No one’s taking it harder than me.
I tried to start a dating service for chickens.  But I was struggling to make hens meet.
What’s green and smell’s like pork?  Kermit’s fingers.
How does The Rock pee?  He Dwayne’s his Johnson.
What do you get when you rub two oranges together?  Pulp Friction.
I made a website for orphans.  It doesn’t have a homepage.
Why is Dwayne Johnson the only guy that can turn lesbians (not true, btw)?  Because Rock beats scissors.
Why are gay dudes so rude?  Because they’re fucking assholes.
I told the cop, “You can’t write me a ticket…I have a marathon to run tomorrow.”  The cop said, “Sir, that’s not how you play the race card.”
What does a perverted frog say?  “Rub-It.”
How do you stop a toddler from drowning in the summer?  You drown it in the spring.

N.P.: “Bruce Lee – Rick’s 1st Dobro Mix” – Underworld

Today, on this cold, likely dreary day (depending on where you’re reading this), we commemorate the birth of  Edgar Allan Poe! Yes, the master of mystery and the macabre, the sultan of suspense, the ayatollah of rock-and-rolla, the king of…well, you get the idea.

Born on this day, January 19,  1809, Poe has left an indelible mark on the world of literature. From “The Tell-Tale Heart” to “The Raven”, his stories and poems have given us the terrors, made us think and become slightly paranoid, and have  inspired more than a few beautiful nightmares.

Now, you might be wondering, how does one properly celebrate the birthday of such a literary legend?  You could start by reading one of his works by candlelight, preferably during a thunderstorm for maximum effect. If reciting “Quoth the Raven ‘Nevermore'” to your unimpressed black cat isn’t quite your style, you could always do what the author himself would have done, and get toweringly drunk.  Drink whiskey in a candle-lit room, horribly alone, writing.  Fuck yes.

I do miss the Poe Toaster.  That was the sort of thing that used to make being a writer cool…the idea that strange people would visit your grave in tribute, 100 years after you died.  Alas.  Pour some out for the Toaster.

Anyway, happy 215th birthday, Edgar Allan Poe!

N.P.: “The Conqueror Worm” – Lou Reed

Welp, it’s Monday, and to be totally honest with you, dear reader, I haven’t been less excited about a Monday in a very long time.  The days are have begun their annual increase, the sky is the color of a tainted meringue, and somehow this day even smells funky.  Not sure what’s up, but we’re simply going to crack on, to hell with this new year’s stank.  First, perhaps some fine haiku:

No resolutions.
Just great writing and revenge.
Pens, swords, and shotguns.

Fuck yes…that felt great.  I need to do that more often.  It reminded me that I do write a mean haiku (usually while imbibing sake bombs at Beni Hana), and that I’ve amassed an admirable collection over the years.  I’ve been thinking about adding a haiku section to the site.  Different from “Doggerel,” though still just as terrible, even more so, since it’s just hacking away at what should be a beautiful, refined Japanese artform.

---

Anyway, how about some bad jokes?  I got you.  My favorite childhood memory was building sandcastles with my grandpa.  Until my mother took his ashes away.
What do you call a horny cow?  Beef jerky.  (I told you they’d be bad.)  What are the lion and the witch doing in my wardrobe?  It’s Narnia business.

I hate my job.  All I do is crush cans.  It’s soda-pressing.

Think that was bad?  I can do worse.

I saw a hot non-binary person the other day…I said, “Let me she/them titties!”

Get it?  Fine, I’ll stop.

Okay, one more.  I recently hired two Vietnamese sisters to help me with my production.  It was a Nguyen-Nguyen situation.

N.P.: “Ghost” – Slash, Ian Astbury

Happy New Years, vigorous reader.  Know that I am drinking whiskey toasts to you and yours.  Unless you’re one of the Three On The List, in which case I am, as always, wishing you ill and encourage you, for the sake of all concerned, to run far and fast if you haven’t already.  But fuck them…this is about you, dear reader…I do hope you have a happy new year.  My advice for 2024: Pay off any and all debts, procure more long guns and ammo, have cash on hand, invest in body armor, do not travel, and be ready to move fast.

But I’m sure everything’s going to be fine.

N.P.: “Nemesis” – Shriekback

JG:  ….mmmhello?

Mgmt: Good morning!  And happy New Year’s Eve!

JG:  Shit…is it?

Mgmt:  Yes, it is New Year’s Eve, and we’re still waiting for your end-of-the-year message.  Have you even started it yet.

JG: Yes, of course…I started that weeks ago.

Mgmt: When will it be done?

JG: It’s ready to go…but no one’s going to want to read it.

Mgmt: What do you mean?

JG: It will drive people crazy.  Literally make people insane.

Mgmt: And why is that?

JG: It’s way too dark for the American snowflakes to handle.

Mgmt: You’re always dark.

JG: No…not like this.  This shit is absolutely apocalyptic.  It will drive people mad.  And I don’t want to do that.  I just want to make people laugh.  How about I just tell some jokes?

Mgmt: Because your jokes are bad and usually completely offensive.

JG: Oh shut up.  You wouldn’t know a good joke if it fell out of the sky, landed on your face, and started to wiggle.

Mgmt: We focused group your last set of jokes, and…

JG: Fuck your focus group.

Mgmt: …several members quit, and one reported suicidal ideation and wanted “trauma compensation” by the time the group was done.

JG: Because they’ve been brainswashed by you woke fuckers, and when they find themselves laughing at something they’ve been indoctrinated not to laugh at, they fall apart.

Mgmt: What’s the general gyst of your New Years message…can you at least tell us that?

JG: I didn’t know what to wear to my Premature Ejaculation Society meeting.

Mgmt: Huh?

JG: So I just came in my pants.

Mgmt: Jesus.

JG: Sometimes I have sex with my uncle in an elevator.

Mgmt: For the love of God.

JG: And it’s wrong on so many levels.

Mgmt: Okay, that’s what we’re talking about…that’s not funny.

JG: My girlfriend dumped me, so I stole her wheelchair.

Mgmt: You are the worst client we’ve ever had.

JG: Guess who came crawling back.

Mgmt: ….

JG: Today I saw a midget climbing down a prison wall.

Mgmt: I personally hate you.

JG: And I thought to myself, “That’s a little con-descending.”

Mgmt: Just send us the new year’s thing.

JG: What do you call a hippie’s wife?

Mgmt: ….

JG: Mrs. Hippie.  Mississippi.  Get it?

Mgmt: So, New Years message…what’s it going to be?  Just give us a hint.

JG: Well, there’s a bunch of categorical bitching about this year and the several prior to it, which bitching goes on for quite a number of pages.

Mgmt: Maybe you could trim down the page count and send those to us.

JG: I could, and I will, but that will have to be in the new year…no way I can do that today.

Mgmt: Okay.  What comes after the bitching?

JG: A litany of truly dire predictions for the coming year.  Dire!  They’re all bad.

Mgmt: It can’t be all bad.  Surely there must be at least one positive thing, one glimmer of hope.  That’s what people need right now…some kind of optimism or hope.

JG: There’s not a lot of sunshine and puppy dogs from where I’m sitting.  Hey, why is it called PMS?

Mgmt: We really need one positive thing from you for New Years.

JG: Cuz Mad Cow Disease was taken.

Mgmt: Please, for the love of God, focus.  What is one hope you have for the new year?  And please, no more jokes.

JG: Okay, fine.  The only hope I have for the coming year is that…hello?  Hello?  Shit…phone died.  Maybe they’ll call back.

N.P.: “It’s Coming It’s Real” – Swans

Merry Christmas, beloved reader.

N.P.: “The Twelve Days of Christmas” – Gary Hoey

Merry Christmas, dear reader!  I love Christmas as much as the next blackguard, but I don’t feel the need to decorate the outside of the house every Christmas.  It, quite simply, seems like a huge pain in the ass.  And for what?  The neighbors’ and other weirdos amusement?  I don’t particularly care for either weirdos or neighbors, so I don’t see the point.  Apparently, many of my neighbors feel differently.  This year, in particular, many of them have gone absolutely apeshit with their outdoor Christmas décor and lights.  When I say “apeshit,” I mean unironically using Clark Griswold as their inspiration and mentor.  Most of these projects have actual budgets…serious money is being spent on this garishness. My issues with this seasonal silliness are myriad, but I’ll just give you the top three:

1.  These are the lowlands of California, which is to say there is no such thing as a white Christmas.  It doesn’t snow here.  I’m old enough to remember the last time it did “snow” in this valley, and that was in 1976.  Since then, not a flake.  Because our governor is an incompetent ass who doesn’t understand even the most basic concepts of deforestation or successfully managing water resources, California is in a state of perpetual drought, regardless of how much rain falls in a given year, most people’s front yards look like the Arizona desert during Christmastime:
   dead lawn and patches of dirt.  Which makes oversized inflatable snowmen look absurdly out of place.  Traditional “winter” Christmas décor where there is no snow comes off as desperate and rather pathetic.
2. These overdecorated and hyperlit houses draw all manner of bridge and tunnel trash into the neighborhood.  There are, of course, no bridges or tunnels here, but you know what I mean: other desert-dwellers in desperate attempts to have something like a white Christmas but don’t have a budget set aside for a professionally designed lightshow drive around looking for other people’s ostentatious displays, which leads a lot of them to my street.  And they don’t do quick drive-bys… no, they drive slower than a parade and oftentimes completely stop and just park it in front of their favorite festooned houses.  This causes actual traffic at inordinate times on an otherwise quiet street.  This, in turn, causes dark states of piss off and anger amongst the various UPS, Amazon, and DoorDash drivers trying to make their way to my door.  “Fuck it, bro…you’re on your own…I’m 750 feet from your house and I haven’t moved for 20 minutes…you’re going to need to pick this shit up yourself,” is a common theme of messages sent to me from delivery drivers these past two weeks.  Then when I do leave the house after dark, I end up ruining multiple Christmases and possibly causing psychological trauma to scores of children who, wide-eyed and gaped-mouthed are enjoying staring at the millions of Christmas lights and various animated inflatable displays when their fragile little yuletide minds are suddenly forced to cope with some crazed and likely drunk writer yelling about traffic and calling their parents pig-fuckers and all sorts of bad and profane noise.  Nobody wants that.  So do us all a favor and stay home.
3. As glorious as many of these displays may be in the dark of night, in the morning light, they’re absolutely ghastly.  The only experience I can liken it to is stumbling out of a San Francisco rave at dawn, just as the drugs are wearing off, and you’re forced to go from sexy darkness that’s illuminated only by sexy lasers making even the most drug-addled revelers look good out into the brutal and excruciating dawn, where all your fellow partiers looks like hammered shit and the gorgeous girl you’ve been following around all night now looks like an animated corpse trying to find a ride home.  These yards that only hours before were cutting edge holiday light shows now look dead.  The lights are off, and the owners have turned off the air pumps that keep the inflatable displays inflated, and now they’re just flaccid, lifeless flaps of plastic laying across lawns and roofs like spent condoms tossed on the pavement in the high school parking lot the morning after prom.  It’s gross and depressing.  Which I believe are the exact sorts of feelings Christmas is meant to avoid.

I’m quite dubious about whether or not next Christmas will be in any way “normal,” but whatever’s going on, at least please consider toning down the outside lights and displays next year.  They vex me deeply and make the baby Jesus cry.

N.P.: “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch” – Gary Hoey