I don’t like you. I mean, in general. I don’t like a lot of people. I honestly, and truly don’t. So there’s a good chance I mean you, when you read this. And of course, a lot of people will read this and think “Oh he means those other people, not me,” and that’s fine. If that’s what it takes for you to sleep at night. Go for it, little buddy, I won’t rat you out.

But come on. This is the internet. It’s kinda part of my job to write shit and speak to you and share what’s in my head. And that includes this. Because I will always be honest with you. But that might not be a great thing for you every day. Some days I might just have to remind you that I don’t like you.

You probably don’t like me, either.

Oh, you might enjoy the blogging, and the fiction, and the comics (assuming you read any of that stuff and if not, why not? It is what funds the blogging. If you like the blog, buy a book, willya? Fuck. Yes I’m a whore. But again, honest about it.) and you might have a blast and come back every day. I don’t know.

But if you do? The majority of you do it for what is here. Not for me. And while this stuff is all true and honest and open, no matter how stupid, it isn’t me. It’s as much of me as I can fit in little boxes, but it isn’t me.

You’ve never seen me in the midst of crippling moments of panic. Not because I’m ashamed of them but because I try to not whine about myself here. Just a personal rule. If it bores me I don’t blog it. And my own bullshit bores me.

Which, as a side note, is how I get past my own shit. I hate to be bored. I despise boredom. And so when I’m depressed or panicked and can’t cope I stop and think about it and realize it is boring me and I then I get over myself. True story.

Which is not to say my friends stuff bores me. No, that I am interested in and try to help any way I can. It’s just my own issues that bore me. I have to deal with them 24/7 after all. It breeds distaste.

Still, let’s stay on message. Me and you. You don’t like me, because you might, possibly, like what you think you know of me, at most. At most. And even then, you don’t like me. You like some construct of me you have in your head.

Most of the people reading this? I don’t even have that for you. I don’t. And you know it. And when I read someone else’s site, their words, I realize that they don’t know me or like me. They’re not my special shiny fucking friend. There’s no connection just because I can relate to their story of the time they got a box of Captain Crunch stuck up their ass.

So no. I don’t like you. You don’t like me. And neither of us is interested in getting to know the other any better. Let’s be honest. Let’s enjoy what we enjoy, be it someone’s writing or music or whatever the fuck it is and leave it alone.

Now fuck off, yer boring me.

There is a list in my head of all the things I want to write but never will. Some of them I cling to harder than others, of course, but if I had to be honest, and I am, here, I won’t. This list, this insane menagerie of ideas that will never be born fully, is longer than a list of things I have written.

Blog posts alone, man, so many I want to write but never will. For example, the other night I had an idea strong enough to mail myself a note so I wouldn’t forget it. 99% of the time when I do that I write the post fairly quickly. This time I have stared at that note for a few days and I want to write the post, and I start to write the post and then I stop.

It’s a great idea, I still think. An episode of Planet Earth, narrated by David Attenborough, about the strange and wild lands of the Hipster Douches. It would all be written in that precise, engaging Planet Earth voice, talking about the mysterious culture and habits of the Hipster Douche, and so on and so forth. I still like it. I’ll never write it. I know that. I don’t know why I won’t, something in it just doesn’t work quite right for my head, but I know that I won’t get to it.

There was the post where I was going to take the patterns of an old Norse saga and rewrite it as a quest for a white kid in the suburbs to find good hip-hop in the late 80s/early 90s. I don’t even remember why I really wanted to do that one but I kept trying it for about a week before I gave up and added it to the eternal list.

Numerous books and movies and comics that I mean to review and discuss and just never do until the passion to do so fades and I still want to talk about them but the desire is so flagged that I can’t be bothered.

One time I fully intended to write a nice long post all about tire swings. There were some tire swings in this park near where I grew up, big ol’ tires with heavy metal chains. And how you would ride them, and worry about your fingers, and the whole bit. Swings, man. I had a whole post about swings. I still want to write it. I know I never will.

There’s a four book series (fully plotted) I know I won’t ever write, comic ideas that won’t happen, so many short stories and more blog posts than you can shake a stick at. It’s amazing sometimes, to me, that I still carry this list in my head. I don’t need it. It’s vestigial. Just hanging out there like a rudimentary tail going “Look it me! I’m useless and just kinda poking out in the wind.”

I don’t write more things than I do. Some days that bothers me.

Odd thought. I’ve noticed that writers tend to never use their first names in their works. Book and comic authors really, I’m discounting American TV since writer’s rooms have enough people that I can’t see that being feasible and most people don’t know the names of the writers anyway.

[Side note here for Farscape, which had a character named D.K. and fans thought he was named for David Kemper. He wasn't the pilot script with D.K. in it was written long before Kemper was involved with the show]

I’m not talking about writers writing themselves into a story but just having a character with the same first name. It’s just not done, or at least not that I’ve noticed. Please correct me if I’m wrong.

Do you think this is because readers will assume that, even with only a first name in common, the writer is writing themselves into the story? I’m looking for feedback from both writers and readers on this. How would that make you feel, or would you even notice?

I’m just suddenly, randomly, fascinated by this. I don’t even know why I noticed it today, but I did. And so now I ask you guys.

Thoughts?

Lots of stuff I missed. Woops.

Burrito Blade updated of course.

Things Wrong With Me has a two-parter go up this week with Episode 101 and Episode 102.

There was a new Interpretive Dunce this week, with A-HA’s Take On Me.

And for those of you who own one: You can now buy STAYS CRUNCHY IN MILK on the Kindle.

I’ve seen a lot of “Fuck Chris Matthews” since last night. Mostly by people throwing around a quote of his, in reference to the State of the Union:

Wow that looks horrible and damning, doesn’t it? But so far most of these screaming people who are flinging hate don’t seem to have bothered to look for context. Fucking genius! Way to go! …seriously, guys? Because here’s the full quote:

“I was trying to think about who he was tonight. It’s interesting; he is post-racial, by all appearances. I forgot he was black tonight for an hour. He’s gone a long way to become a leader of this country and past so much history in just a year or two. I mean it’s something we don’t even think about. I was watching and I said, wait a minute, he’s an African-American guy in front of a bunch of other white people and there he is, president of the United States, and we’ve completely forgotten that tonight — completely forgotten it. ”

And that isn’t really damning. It’s a statement by someone trying to see a situation and talking about it, fairly honestly. Far more honesty than we normally get, in fact, on TV. Does it contain a hint of “Well he’s black and sometimes that’s still shocking to me”? Sure. But that’s honest. Does it mean Matthews is a monster? No, of course not. But why the fuck are we attacking this and not applauding it for its honesty and reality?

Explain it to me, please.

Edited to add: Please keep in mind I do not like Chris Matthews and it pains me to defend him at all, because wow, he’s an ass, but seriously, context counts, people. We rail against soundbites and then use them ourselves the same way the people we rail against do? That’s bullshit.

Who, or what, is Twee-Tor?

Twee-Tor:
• is the cute killer robot who kills 140 humans at a time. But only 140, max.
• hugs his victims to death and whispers ‘I love you’ as he does so.
• is the invention of Doctor Ignatius Nathanial Terrence Teuoobe. (Dr. I.N. Ter. Teuoobe to his friends)
• can fetch coffee
• has a large camera for a face, enabling him to track victims and record their demise.
• has an unnecessary lower abdominal spike. He uses it to tickle bears.
• loves to play with bears.
• is utterly ambivalent about dogs and giraffes, however.
• possesses eight separate silly string guns on his shoulders.
• likes it when humans think the guns are all fun and games.
• laughs to itself when humans die a horrible, silly string related death.
• then sighs, because it has no one to play with. No one to love.
• will then go off in search of a bear to tickle and play with.
• loves to play with bears.

—————-
(You can download a background image version of Twee-Tor right over here!)

Twee-Tor is from the brains of APK and Atilla Adorjany

As some of you know, I’ve always had a list, in my head, of things I want to write and forms I wish to publish in. I wanted a hardcover book, and I have one. I wanted to write some comics, and I have. That sort of thing.

One of the things long on the list has been porn. I’ve always wanted to write a porn, or should I say adult film and be all nice about it? Now this isn’t because I enjoy porn or watch porn. I don’t It doesn’t tend to do it for me. But still, I’ve always wanted to write it. Which brings to mind the question of why.

See, I like a good challenge. Most porn I have seen has a crappy plot and worse dialogue, if any. You know the sort of stuff I mean:

Cable Repair Woman: Well the problem seems to be with your cable box.

Customer: Oh, really?

Cable Repair Woman: Yes, sir. Let me just fix it. There. Oh, no, while I bent over to fix it, my pants fell off. Now we must fuck!

Customer: Oh. All right. Do I have to pay an extra service fee for that?

And then they fuck a lot. Eh. Sure, I suppose if the point if to get to the fucking then you’ve done that, but really is that all we want? Vivid did a series of movie takes that were, for certain values, perfectly hysterical. Lord of the G-String, Playmate of the Apes and the like. The idea went in the right direction. It didn’t go all the way there, though. Not to my mind.

No. I want to write truly awesome porn. Now, I’m writing this at 2am, off the top of my head, so it isn’t exactly polished but wouldn’t you love to see porn more like this:

Joan: So you see, Bob, the problem is that your base expectations of life are off-center and that leads to endless frustration that you take out on your co-workers and friends.

Bob: Well fuck-a-doodle-doo, Joan! But what makes you think that I give a damn?

Joan: The inner eye sees what the external can not fathom, don’t you get that?

Bob: But if that’s the case, shouldn’t I wear pants far less often?

Joan: Oh, Bob, a pantless society is the entire point, you idiot!

Bob: But if that’s true…

Joan: It is.

Bob: Then…

Joan: Yes!

Bob: Huzzah!

And then we can cut to some good, down-home fucking which takes place on a bed shaped like a fish. But I fear that until I get to write some truly off-the-wall porn it won’t exist. Not really. And absurdist porn should be done. See also: Steampunk Porn.

Sadly I have no contacts in the industry, no ins and I refuse to write a porn epic on spec. Some things just aren’t done. And so the chances of me ever actually writing porn are slim to none. Hell, I’m not even sure who would finance absurdist porn. There has to be money in it, though. There has to be. The type of porn that people would watch partly for the fucking and partly to sit there and go “Wait, they said what?” and possibly “But in a Jungist modality, they would never end up doing a reverse cowgirl!”

It’s a shame.

I also want to write Children’s Books, though. I’m not doing that, either. Life is full of disappointment, it seems.

Why do I ever go outside?

I’m standing on the platform, waiting for a train so I can go home. Headphones are in, Glee tracks are playing, everything is right with the world. I have a list of stuff to do when I get home and I’m feeling good about it all.

This old woman starts to tap on my arm. She had to be at least 80, big tan down jacket that went to her ankles just about, scarf on her head, the works. So I take out my headphones. I figure I can be helpful, right? She had to need directions or something. It was the last nice thought I had.

“Aren’t you that man from the TV?” she asked. Well that’s new. I don’t think I’ve ever been mistaken for an actor before. That’s pretty cool!

“Uh, no, sorry,” I said.

“Are you sure?” she asks, seeming to be positive I am who she thinks I am. “That man from the TV you know the one who plays the retard?”

I stop. I blink. I play that back a few times at speed. “Excuse me?”

“That nice man from the TV, on that show?”

“What show?”

“You know the one with the police? Yes, you look just like him!”

“Like the… like the mentally challenged man on the police show?”

“Yes,” she insists, smiling now, “but well he’s… well.”

“Taller?” I thought maybe he was taller, you know. He could’ve been taller. Taller would’ve been fine. But no.

“No he doesn’t look as strange.”

“Strange?”

“Well, you know, not ugly but… Are you sure you aren’t him?”

“The retarded, ugly actor from your TV?” I ask, trying to keep my voice perfectly fine while I simultaneously try to not push her onto the tracks. “No. I don’t act.” Because what else can you say?

And I turn toward her, trying, seriously here, to be nice and calm. And then… well…

“Oh,” she says, frowning, now that she can see the left side of my head, “no he didn’t have a gay earring.”

Which is when I snapped.

“Bitch,” I said, “you do not insult the Hello Kitty earring. You respect it! Got that?”

“What did you call me?”

“The retarded, ugly man called you a bitch. Keeee-rist!”

At which point I walked away, further up the platform to get away from her. Because with my luck she’d want to throw down, whip out a taser, shock me until I fell onto the tracks and then the train would come. That’s how this shit goes, it seems. I still have no idea what show she even meant! But I do hope we all learn a lesson from this:

THE HELLO KITTY EARRING

RESPECT IT!

One day, when I was a kid, I looked at the TV and asked why my grandmother was on it, on an awards show. Not the grandmother who caused me to electrocute myself, fall off a six foot ladder and then stepped on my head while laughing about it – no the mean, crazy one I didn’t like.

Of course my grandmother wasn’t on TV. Her doppelganger was. The one person in the universe who looked exactly like her, to a scary degree. The person who would confuse me when I saw images, even today.

Yes, I’m talking about George Burns.

It’s very odd when your grandmother, the crazy drunk, looks like George Burns. First of all you never really learn to enjoy the “Oh God” movies. Not ever. Secondly, well there’s the problem that your grandmother looks like a tiny draper man. It’s disconcerting at first.

Of course then you get older and realize a bigger problem:

They both kinda look like E.T.

I present you with the best (and simultaneously worst) weapon yet invented by man! Yes, this is the weapon of myth, the weapon of “What, seriously?” and the weapon of glory all rolled into one! I give you: THE SHARK KNIFE!

I did not create, do not own and have nothing to do with the Shark Knife. Except that I offer it my love and respect. For it is the Shark Knife, and to wield it is to wield glory and shame at the same time. A magical weapon indeed!