MP3 Philosophy

Playing on the MP3 Player: "You Always Hurt the One you Love" by Brenda
Lee

Philosophical Realization: What a stupid song. If you loved them you
wouldn't hurt them. I think it's more like "The One You Love Always Hurts
You."

Episode 11-15-2002: Where I Pick Up Hitchhikers

I was living in Springfield, Mo., at the time, working the evening shift at the News-Leader.
I get off work one night just as the bars downtown are closing, and as I'm driving home, two men carrying cups (of what I assume was, well, alcohol) stumble into the street in front of my car. So I stop to let them pass, not realizing that the path they are intent on following was still on the road.
At the point they finally get off to the side of the road, they have their thumbs out in the classic "hey, give us a ride -- we're drunk, dammit" position, and I pull up even with them.
I roll down my window, which they take as a sign that I'm going to help them, and crowd around my window, much like animals at a drive-through park waiting to get fed.
"Hey, we need a rrrrrrride. Can you give us a rrrrrrrrrrrrrride?"
This is the taller, bigger and swarthier of the two talking. When I'd first spotted them, in fact, my first thought was that he looked like my brother.
He puts his arm around his slighter friend, a guy who looked, now that I think of it, like a miniature version of a guy I'd gone to high school with, all freckles-on-pasty-skin and red hair and oddly bulbous features.
"I's his 21st birthday ... and i's COLD!"
(Author's note 1: He really did pronounce "it's" as "i's")
(Author's note 2: It WAS cold. In fact, I think the low was to be maybe 28 degrees that night.)
"I'd really like to help you out," I sayid, "but I don't have enough room for both of you."
I gesture to my back seat, which is full of bags from a recent visit home, a box of food my nana who starved herself to death a month later had insisted we take with us the last time we had visited her, and the ubiquitous generic crap that never makes it from my car to the house.
"Oh, c'mon," Swarthy Boy says. "I's his BIRTHDAY."
"An' I'm drunk," Mini-Carrot Top pipes up.
Swarthy Boy chimes in again: "An' i's not that far ... an' I can sit in back."
This is funny and not at all scary, just weird in a Bermuda Triangle-in-downtown-Springfield kind of way.
What the hell ...
"Sure, fine," I say, "but one of you" - I point to the smaller one -- "is going to have to sit on the other one's lap" -- and I point to the bigger one.
They grin and run around to the passenger side of the car.
Swarthy Boy opens the back door and looks a the massive amount of crap there, and says what shall resound through the ages as one of the Ultimate Truths, one of the declarative statements that echoes through philosophy books that are studied for eons:
"You got a lot of crap in your car."
Yes, well ...
"That's why one of you's gonna have to sit on the other's lap."
SO Swarthy Boy sits in the passenger seat, and Mini-Carrot Top gets in on top of him.
They get situated and shut the door, at which point Mini-Carrot Top looks over at me: "I's my birthday. I'm 21 today."
So off we go, them giving me directions, me thinking what I'll do if they suddenly say, "Hey, by the way, we live in Arkansas."
I turn up the heat.
Swarthy Boy: "Thank you, thank you. I's his birthday and i's cold and we're druuuuunk."
Me: "Hey, no problem. Besides, the last thing you want on a birthday is to get hypothermia."
Swarthy Boy: "That's right. You don' wanna get hypothermia on your birthday."
That's Mini-Carrot Top's cue. "I's my birthday. I'm 21 an' my head's in a windshield."
(Author's note 3: His head was indeed in the windshield.)
(Author's note 4: At this point, I'm hoping against hope that Mini-Carrot Top won't puke in my car.)
Me: "So, how are you now?"
Swarthy Boy: "We're druuuuuuuuuuuuunk, and we were walking home, an' i's cold, did you know i's cold, and we were hopin' we'd get a ride from some sweet woman, an' here you are."
Awwww ...
The radio is tuned to the regional Old Tyme Music station, one that usually plays standards from the '40s through the '70s, but right now, it's the jazz hour. I don't remember exactly what's playing, but it's definitely jazz.
Swarthy Boy: "Do you like jazz?"
Me: "Who doesn't?"
Swarthy Boy: "I like jazz." (long pause) "I like whacking off to it."
Mini-Carrot Top: "He whacks off the jazz music."
Me: "I can understand that. It has a good beat, but it's kind of sassy at the same time."
Swarthy Boy: "I wanna whack off now."
Mini-Carrot Top: "Dude, I'm on your lap."
And indeed, he is.
Swarthy Boy looks around the car and into the back seat.
"You should clean your car."
I'll take that under advisement, since we're all such buddies now. God forbid my car not meet the oh-so-high-and-lofty standards of a couple of downtown Springfield hitchhikers.
Mini-Carrot Top: "I's my birthday."
(Author's note 5: Nov. 15 is the birthday of some random miniature version of Carrot Top who lives in Springfield, Mo.)
Swarthy Boy: "You should blow him."
Me: "Maybe not, but thanks all the same."
Swarthy Boy: "But i's his birthday."
Me: "Yeah, but all the same, not quite thinking that's going to happen. Besides" -- I gesture toward a stain at the crotch of Mini-Carrot Top's shirt -- "judging by that stain, it looks like someone already got there."
Mini-Carrot Top (looking down in wonder): "There's somethin' on my shir'!"
Swarthy Boy: "Dude, that's where I spilled beer on you." (to me) "C'mon, blow him."
Me: "Judging by the state you're in, I think it'd be a case of the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak."
(Author's note 6: At this point, I'm thinking, If you guys were sober, you'd be thinking this was one hell of a funny conversation.")
By this point, we're closing in on their home.
They point me down a one-way street (going the wrong way, of course, kind of symbolic of the whole trip, actually), point at a house that's all lit up and has the front door open, and I pull up to it and stop.
Whatever, I think.
Even if it's not a house they know, or even belong to, once they get out of my car, I figure my Karmic Credit Plan's paid up for awhile.
Mini-Carrot Top opens the passenger door and gets out.
Mini-Carrot Top: "Than' you."
Me: "Have a happy rest of your birthday."
Mini-Carrot Top flutters his fingers and goes to the house.
I look at Swarthy Boy.
Swarthy Boy: "He'd have a better birthday if you blow him."
Me: "Yeah, no, not so much that's going to happen."
Swarthy Boy: "OK."
He gets out of the car, the leans back in, his hands on the seat. Then he bends down even further and picks up an empty Diet Coke bottle that's on the floor.
He looks at it, turning it a little, then drops it.
"You gotta clean your car. I's a fuckin' pigsty."
And with that, he shuts the door and walks into the night, leaving behind nothing but the astounding truth of his final statement lingering in the air as any proof that he'd been there at all.

Found on amazon.com

This was on the page for Motley Crue's "Red, White & Crue":

Not The Complete Hitz!! Support Emo And Nu-Medal Instead!!!, August 22, 2005
Reviewer: Fred Dursts Numba One Fann (The Ghetto's of Guam) - See all my reviews

Yo yo my peeps, how ya'll be hangin' dis nite?? I recently purchased this album expecting all kind of killa hitz from Motley Crew, boy was I let down by the track listing they chose!! Come on now, just how the hekk can ya have a Motley Crew compilation and not include timeless hitz like "Round And Round", "Lovin' You's A Dirty Job", "Lay It Down", "Back For More", "You're In Love", "Wanted Man", "Way Cool Jr.", "Slip Of The Lip", "Body Talk", "Lack Of Communication", "I Want A Woman" and "Nobody Rides For Free"!!! The rekord company really let us down here peeps, so look to today's awesome talent in the music fields of emo, pop-punk, ghetto rapp and of course nu-medal!! This Vince Pearcy guy isn't really the best singer around, and the rest of the band dress dark and wear make-up just cuz Good Charlotte and My Chemical Romance made it cool to do it on TRL!!! You'll thank me later when you let go of this old, wacked out musik and suport the likes of Limp Bizzkit, Linkin Park, KoRn, Slipknot, Mudvayne, Disturbed, Atreyu, Trapt, Papa Roach, Kidd Rokk, Staind, Good Charlotte, Weezer, My Chemical Romance, Simple Plan, Nelly, Chingy, Ja Rule, 50 Cent, U$her, Juvenile, Ludacris, the funny yet brutal Green Day and those silly cowboys---Toby Keith, Garth Brooks and the cute Kenny Chesney-Zwellwigger!! Peace out my girls, girls, girls...

For someone who goes on to dismiss Motley Crue, he sure knows a lot about songs they left off this set.
And while he's "Fred Dursts Numba One Fann," he can't even spell that name of Durst's band correctly (in fact, spelling it incorrectly even differently than it's correctly spelled incorrectly).
And it kind of sickens me that he thinks male band members in makeup started with Good Charlotte and My Chemical Romance on TRL.

Holy crap. If I actually thought this person was for real, I'd have to laugh in his face for his stupidity and weep at the culture that created him.

Weird-ass KISS dream

In this dream, my mom, dad and I are going to Maine with my Uncle Henry so he can visit some people he went to college with. When we get there, it turns out that they're the parents of the original KISS members, who are living together in a small apartment a la "The Monkees."
So, my mom, dad and Uncle Henry go to visit with my uncle's friends, leaving me in KISS' apartment.
The apartment is in a converted Victorian house, maybe on the second floor.
There are plants hung '70s style in macrame baskets all over the room.
One wall of their living room is book shelves top to bottom, and there's an entertainment center with a huge TV right in the center. There's a couch right in front of the shelves facing the TV.
The wall to the right has two windows that lead out to the fire escape, a huge iron staircase and "balcony" that overlooks the parking lot and a back alley. The dining table is on the back wall under another two windows.
And on the wall to the left, the wall with the front door, is a bar.
Whereas the wall with the TV has shelves full of books, this wall is top to bottom BOOZE.
This looks like the wet bar that Dudley Moore's character in "Foul Play" would have had, down to a mirror behind the liquor shelves.
It's Bacchus' downfall.
I'm sitting on one end of the couch watching TV when in walk KISS.
Two of them head behind the bar to mix drinks, one sits on a bar stool and starts playing with a caged bird at the end of the bar, and Gene Simmons (OF COURSE I recognize Gene Simmons) comes and sits at the other end of the couch to portion out marijuana into baggies to sell.
He scowls at me when I try to talk to him, so I just sit back to watch TV.
Eventually, he just sort of grunts and tosses a joint to me.
I thank him, and he just grunts again.
I light it up and get two good lungfuls when half the pot falls out of the rolling paper onto my shirt.
From out of nowhere, a kitten hops on my lap, eats some of the pot and IMMEDIATELY just takes off rocketing around the apartment. Were this a cartoon, you'd see clouds of dust kicked up as the speedy cat blurred itself into oblivion.
For some reason, this INFURIATES Gene Simmons, who stands up and starts bitching about why did I do that and how did I let that happen.
I stand up, too, noticing that he's much shorter than I thought, and as the cat starts weaving figure 8s around our legs, I'm struck by the realization that the cats was ALL OVER the pot.
And that seems curious.
I point at Gene.
"YOU'RE CUTTING THE POT WITH CATNIP!"
He stamps his feet, frightening the cat.
"NO, I'M NOT!"
"You ARE! You MUST BE! There's no reason the cat would have done that ..."
His roommates are enjoying the show as Gene just gets madder and madder.
Finally, he gives up, and reminds his roommates, "We gotta go find my sister."
Turns out, his younger sister (played in this dream by my friend Meredith) had run away and he and KISS have to go find her.

Regarding weird band names

Further evidence of the weirdness of people in bands these are real band names:
* Throwdown
* Turmoil
* Most Precious Blood
* Remembering Never
* The Agony Scene
* Scars of Tomorrow
* At All Cost
* From Autumn To Ashes
* Rise Against

"Honky"

This guy I work with got sent to cover a shooting and when he was trying to interview the dead guy's survivors, they got really upset and some guy called my co-worker a "mother-fucking honky."

I didn't even know people still used that word as an insult. I'm not sure if that means that I CANNOT just start calling people "honky" instead of, say, "dude," or if I SHOULD start using it to show that I'm "owning" the word and that therefore it can't be used to insult me.
I also thought it was funny because it's just so obvious. I mean, this guy is so white, he's clear, for crying out loud.

Testing this out

Apparently, I'm supposed to be able to post by sending stuff to an e-mail address. I tried this before with NO success. Fingers crossed for this.

Remake fever

Touchstone Pictures has picked up "Blowback," a buddy action comedy with Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Ryan Reynolds attached. The high-concept project is being described as a modern-day "Lethal Weapon." The two main characters are San Francisco cops.

I thought "Lethal Weapon" WAS a modern-day "Lethal Weapon."

The tale of the flickering light

For months, the fluorescent light above my desk has had a slight, but constant flicker.
I think it's getting more and more depressing, like Fight Club depressing where suddenly the flickering light is occupying my every workday thought.
In my mind, I keep closing in on it and it's getting bigger and bigger and bigger, like an unchecked tumor pushing on my brain.
I imagine that the walls are that weird medical green and that there's a fly stuck somewhere, its buzzing accompanying the flicker in some Teddy Ruxpin-ish symbiosis.
It's funny how right before people go completely nuts in movies, they achieve exactly the same sense of clarity to where they notice crap like bugs caught in lights and stuff like that.

Wonder when I'm going to snap ...

:)

High hopes

Apparently from the World Entertainment News Network:

Sylvester Stallone's mother Jackie is urging movie beauty Angelina Jolie to play her in a film the Rambo star is making about her colourful life.
The celebrity astrologer has worked as a circus rider, a trapeze artist, a dermatologist, a trainer of two psychic dogs and appeared on British reality TV show Celebrity Big Brother earlier this year (05).
And her doting son insists her experiences would make a gripping movie, particularly if the Tomb Raider star gives in to his mother's demands, reports British newspaper the Daily Mail.
An insider says, "Jackie's adamant. She wants to be played by Angelina Jolie."

As long as we're playing the laughably improbable card, I want Nicole Kidman to play me.

Truth in advertising?

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - David Arquette and Richard T. Jones will save the world in a real-time CBS TV movie tentatively titled "Time Bomb."

Considering it's starring David Arquette, maybe the name should just be "Bomb."

FREAK OUTS!

My parents have had a ton of stuff in storage for me since I moved to California in January 2003.
About three days ago, my mom sends me this FRANTIC e-mail talking about how she's trying to get rid of some junk while keeping the important stuff, and she knows my my sister wants to get in the storage shed to get some stuff and wouldn't it be nice to be able to move all the stuff to a smaller storage shed, basically saying she wants me to come home and go through it all and toss some stuff and freak out freak out freak out.
So I frantically try to figure out when we could go out there and deal with it and money for tickets and when could my boyfriend and I take off work and I send her e-mails about plans and options and freak out freak out freak out.
And she's not responding to my e-mails or calling back or anything and I'm getting more and more frantic.
So I FINALLY talk to her and she's like, "I said that? I must have been having a bad day!"

Dead frog, red eye

I found a dead frog inside our apartment! Gross! I'd moved one of the cat beds and saw a shadow there. At first, I thought/hoped it was a leaf, but the Kansas in me said, "Hope all you want, but guess what, that's a frog shape." The light in the room it was in is bad, but I sure as heck didn't want to touch it, so I (in typical Kate fashion) contented myself with taking picture after picture of it to satisfy my curiosity and confirm that it was indeed a dead frog, then waited for Dave to come home and clean it up. (That may sound stereotypical and sexist, but the deal is that I deal with spiders and bugs, and he gets the amphibians. Considering he's so tall he ends up getting the bugs that are too high for me to get, I'm sure I'm getting the better of the deal.)

After we found the frog, I went on a massive cleaning jag (a FROG, for crying out loud) and burst a blood vessel in my eye while moving furniture. Nothing was wrong, it just looked bad!

My "Seinfeld" episode idea

Jerry does something to some woman while ______ (fill in the blank. Maybe they're in line at the dry cleaner's, or he steals a parking space from her but thinks he deserved it, whatever). That woman knows Elaine but doesn't know Jerry, so she complains to Elaine about Jerry. Jerry's talking to Kramer about this run-in with the random person when Elaine comes in and starts complaing about what this rude guy did to her friend.
Then Elaine gets the idea to set up Jerry and this random friend up on a blind date.
Jerry and the woman meet at the restaurant but don't realize that they're the blind date duo, but recognize each other from the run-in, so start fighting again about _______(the place in line, who was at the dry cleaner's first, who deserved the parking space, whatever).
So they're fighting and Elaine shows up to spy on the blind date.
Obviously it's going poorly. The random woman storms out, leaving Jerry and Elaine alone.
And then some clever ending.

Dark and sad

Some record coompany that has a boatload of those "rah rah, kill kill, die die die" types of bands is having an all-star tribute CD in the fall. I think all these bands are a bit too aggressive for most people, so I wonder who's going to buy it.
The bands have names like Life Of Agony and Coal Chamber and songs like "Tired 'N Lonely," "Annihilation by the Hand of God" and "The Enemy."
And I'm not making those up.
It would be easy to say there was a band called At the Devil's Right Hand or something like that to scare you, but the fact that a band actually sat down and decided to call itself Life of Agony is bizarre.
I just have to think that those people are just like, "Hmm, what sounds really nasty that we can be all posy and dark about? I know! Pus-Filled Heart! That's AWESOME!"
And that's just sad.

Weird dream

I meet Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson in a mall bar, then we go to see "Wedding Crashers." We are the only people in the theater.
In the theater next door are the contestants from "I Want to be a Hilton," and I take pics of them as they ham it up for the camera. Then I go back to watch the movie with Ben and Owen.
We had left our coats at the bar, so we have to go to the security office to get them.
So, we're in Ben's Gremlin and driving to the office. Ben says it's closed and they won't give them to us. I say, "I'm a girl, I'll charm them into giving me the jackets."
So, I get back his jacket (a black leather jacket with fringe), but the office ends up giving me a better coat, a light leather duster. Owen gets a midnight blue tuxedo jacket with shiny lapels and pocket edges.
As we're driving off, I tell them that they have to meet Dave because they'd think he was a funny guy.

Wow. 'Dukes of Hazzard' sucks and the AP's peeved they aren't getting to review it

Here's a note the Associated Press sent out. Check out the wording:

We will not have a film review of “The Dukes of Hazzard.” To suppress critical coverage, the studio prevented critics from seeing the movie in time for AP to write our review.

The AP

Usually, they just say, "Such-and-such movie was not available to review."

I wonder if this was written by some young editor who rode a "Dukes of Hazzard" Big Wheel down his sloping front yard, carving with his stops a doughnut groove into the area in front of the stone wall at the bottom of the hill, and so feels betrayed by the studio's choice.
Damn, it's gonna be bad.
But it's the casting that confuses me. Not Seann William Scott and Johnny Knoxville, who are funny and seem to have real personalities and you can see how they'd mesh well as Bo and Luke Duke. Willie Nelson has a great personality too, and seems perfectly cast as Uncle Jesse. Plus he's a rebel. And even Burt Reynolds has shown that he has the edge and williness to overplay Boss Hogg.
No, what confuses me is the casting of Jessica Simpson. Sure, she has a personality, but not much of one beyond being her Svengali father's Barbie.
I mean, she playacts at being dumber than she is, but she's not even smart enough to play dumb well.

Euphoria on a Monday morning

Hearing "White Lines" on the radio on the way to work.