Summertime Blues

When one of your main outlets in life is writing about what’s on television, not for fame, not for money, but for the purpose of sharing it with nine of the greatest preferred readers an aspiring writer could ever hope for, the summer can be a dark, desolate time. Oh sure, I should be at the beach, at a baseball game, or doing something else outside in the fucking sweltering soupy mass of shit that is summer weather. But being the semi-hermit that I purport myself to be, I often prefer to tuck myself away in my home, blinds drawn, air conditioner at full blast, and enjoy some mind-numbingly poor television. Yes, the networks are in reruns during most of the summer, save for the new crop of reality-based dogs that they’ve marched out:

• Dancing with the Stars: Not to dwell on this since I’ve covered it before, but I’m not sure I could come up with a less interesting concept than watching washed up pseudo-celebrities demonstrating newly acquired ballroom dancing skills in front of the post-Saget, post-Fuentes host of America’s Funniest Home Videos, three judges you’ve never heard of and an audience of people with what seems to be a ridiculous amount of free time on their hands, even if you were to rip off my fingernails and dip my hands in bleach, only allowing me to take them out when I came up with a less interesting concept. How’s that for hyperbole?

• I Want to Be a Hilton: Or, as I like to say, I want to piss on the legacy that my family has created in order to get rich and gain acceptance into a family with two members whose only claim to fame is that they are rich Hiltons. Oh, and performing fellatio on tape, but who am I to judge?

• The Scholar: With the success of their Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, ABC just can’t pass up an opportunity to tug at our collective heart strings. What better way than to take a bunch of kids who want to go to college and fuck with their minds by dangling a scholarship in front of their faces while making them demonstrate their prowess in such critical areas as oral examinations and school spirit? As Principal Skinner told the children of Springfield Elementary as they prepared to accompany their parents to work: “This is your chance to apply your knowledge of gym and fractions to the real world!”

• Hell’s Kitchen: Hey look, it’s another show where an insufferable prick puts a bunch of spineless shits with no sense of self-worth through complete misery in hopes of winning a vaguely ambiguous contest! And it’s on Fox, no less! What will they think of next?

As you can see, there’s oh-so-much to choose from that I hardly know what to do with myself. Do I watch Evander Holyfield do the waltz? Do I cringe as seemingly normal people vie for a chance to be part of the Hilton clan? Or watch some pimply-faced nerdlingers compete for the right to become clear-faced nerdlinger college graduates free of charge? Or watch some Australian asshole shove plates of spaghetti into the chest of one of his young charges? So much quality entertainment, so little time.

That’s why I haven’t touched any of this shit with a ten foot pole – I can honestly say that I’ve watched a grand total of 11 minutes of all of these shows combined, and 8 of those minutes were spent seething with rage at the fact that fucking Trista is still on fucking TV!!! But the summer has not been a total loss when it comes to quality television programming. Take, for example, MTV’s True Life. Now, I know what the nine of you are thinking right now: “Who wrote this blog piece and what have they done with our good friend J?” No, it’s still me, folks – and to prove it, here’s a little sidebar rant that could only come my twisted mind:

I am sick and fucking tired of all the jocksniffing sports talkers on local radio, national radio, national TV and even online harping about what a weak division the White Sox play in (for those of you who couldn’t give a shit, it’s the AL Central), yet these same folks are just as quick to shove their noses straight up the ass of the AL East, simply because this division houses America’s “darlings” the Boston Red Sox, and America’s favorite enemy, the New York Yankees. Yet if one were to compare each division from the bottom up, one might see an interesting trend:

• Royals-Devil Rays: Everyone says the Sox and the Twins have the best chance of making the playoffs because they get to beat up on the Royals. But last I checked I wasn’t even sure if the Devil Rays had any major league players on their roster. Granted they can beat the Yankees, but the Royals have a World Series Championship, and in my mind that gives them the edge. So, if one truly wanted to argue about the absolute futility of a division’s bottom feeder, I would look no further than the team with the ugliest uniforms, stadium and city in America.

• Tigers-Blue Jays: The Battle of Windsor, Ontario. As of the writing of this mad rambling, the Tigers stood ½ game better than the Blue Jays, whose entire 1993 squad got a blanket gonorrhea wish from yours truly. Joe Carter and Dave Stewart can rot in hell for all I care.

• Indians-Yankees: In theory, the Yankees are the deeper, more loaded team. In theory, Communism works.

• Twins-Orioles: These teams are separated by a percentage point in the standings, but who would you rather face with the game on the line: Torii Hunter or head case Sammy Sosa? Yeah, me too…

• White Sox-Red Sox: Yes, they’re the defending champs. Yes, they are really heating up. Yes, they put themselves at risk of countless barbs from homophobic fans across the nation with their recent appearance on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. Yes, every bandwagon jumper within reasonable distance has become a member of the severely jingoistic Red Sox Nation. Still, it’s tough to argue against the BEST RECORD IN THE MAJOR LEAGUES.

So there you have it – don’t even get me started on the other divisions. It’s time to stop this irrational prejudice against the AL Central – wake up, America!

Where was I? Oh, right – True Life on MTV. Basically, this is a chance to peer inside the life of someone who’s got shit a lot worse than you do, which as we all know makes us feel superior, high-and-mighty, above others, and all that other healthy stuff. Each episode is framed from the mind of the individuals it focuses on (typically someone ranging in age from 16-26 – Generation Y, I presume), and this frame is typically summed up with one simple sentence – for example, the episodes I have watched are as follows:

• I am on a diet.
• I am poor.
• I moved back in with my parents.
• I am obese.

Yikes – they should have just grouped them together and called the show “I wish someone would bash my skull in and end my misery.” But for all the times I’ve criticized MTV in the past, I have to say that this is a fascinating show. “I’m on a diet” featured stories ranging from a high school wrestler – you know, the freakish kind who runs 7 hours a day in a silver jumpsuit and eats 4 grains of rice in order to make weight – to a 250 lb girl who had admittedly “let myself go a bit” and wanted to lose some weight before heading off to Cancun with her friends, and then just about died on the spot when her nutritionist told her it might be a good idea if she stopped eating potato chips. No shit, you mean putting more saturated fat into my 250 lb frame WON’T help me lose weight? I’m FLAB-ergasted! (I’ll be here all week).

“I am poor” was much more depressing, as we watched a couple with a collective credit score of about 2 apply for a new apartment and almost shit themselves with excitement when the landlord didn’t require a full month’s rent as a security deposit, as well as a girl who planned to go back to high school as soon as she got a car to get there with, but she needed to work in order to buy a car, but she needed a car to get to most of the places she could work, and she got fired from the one place she could work without having a car (a bar waitress job) because she decided to show up on her night off and smoke pot in the bar. And yes, she was from the South.

The only thing I took from “I moved back in with my parents” was that, God willing and even though I love them to death, I hope I never have to move back in with my parents. Maybe it was watching the one kid who had quit his job at the bagel shop because it interfered with an art show compete with his father in a Beer Hunt on Easter Sunday. Now I may be wrong, but I believe the South was somehow involved once again.

Finally, “I am obese” featured morbidly obese people who, for example couldn’t fit in a regulation size school desk. In fact, one featured lady was in such trouble (500+ lbs) that all she could really do was sit on her couch and eat. It didn’t help that her husband (a saint of a man) began the process of cooking her dinner by filling a deep frying pan with about three quarters of a bottle of Wesson oil, but hey, at least he knew enough to watch out for those pesky carbs when he went shopping! And the campaign of misinformation continues.

What did I learn from this MTV experience? I learned that there are a lot of people who are worse off than me. I learned that MTV’s commercial breaks are longer than each segment of their half-hour shows. I learned that there is a tampon out there that’s both comfortable and absorbent. And I learned that the Real World has become nothing more than an excuse to throw a bunch of young, sexed up people together in the hopes they will have sex. Hats off to you, Generation Y – thanks to you, the future is a dark, desolate place!

Until next time...

Seize This, Honkus

No friends, I write to you today not about the great film that is History of the World Part I, specifically the delightful scene where the uncircumcised Gregory Hines tries to pass himself off as Jewish so he won’t get sent to the lions. Rather, I refer to yet another blow to the common man. Sadly, it is now official that the Supreme Court has dropped the ball twice in the same month. First, it was the buzzkilling dick move of shooting down medical marijuana. Now CNN.com is reporting that the no-so-high court has ruled in a 5-4 decision that “local governments may seize people’s homes or businesses – even against their will – for private economic development.” The case stems from complaints issued by New London, CT residents who were challenging that municipality’s right to seize their riverfront homes in order to build a hotel, health club and offices.

In this humble madman’s twisted mind, this means that, as long as you are able to exert a significant amount of influence in local government, you can basically bully those who don’t have the resources or knowledge necessary to fight your assertion that what you’re doing is for the “benefits of the community, including – but by no means limited to – new jobs and increased tax revenue,” as misguided Justice Paul Stevens blathered on in his majority opinion, out of their property so that you and your golf buddies can pad the coffers with a few extra dollars. Justices Scalia, O’Connor, Rehnquist and Thomas stood on the dissenting side (the latter three also the dissenters in the medical marijuana case). This makes me want to marry O’Connor, cure Rehnquist’s cancer, and overlook the fact that Thomas once put one of his pubic hairs on a Coke can as he sexually harassed his secretary. But sadly, they were not to be the victors in this case.

Well, this being America I can’t just stand by and let this get me down – I should “capitalize” on this new opportunity, shouldn’t I? I should play with the hand that’s dealt and make the best of it. That is why I am announcing my grand plans for a hotel/resort/shopping area in my hometown of Elmhurst, IL. Hey, since the Supreme Court didn’t specify that the community in question had to be depressed, why not go straight for an affluent suburb? I figure I could gather up some political influence, gather some capital and buy up every damn house in Mexicali Valley, the neighborhood of working class Hispanic, Greek and Eastern European families near my old neighborhood. That’ll work perfect, seeing as I’ll need maids for my hotels, managers to run my restaurants and folks to clean my office building!

I can see it now – my future employees and their families weeping at the front doors of their former homes as I lead a ribbon cutting ceremony from atop a bulldozer – how proud my investors and the local politicians whose pockets I’ve greased will be as they see new jobs and tax revenue popping up right before their eyes! And maybe they’ll use that tax revenue to subsidize housing for the folks they’ve misplaced – or maybe not. Hey, the Supreme Court says that those local politicians know what’s best for their constituency, so let them figure it out!

My resort will be awesome! I’m also planning on putting in a theme park that will feature people who have been uprooted and forced out throughout history – we’ll have Jewland, Kurdland, Palestineland, Serbland – it’ll be fun for the whole family! There’ll also be the Rockin’ Rumblin’ Refugee Camp, which is a place where the kiddies can run around in search of a new home for their family! Won’t that be exciting? And just like Six Flags has the loveable Looney Toons characters, my theme park will have its own cast of miscreants running about: Big Banker Bob (the overfed financier of the project), Mayor Valiant (the brave politician who exerted his clout in city council to force the other councilman to vote for approval of the plan), Dirk the Developer (who, like the beloved Bob the Builder, likes to bulldoze things – for example, people’s homes that were taken by brute force and clout money), and Ronnie the Refugee (that homeless scamp who’s always causing trouble by speaking up at city council meetings, squatting on his property and other silly home-saving measures). Yes folks, it’ll be fun for the whole family.

So after thinking it through, I think this property seizure thing might not be such a bad thing after all – as long as there’s money to be made, it’s gotta be good!

Until next time…

Off the Deep End...

...and into a full-page newspaper advertisement near you, it's Chicago's favorite son, severely misguided, heavily-medicated, grunge rocker extraordinaire - Billy Corgan!

Yes, folks, those of us here in The Greatest City in the World got a real treat yesterday when we opened our Chicago Tribunes to find a full page ad from BC himself touting the release of his new CD, excuse me, solo album "TheFutureEmbrace". Is it one word? Is it three? Whatever it is, I now have the urge to embrace the future. Or is it to look forward to a future embrace - I'm not sure.

Hey, it's easy to get lost when you step inside the mind of Mr. Corgan. A while back I begged you to go read his insane ramblings (not to be confused with these mad ramblings) at mySpace.com/BillyCorgan - oh what fun you'll have! Now, as if exposing himself as a disturbed young man on a sparsely-read website (I know it seems like I'm referring to myself again, but rest assured I am not), Bill feels the need to try and reach the readership of the Tribune in an effort to scream, "Look at me! Hug me! Love me!" Desperate times call for desperate measures, I suppose.

Let's break down the ad, shall we? Bill tells us that the day of said ad is "a special day in my life" because he has a solo album coming out. I seem to recall when Paul McCartney took out a full-page ad in the London Daily Mail about how special a day it was when he released "McCartney" - OK, that never happened. Neither did Sir Paul waiting 5 years after his first band's break up to put out more music, but I digress. Bill is excited because his "very first solo album" was coming out - not to be confused with his very first diary or his very first wet dream - special times, each and every one.

He then tells us that his album's "embers bear witness to [Chicago's] unique soul" - which of course tells me it has overtones of corrupt government, racial strife and shitty sports teams. Bill then goes on a wonderful "look where I get to go" name dropping rant about his return from Europe, and his future plans to travel to such exotic locales as Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Atlanta! Bring me back a souvenir, if you please!

Next, we are informed that "'TheFutureEmbrace' is an album of hope, and represents fully my desire to make music to stand and fight for." I guess that's better than making music you'd want to stand up and fight against, such as anything by Bruce Springsteen, John Mellencamp or The Eagles. Given that he's also writing his life story online (see aforementioned website), it's evident that "this truly has been a creative time for me, with many new revelations". One can only sit and wonder what majestic hallucinations Paxil might bring to all of us!

As he begins talking about his decision to reunite Smashing Pumpkins (fans of 1994 rejoice!), he gives his reasoning for the reunion plans: "What I have been really trying to do is find that same kid again, the one who believed he could change the world with a song." I believe that's already been done, Bill - that 1971 Coke song changed the world into a hellish utopia where non-drug-using hippies hold hands and drink toxic liquids on mountain tops.

Seeing as Bill "naively tried to start a new band," the only cure seemed to be to "move back home to heal what was broken in me" (read: his brain) "and to my surprise I found what I was looking for." After announcing that his plan is to revive the Pumpkins (I still can't believe James Iha would even be available!), Bill pours his heart out: "I want my band back, and my songs, and my dreams." Well, as reader Jeremy points out: "I would like the $12.50 I paid for Siamese Dream back." Sadly, we can't always get what we want, not even our dreams. Sniff.

Per Bill's closing, "there is so much work to do, and as always, so little time!" That being said, I better get back to doing something more important than reading money-wasting ads placed by mentally disturbed malcontents.

"Rock on, and may God bless you!" Or, to put it another way...

Until next time...

Tales from the Lost Semester - Volume 2

Where the Happy People Meet…

College is full of important decisions: Keystone Light or Special Export? Study or party? Dorm food or Free Flow? Kam’s or Bub’s? Bong or bowl? However important these decisions were to me during the Lost Semester, none was more important than solving the following two-part riddle:

Should I stay in the dorms with my freakishly tall douchebag of a roommate, or should I move into the fraternity house? And, if I should choose to move into the house, who will I live with?

These are two of the major questions I was asking myself during first semester as I earned a D in Psychology 101 – do I move from the partial freedom of the dorms, where I have started to make some good friends who don’t happen to be in the same fraternity as me? Or do I dive deep into the anarchy that is a fraternity house – a place where the booze flows and the doobage is plentiful; a place where slack lurks around every corner; a place that remains a vile, filthy den of inequity, at least until the next pledge class arrives to be handed their shit duties? Well, given my roommate situation, and given the fact that I was busted in the dorms in week 2 of my college experience with 6 other guys in a room with 4 open beers and had to attend an alcohol counseling class as a result, this decision became rather easy (at worst, I figured I’d get in trouble at the house for having 7 people in a room and not having more than 4 beers).

The second part of this equation also seemed pretty easy. There were several good guys in my pledge class, yet only a few who were willing to make the leap to fraternity house living right away – most of my fellow pledgemates were too interested in remaining at Forbes Hall in U of I’s glorious Six Pack of dorms (where I hailed from – 469 Hopkins, aw yeah) to see if they could break the all time dorm floor record for dollars in damage inflicted during a school year – and two of those making the leap stood out as the logical choices for my roommates: CS, who you might remember as the B student from the Paper Writing Scandal, and a fine young South Sider we will call “Pops”.

For starters, we were the three bona fide stoners in our pledge class – the guys who would attend a line up at midnight (for the uninitiated – that’s where the “sergeant at arms” “lines up” the “pledges” in order to “haze” them by making them do push ups and wall sits while other “actives” look on to laugh at/yell at/ridicule you – so as you can see, there’s a real allure to joining a fraternity) and hang around afterwards so we could pull tubes with our already-initiated friends. We set the bar quite “high” for the ’96 pledge class, and we lived up to our reputations like champs. Naturally, our initial reaction was to have the three of us go in on a room together – we all had the same interests (dope, baseball, booze) and even though it was a 2:1 Sox Fan-Cubs Fan ratio, we felt that it was a match made in heaven! However, late in Semester One, we got word that our good friend (we’ll call him “Silky”) was going on, ahem, academically-imposed hiatus for a semester, leaving a spot open in another room with two sophomores: Sadahara and The Big O. Seeing as Pops was good friends pre-college with Big O, he stepped right into the open slot, which left just me and CS, with room for one more. Enter the wild card – the Miser.

(Sidenote: The Miser was not a cheapskate. Sadahara is not a Japanese guy. The Big O refers not to an orgasm. As I mentioned, I need to leave a little bit to the imagination here – those who know the stories and the people will know exactly who I’m referring to – those who don’t know can either a) do some hardcore research to find out who I’m talking about, or b) let it read like fiction and not give a shit who’s who and what’s what. Some semblance of secrecy must be maintained – YITBOS).

Where was I? Ah yes, our good friend Miser. This is a guy who had the distinct honor of making it through pledgeship by doing the absolute minimum required (which of course led him to be admired by dorks like me who always showed up for weekend work duties). In fact, when CS and I lived with him, he was a lowly neophyte – not a pledge, but not yet fully initiated – more on this another time. He was laid back, easygoing, and liked to party just as much as we did. Did I also mention that he was also a black belt in Tae Kwon Do? Yeah, that’s not a bad guy to have on your side. Rumor has it he had a death cry and everything, but no matter how hard CS and I tried, we never did get the full experience with that (probably a good thing). So now that we had determined who we were all going to live with, the next step became finding a vacant room we could take over. The way it worked in our house was that you “bought” your room from the dudes who lived there before you – each room’s price was set at $500, and you could do whatever the hell you wanted with your room once you bought it. So CS, Miser and I scoured the house for open rooms, finally cutting a deal with two super-seniors who were moving out of…Room 23.

Room 23 – just typing it makes me feel a bit inebriated. Now before revealing any of the happenings that occurred within the hallowed halls of Room 23, I must first paint you the image of the place that served as my bedroom, arcade, hash den and general freak out haven, for only then can I truly take you back there with me. The number one thing you need to know is that Room 23 was officially known as the place “where the happy people meet” – we were happy, alright. Given what went on in there, if you walked in uptight, you were sure as hell to walk out a lot more serene, I can tell you that. Now, close your eyes (opening them only to read each paragraph, of course) and let me bring you there…

As you walk in the door (think Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley), a closet appears to your right, and a pseudo-closet with no walls and a dresser wedged in the corner on your left. Clothes crowd the closet racks and litter the floor. Walk through the entry way, and to your immediate left sits a shoddy entertainment center holding the ever-important stereo. The room is slightly bigger than your average second bedroom – let’s call it 18x18. Directly at the back of the room is a wooden loft, going about halfway up the 10 foot ceiling. First and foremost, this is our sleeping quarters. On top of this loft is bed one, a simple twin mattress (Miser). Under the loft to the left sits a nice, comfy waterbed (somehow snagged by the wily CS). To the right, you find a ratty black love seat, our TV with the divot in the top where the incense cone burned through and a taped-on, cut-out graphic from a Wheat Thins box that states: “Baked, Not Fried!”, as well as the glorious cabinet that contained everything a 19-year-old stoner could ever possibly need. Finally, as you peer into the dark recesses underneath the loft, behind the ratty loveseat, sealed off by the big, comfy waterbed, you see a dark, dank, desolate cave containing a mattress with the bare minimum in sleeping amenities (yours truly). A bagger’s delight if there ever was one. Throw in a few posters, a possible tapestry, an Arizona Cardinals lamp (which I once burned CS with – by ACCIDENT), and a Nintendo, and you’re there, man.

Proper seating for one of our multiple party sessions is of paramount importance in Room 23 – if you don’t have one of 3 select seats, you’ve immediately dropped to the second tier. Also, let me assure you there was no preferential seating treatment for the residents of the room – save for CS, who always seems to nab the waterbed/armchair pillow seat, which is the equivalent of the King’s throne (slick bastard!). In the cutthroat world of Room 23 seating, you had better damn well know the phrase “tic-tac”. A seemingly innocent play on words, its mere utterance ensures that your seat is not thrown back to the vultures on the edge of the waterbed, on the loft, or on the floor, provided you returned in a reasonable period of time. The other two rock star seats are naturally the love seat combo, all but guaranteeing its inhabitants the first game of Nintendo should the general populace agree that there doesn’t seem to be jack shit on TV.

As for TV, while it is always on for visual stimulus or Nintendo playing purposes, the primary mode of entertainment in Room 23 is naturally the music – provided you can find something in my shoebox of CDs (probably numbering around 25 at the time) or in CS’s killer record collection – yes, the turntable is fully functional here in Room 23, and thank goodness, because most of our standbys reside on vinyl. If you happen to be one of the curious folk wandering by Room 23 at any given time, aside from the sweet smells emitting from under the door crack, you will likely hear anything from Abbey Road by the Beatles, to the Grateful Dead’s One From the Vault (much to Sadahara’s sheer pleasure, there is a LOT of Dead to be heard here), to Paul’s Boutique, to the Shaft soundtrack, all the way to Disneyland Records’ Scary Haunted House Sound Effects (what am I saying, I’m not even Chinese! – and yes, I’ll ease up on the inside jokes).

Should you decide to pop in and indulge in the pleasures of the happy person’s meeting place, you’ll no doubt be hungry – well, just pick up the phone and call in a Late Night Special – the medium, one-topping pizza that CS and I made our meal at least three nights a week. Or feel free to stagger in late night looking for a little something to enhance the flavor of that La Bamba burrito you’re about to enjoy. Of course, if the Kitchen Manager passes out drunk or is struggling with a near heart attack because he just ingested 14 ephedrine, you could always steal his key and head down to the kitchen where all kinds of cereal, grade B lunchmeat and canned food goodness awaits you!

Now to the important part. Go ahead and open up that little cabinet of tricks. Maui, wow-wee, what do we have here? Being an experienced craftsman, I’m sure you can appreciate the fine set of tools you see before you. Do you prefer a bowl, a hitter, the Aquapipe, or the purple “Clown Boy” bong (which actually made it’s home up in Room 7 with Pops, Sadahara and Big O, but still took several field trips down to 23)? Take your pick, pick a pack, and go to town. We have an honored ritual here in Room 23 – B.A.B.S.A.B. That is to say, purchase a sandwich sack of goodness and work as a team with your good friends to ensure that it doesn’t last past the end of the evening. There, we’re all ready to go – but who starts it all off? Who gets the coveted Green Hit? And which way will the fun move along? Well, friend, in a place like Room 23, you can bet that there’s a lot of thought that goes into something like this. Here’s the basic process:

• Someone in the room (again, usually Room 23 alpha male CS) assigns a person to serve as starting point.

• Everyone in the room plays the Odds or Evens hand game, holding out zero, one or two fingers.

• The total of all displayed fingers is obtained, and, moving clockwise from the starting point, the number is counted off around the room – if it lands on you, then congratulations – you get the Green Hit!

• The individuals on either side of the Green Hitter play a best-of-1 Rock-Paper-Scissors to determine the direction of the pass.

• Should you lose this match, the individual seated immediately next to you will typically let out a sigh of disgust, letting you know just how badly you suck at Rock-Paper-Scissors.

Yes, Room 23 is deeply shrouded in mystery and ritual, much more so than the goofy shit we experienced during our fraternity initiation (more on that another time). While a sizeable number of our “brothers” had the Room 23 experience at one time or another, there was an elite list of regulars who regularly haunted our den: Me, CS, Miser, Sadahara, Big O, Pops, Ox, Mayo, Phelps, Dirk, Silky, Reggie Taco – good men, every one. Again, I prefer the shroud of mystery here – I don’t know who wants to become a politician in their adult life, and I’m not about to ruin any reputations. Those on this list know who they are – and some names are more easily decoded than others, so those outside of the experience may have some luck putting two and two together and figuring it all out. But rest assured: The key players and their critical involvement in my Lost Semester will further materialize as the stories seep from my brain like the incense/marijuana haze from the crack under the door…of Room 23.

Six Random Thoughts for Monday

1. I had a chance to catch Britney and Kevin: Chaotic this past weekend. All I can say is that if I thought I had reasons to dislike her in the past, watching this poorly edited, unfunny, unintelligent mess of a program blew all the others away. A basic synopsis of the episode I was fortunate enough to see goes like this:

- The majority of the episode is shot using a video camera from Britney Spears' perspective - a Rich White Trash Broad-Cam, if you will. As a result, you constantly get the feeling that you've just staggered off of the old Cajun Cliffhanger ride at Great America.

- Britney has a ton of "hilarious" voices and faces in her repetoire. For instance, she can be normal one minute, talk like a goofy hick the next, and follow that all up by doing a pig-nose into the camera and making strange noises. The staff she has surrounded herself with are constantly in hysterics over these antics, leading me to believe that they are either a) paid extremely well to patronize her, or b) insane.

- The parts of the show that do not involve Britney making us nauseous with her camera work are actual clips from her concerts. Despite the fact that she is dancing furiously and sweating profusely, her voice is mysteriously free of any hint of exasperation, which leads me to conclude that there are millions of teeny-boppers that have duped their parents into spending $100 per ticket to go watch Britney Spears lip-synch and dance for 40 minutes. Ah, Capitalism!

- Britney likes to go around asking her staff ridiculous questions, to which they provide equally ridiculous answers. Example:

Brit: "Hey Big Black Bodyguard, what's your favorite sexual position?"

Big Black Bodyguard: "The bedroom"

Brit: "AWWWWW, that's sweet!"

- Once Britney meets Kevin Federline, they begin having sex three to five times per day, a fact that only comes to light because Britney tells everyone within earshot: "I just had sex three times - I can't get enough!" So much for saving yourself...

This was indeed a chaotic experience - one I shan't be repeating any time soon.

2. Well, the Supreme Court took a dump last week when they shot down medical marijuana. Now I’m not just saying this because I am a known reefer-head. And I’m not saying it simply because of marijuana’s proven medical benefits (although, due to its illegal status, the G has not seen fit to actually do a real in-depth study of its benefits). This is a matter of State’s Rights. If the State of California wants to let people suffering from AIDS, glaucoma and cancer get stoned because it helps ease the physical and mental anguish in their lives, why does the Government need to snuff that relief out like so many cashed bowls? For that matter, why does the Federal Government need to get involved in any way, shape or form on determining the welfare of its populace on such minor matters that are better handled by state legislatures? Don’t they have bigger fish to fry (Iraq; Social Security; medical care for its constituency) than to cling to a policy of demonization that stems from the fact that they didn’t trust Mexicans in the ‘20s? Don’t they realize that a potential marijuana lobby would line their fat ass pockets just as much as the liquor and tobacco industries already do? Hey, at least I can still get Xanax to help me ease my pain. And Valium. And Zoloft. And Oxycontin. And Paxil. And so on, and so on, and so on...

3. I saw Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith yesterday. Story line - really good. Special effects - great. Dialogue - weak. Overall - B+/A-

4. As one of the 17 people in the world who couldn't give two shits about the Red Sox playing the Cubs at Wrigley this past weekend, I must say I was impressed by the Cubs play in the first two games, despite their best efforts to give Saturday's game away. It was also impressive to see just how sheepish Boston fans became after having their team lose the first two games of the series - every Boston fan I saw yesterday seemed to fear making eye contact with anyone who looked like a local. It warmed my heart to see that. Meanwhile, up in first place, the REAL Sox are looking pretty damn good. A quick pointer to any Red Sox "fans" in Chicago: saying "Sox" = White Sox around here - deal with it.

5. If you want to watch extremely spoiled, wildly unlikeable and horribly shrill women prepare for their wedding day by berating their parents, alienating their friends, verbally abusing reception staffers and psychologically castrating their future mates, be sure to tune into Bridezillas on WE - Women's Entertainment (I live with a woman who likes to be entertained, so get the fuck off my back!) on Sunday nights.

6. And finally, I know someone, somewhere out there reads this and possibly forwards it on to others. Please note that if you would like me to put you on a mailing list so you can be updated rather than constantly having to check back, send an email with the account you wish to use to newsandnotes@hotmail.com with something in the subject line to the effect of you want to be put on a mailing list so you can be updated rather than constantly having to check back.

Until next time...

Your Fifteen Minutes Are Up

In an earlier writing, back when I used to force feed writings to my reader rather than rely on the scarcity that is a hit on this website, I touched briefly on the curious creature that is the Repeat Reality Show "Star". I put the word 'star' in quotes for good reason, for in my mind one does not become a star (i.e. glamorous celebrity) by virtue of having appeared on television. When I was a freshman in high school, some freak in my class gained notoriety by stabbing a couple of burn outs who were mercilessly picking on him. Did the burn out friends of those burn outs become stars because they appeared on ABC 7's 5:00, 6:00 and 10:00 newscasts? I think not!

Now granted, at this point in time (1989) there was no reality television as we know it today - the closest thing we had was watching the wacky Balki Bartokomous and his crazy cousin Larry get in all kinds of madcap situations on ABC's Perfect Strangers and realizing that we could relate to this as reality, given that all of us at one point or another had missed a double date with our sexy neighbors because we and our cousin had somehow gotten rolled up inside of a carpet and therefore couldn't use the phone. But again, I digress. I touched on a few of the repeat offenders in the previously mentioned earlier writing, which of course included Man-Woman-Beast Toni from Fox's equally appalling Paradise Hotel and Love Cruise: The Maiden Voyage. But two (or three, depending on your view) of the more recent offenders are the Rob/Amber two headed monster (or 'Monstah' if you are speaking with Rob's annoying Boston speech impediment) (Survivor, Amazing Race, Utterly Tasteless TV Wedding) and Trista Rehn-Sutter and her Man-Goblin Ryan (Bachelor, Bachelorette, Utterly Tasteless TV Wedding).

Why, oh why, do some people appear on reality TV only to quietly (and appropriately) disappear, while others cling to their vague concepts of "fame" and "stardom" like they are clinging to precious life itself? And why should we as the general public really give a shit what these people are up to long after their appeal has worn off? I guess I will never understand it - being a "star" doesn't seem like it's all it's cracked up to be, but there's Rob and Amber whoring their marriage vows for further cash and exposure. And here comes Trista again, appearing on ABC's Dancing with the Stars, a show that ABC.com describes as "a totally unique and original series that pairs a celebrity with a professional dance partner as they train and then compete in front of a studio audience in a televised dance competition."

My God, what studio exec is going to lose his job over this one? Does anyone really care to see whether Evander "The Real Deal" Holyfield can learn to dance better than John "J. Pederman" O'Hurley? Apparently so, because the show made it to air. Now, thankfully I have not watched a minute of this show, but since I do tune into some of ABC's finer programming (i.e. Lost), I did happen to catch the spots for this train wreck and spotted....Trista! Apparently she has designs on sucking every last ounce of celebrity from the veins of fledgling public interest until it dies a painful and horrible death. In her bio on the show's website, Trista's profession is listed as "Reality Star", which nowadays has all the luster of "Kiddie Rapist" if you ask me (and most people do, of course).

I am really at a loss here as to why Trista can't leave the spotlight. We've seen her in two installments of the Bachelor series, one pretentious TV wedding, and several gratuitous "look at me, please GOD look at me" photo spreads in the pages of the nation's tabloids. Is she still around because people are interested in her? Or are people interested in her because she's still around? Chicken or egg?

Whatever the case is, I pray to God, Yaweh, Allah, Buddah, L. Ron Hubbard, and anyone else that this be her Swan Song. Given the fact that she was probably one of the least likeable people on the original Bachelor, there seems to be no conceivable reason why she should still be hanging around. So I implore you to turn off your TVs when you see her, to not purchase any magazine whose pages she graces, to write your congressman and ask him or her to have a 40-foot high wall built around her house in Vail so that she may never escape. Let us rid ourselves of this repeat reality scourge once and for all. After that, we can take care of Rob and Amber. Thank you.

Follow up note: I received some feedback on Vol. 1 of Tales from the Lost Semester - I think people got the wrong impression of just how much work I put into that paper. When I say I edited the paper, I meant that I took the rough outline and loose draft and actually made it into a paper - it was hard work, trust me, especially for someone whose brain was not firing on all cylinders (sorry, CS, but you know it to be true!)

Until next time...