Give Me the Weapon

So…have any of you watched a movie or TV show where an attacker is threatening people with a weapon and someone pleads with him to hand it over?

“Give me the gun. Don’t do this.”

“It’s okay, just give me the knife. Please.”

“Give me the crowbar before you do something you’ll regret.”

It makes for some intense drama, no doubt…unless of course the weapon isn’t a basic one and has a complex name.

“Give me Excalibur. Please.”

“Give me the Dork Slayer before you hurt somebody.”

“Give me the Shadow Edge before something bad happens. I’m begging you.”

And just like that you’ve gone from dramatic tension to the audience busting up with laughter.

Food-Mindedness and Body Horror

In case it wasn’t already abundantly clear from my 300 lb. belly, I’m very food-minded. Almost everything in my life reminds me of food in some way. Hell, the word Life will conjure images of the oat square cereal swirling around in milk. The word swirling will remind me of frosted cinnamon buns, keyword being frosted, as in enough frosting to cover the whole fucking thing. At least those words make a modicum of sense, but then there are names of people that remind me of food for no reason at all. Marcus reminds me of hotdogs and mustard. Brad reminds me of French bread. Rachel reminds me of apple juice. Erick reminds me of birthday cake-flavored milkshakes. How did this happen? Was it the constant advertising? Was there some trick of the brain during childhood I wasn’t aware of?

Already, my relationship with food is off to a rocky start. But then there are the things I find disgusting in life and how they find their way into my food. Not literally, but I imagine that they do and my imagination is powerful enough to make me vomit in some cases. For example, if you’ve ever seen the movie Clerks, the View Askew Productions logo at the beginning will serve as nightmare fuel to haunt you at every stage of life. There’s nothing wrong with men dressing in fishnet pantyhose, high heels, and leather thongs…even if they do have grotesque body hair. But it’s the unwanted sexual attention and creepiness of his flirtation that makes it such a traumatic logo. After seeing that logo for the first time, I kept involuntarily picturing his hairy disgusting body in pieces of my lunch meat. Every time I take a bite of ham or turkey, I imagine I’m taking a bite out of that man’s body. My stomach is aching and my fingers are convulsing just thinking about this.

But that’s just one example. If that was the only one, then I wouldn’t have been inspired to write an entire essay on it. What about the Calcobrena Puppets from Final Fantasy IV? You know, those creepy leotard-wearing dolls with buzzed heads, bloodshot eyes, zombie movements, and murderous intentions. They look like they could be Pee-Wee Herman’s children based on their buzz-cuts alone. Pee-Wee Herman once taught his audience how to make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on his show. Therefore…all of my peanut butter and jelly sandwiches will taste like the bodies of the Calcobrena Puppets. It’ll be like eating right off of their skulls, head lice, fleas, and maggots be damned. It’ll be like giving French kisses to each and every one of those dolls…while passing pre-chewed sandwiches back and forth! Again, my stomach is boiling and rotting while I’m typing this.

And what about the Simpsons from their Treehouse of Horror Episodes, particularly the ones where they turn into pale zombies. They chew flesh, they lose limbs, they groan like exhausted monsters, and did I mention that they have pale skin? You know what else is pale in color? Pasta covered in white sauce, whether it’s American cheese or Alfredo sauce. Every bite that I took of those macaroni shells made me believe I was eating pieces of the zombie Simpsons. I took a long time to swallow knowing that zombie flesh was going down my throat and was going to poison me to death. The macaroni turned to mush in my mouth, so when I finally swallowed, I gagged and brought up a little bit of bile with it.

If I rattled off every example of food-related body horror, then we’d be here forever and a day. I could talk about the faceless masks from Pink Floyd the Wall reminding me of melted cheese. I could talk about the diarrhea blasts in The Human Centipede reminding me of chocolate ice cream (that one’s too obvious, though). I could talk about dead flies reminding me of Butterfinger ice cream. How did this all happen? Why are these disgusting things finding their way into my every meal? Am I so linked up with food that every trauma will remind me of such? Suppose I was more inclined towards Legos instead of food. If I touched a Lego piece that had three holes in it, would it remind me of the Pink Floyd masks? What if I was geared towards clothing? Would the View Askew drag queen’s body hair remind me of a wool sweater that’s literally hugging my chest?

I can already hear fatphobic assholes using my food horror as motivation for me to lose weight…or is that just my schizophrenic voices? Nah, I’m pretty sure someone has thought of exploiting me at one point or another. To those fat-shamers, I say watch the Human Centipede and eat a bag of shit and then watch Pink Floyd the Wall and eat an entire McDonald’s Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese (there has to be cheese in it, no exceptions). Unlike drugs and alcohol, food is actually necessary to survive. A cheeseburger will carry you over into the next day. A pack of cigarettes will not. A pepperoni pizza will give you the nutrition you need, even if it’s bad. Alcohol will not. If I gave up all of my favorite foods due to the body horror I’ve witnessed over the years, I would die of anorexia. Imagine that: fat-shaming actually hurts people instead of helping them find motivation. It’s almost as if people are only fat-shaming to satisfy their sadistic urges and are just using motivation as a cover-up for their shitty behavior. Bullying never went away; it just adapted to the new world.

I could tell you all that I’ve found the perfect counter for body horror-induced trauma, but I haven’t. Yes, I’m still alive and eating like a pig, but that’s only because the trauma went away on its own. I eat ham sandwiches whenever I damn well please even though the View Askew drag queen lusted on me through the TV screen as a kid. I eat stuffed mushrooms despite the fact that it feels too much like I’m eating Phanto from Mario Brothers 2, the evilly-smiling little bastard. Trauma going away on its own is not a typical outcome for most people, especially if schizophrenia is a factor like it is for me. Sure, you can take away the stimulus and hope for the Law of Diminishing Returns to kick in, but it doesn’t always do that. I have no solutions for your body horror trauma. As a matter of fact, I may have given you some of that as I described examples of how they make their way into my food.

Sometimes I think I’m the only one who experiences things like this until I Google it and find entire communities full of people who share my problems. But that’s assuming I’m not too lazy on any given day to use Google. It’s such an easy thing, yet I find myself too lazy sometimes to type words into a search engine. If you’re out there and you’re as food-minded as me, I’m sorry I can’t provide solutions for you other than the occasional animal picture and some digital hugs. You know who can provide more than that? Your therapist. They can talk you through your trauma. They can encourage you to face your food-themed fears. They can be there for you when you feel like others would laugh at your plight. Yes, therapy can be expensive at times, but it’s worth every penny if it means you’ll be okay in the end. If you’re not okay, it’s not the end. Life is better alive. It’s a dumb thing to say, but the truth won’t wane away. Okay, now I’m just ripping off quotes and lyrics. I should stop doing that before I get sent to prison for copyright infringement and have my vanilla pudding remind me of my cell mate’s semen. Uh-oh! More body horror!

Gary-Stu

I spent a hundred years in the navy

The sexy siren is carrying my baby

I spent five decades in the marines

They all call me a fighting machine

I spent half a century in the army

No way could the enemy harm me

I spent ten years in the air force

I still don’t make sense, of course

I’m a Gary-Stu who’s lost at sea

Always carry machineguns with me

A battleaxe bigger than my body

Always imitated, but never copied

Except by those trying to make a buck

Make a fortune from negative luck

Put me in a videogame or paperback

I’m a macho man, genetically jacked

Everybody wants to buy my image

Everybody wants to laugh at critics

Everybody wants to look for tropes

Everybody’s given too much rope

Whatever happened to character depth?

Got slaughtered in a battle to the death

Everybody’s got their own little flaws

They don’t include too much brawn

They don’t include a nasty attitude

They don’t include a lazy aptitude

Three dimensional isn’t hard to achieve

All you have to do is make them believe

If a captain is going to be lost at sea

If a warrior is going to bleed, bleed, bleed

If a damsel in distress screams one last time

Put some reason in your fucked up rhyme

Millennium X Otherwise: Beautiful Monster

***MILLENNIUM X OTHERWISE: BEAUTIFUL MONSTER***

Raise your hand if you at least have a surface level understanding of the 1990’s horror TV series Millennium. I didn’t watch it on a regular basis when it was on TV, but there was one episode in particular that disturbed the shit out of me. The title is creepy on its own: “A Room with No View”. Gee, I wonder what kind of room they could be referring to. No windows, no balcony, just walls and darkness. This wouldn’t be the kind of room where kidnapping victims are kept, would it?

After seeing news stories on TV about pedophiles kidnapping children and keeping them in captivity for decades at a time, you’d be right to think that kidnapping is a disgusting topic to approach. If a creepy guy kidnaps an innocent girl, there’d be no debate at all as to how sickening that is. We’d all be clamoring for the creepy guy to be locked up. But in “A Room with No View”, the gender roles are reversed. A drop-dead gorgeous young woman named Lucy Butler kidnaps a high school student named Landon Bryce.

The minute Lucy has Landon under lock and key, she goes right into lovey-dovey mode. She tells him she loves him, she cuddles with him, and “comforts” him after he tries to get away and is recaptured. Attempting to escape the compound and getting caught again is something that happens over and over in this episode. And who’s there to give him love and sugar when he returns? Lucy Butler, of course. Oh, and Landon also is told to believe that he’s mediocre and ordinary. So when the FBI eventually raids the compound and rescues him, not only does he have sexual trauma to deal with, but also self-esteem issues. How nice.

If a story is creepy on its own and that’s the only emotion it dabbles with, then we’ve got an open and shut case no doubt. But then this episode of Millennium fuses the creepy feeling with sexual desires and lovey-dovey romance. That makes the creepy feeling even worse. The more emotions you can mix with creepiness, the more intense said creepiness becomes. Landon Bryce is probably going to be fucked up for the rest of the Millennium canon. Society loves to judge male victims as “pussies” and “fags”, so it’s not like he can get away from that stigma after becoming free from the femme fatale known as Lucy Butler.

When I first saw this episode back in the late 90’s, the timing couldn’t have been worse for me. I was already a middle school kid who was turning down dates with girls left and right because I was in constant fear that they’d screw me over in court. My own father had divorce issues of his own and was paying out the ass for it, so that’s where my irrational fear of romance came from. And now I see this episode of Millennium and think, “Is that what relationships are really all about?!” Obviously, the answer is no. But at the time, it seemed reasonable to me.

I wrote this blog entry for two reasons and not one of them is so that Men’s Rights Activists could rejoice. I have lots of love for feminist culture and know full well that there’s only one Lucy Butler in the world (on top of that, she’s not even real!). Would you like to know what my two reasons really are? One of them is to announce that I’ve come up with a fantasy novel idea based on the motif of women kidnapping men. The other reason is because I’ve found the perfect song to go with this novel (should I decide to write it). It’s called “Beautiful Monster” by Otherwise and it’s my current favorite song from that hard rock band from Vegas. If you read the lyrics to the song, you’ll find out just how much Lucy Butler and the villainess of my own novel idea have in common with Otherwise’s beautiful monster in question.

VERSE 1

Something about the way that she makes me hate myself

I could run away but I don't want no one else

So say what you want, it's already done

It's Russian Roulette and love is the gun

You don't know her, you don't know her like I do

CHORUS

Looking like an angel so divine

You can see the devil in those eyes

She's a monster by my side baby

Taking me six feet down tonight

Cause dancing with the devil gets me high

She's a monster, a beautiful monster

(A beautiful monster)

VERSE 2

Something about the way that she tears me up inside

Is it wrong that I love it when I know she'll bleed me dry

So say what you want, it's already done

It's Russian Roulette and love is the gun

You don't know her, you don't know her like I do

CHORUS

Looking like an angel so divine

You can see the devil in those eyes

She's a monster by my side baby

Taking me six feet down tonight

Cause dancing with the devil gets me high

She's a monster, a beautiful monster

BRIDGE

A beautiful monster

I don't want to be saved

A beautiful monster

I don't want to be saved

A beautiful monster

I don't want to be saved

A beautiful monster

I don't want to be saved

CHORUS

Looking like an angel so divine

You can see the devil in those eyes

She's a monster by my side baby

Taking me six feet down tonight

Cause dancing with the devil gets me high

She's a monster, a beautiful monster

A beautiful monster

Are you scared yet? You should be! I’m Garrison Kelly and I’ll see you next time!

***TELEVISION DIALOGUE OF THE DAY***

LEMONHEAD: We’re all going to crash and burn because of you! Amy’s not even that hot, man!

SHANE VENDRELL: Oh, thanks for the support, asshole!

-The Shield-

Chris Hammer

NAME: Chris Hammer
AGE: 43
OCCUPATION: Fitness Guru
CANON: Jumping Jackholes


If you’re ever feeling bad about how much you weigh or what your body looks like, the world’s biggest jerk-ass known as Chris Hammer will make you feel even worse as part of his motivational gimmick. He’s got muscles the size of pumpkins, veins the size of pipelines, blood flowing through his steroid stream, and more anger in his heart than the entire Westboro Baptist Church. Speaking of the latter, Chris Hammer hates fat people so much that he has become a venomous bigot. He might as well hold up a rainbow colored sign that says “God Hates Fats”.

The worst part about this nimrod? He has his own TV show. That’s right, folks. People desperate to lose weight actually turn on their tubes and listen to a full hour of Chris Hammer screaming anti-fat slurs at them while doing exercises that are ridiculously hard even for the physically fit. Because he’s so disgustingly strong, he can do things like move boulders, do jumping jacks while carrying cannonballs, do pushups with fat customers on his back, and run a mile in less than ten seconds. His only response: “What’s your excuse?” And if you don’t have an excuse, relax, because he’ll put it all into perspective for you. In a thunderous voice, he’ll threaten to give your food away to hungry children in Africa because you’re fat enough to have a heart attack any minute now.

The best way to deal with this prick would be to punch him in the mouth, right? Well, part of being muscular is having a high tolerance for pain. Plus, Chris Hammer just happens to have a chiseled jaw, so you would probably break your fist before you broke his face. What about firepower? Are you so desperate to see this guy killed that you need to arm yourself with pistols and shotguns? Maybe even rocket launchers? Once again, the rocket shell would turn to shrapnel before Chris Hammer turned to fire and ashes. Due to this guy’s indestructibility, he has a complex that makes him feel entitled to belittle others because he has everything going for him.

Know any celebrities like that? I can name a few off the top of my head right now. Donald Trump comes to mind. He has so much money that he can manipulate the odds when he’s suing other people for even more money. Mel Gibson is next on deck. He has so much celebrity status that he believes he’s entitled to scream at his wife or girlfriend, maybe even beat her. Phil Robertson is yet another example. Because he has his own TV show and immerses himself in Christian culture every damn second of his life, he believes he is entitled to use homophobic slurs without facing backlash. Donald Trump, Mel Gibson, and Phil Robertson are nothing more than prototypes for Chris Hammer, yet another guy who uses his power to oppress others.

The last time I wrote something as bold as Jumping Jackholes, it was 2012 and I was desperate for novella ideas. And because 2012 was an uneducated year for me, I firmly believed back then that hyperbolic descriptions and unbelievable endings were acceptable. Now we come to today’s world where Jumping Jackholes has been deleted from my archives and this asshole Complete Monster Chris Hammer is left without employment. Normally, using Complete Monsters is a bad thing because it disenfranchises the reader. But just like Mary-Sues, Gary-Stus, and any other character who’s labeled with a literary slur, Complete Monsters come in all shapes and colors. If Chris Hammer gets used again, I will definitely take my fitness frustrations out on him.

　

***WRESTLING QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“What’s wrong with you, Jamie Noble? Are you upset with me because people actually know who I am? Or is it because unlike you, I can get on all the rides at Disneyland? Don’t worry, Jamie, my six-year-old daughter feels the same way.”

-Randy Orton-

Grading System

You all have probably noticed when I review something I give it a generic grade of either pass or fail. Over the time I’ve been giving reviews, things have gotten more complicated than that. It’s suddenly not as simple as a P or an F anymore. In fact, here’s my grading system in a nutshell:

　

1. Extra Credit: This is an extremely rare grade that I give to a medium that I not only liked, but thought it exceeded expectations. Whenever I watch something, I usually expect that it will be likeable. When I give something an EC grade, it really blew me away and changed me forever. The only movie to get this grade so far is The Lego Movie, because it gave me the creative fuel I needed to get out of a slump of depression.

2. Pass: This is the most common grade I’ve given any movie, TV show, match, or book. When I watch something, I want to enjoy it, so I don’t intentionally pick out flaws or even dig very deep to find them. An example of a UFC match with a passing grade is the 2013 Fight of the Year, Gilbert Melendez vs. Diego Sanchez. It was exciting, just like a UFC match should be.

3. Mixed: This is exactly how it sounds. I liked whatever I was watching or reading, but not enough to give it a passing grade. I liked it despite the overwhelming number of flaws in the medium, and these are things that are obvious enough to even the most brain-dead viewers. The only movie to receive this grade so far is Dead Man Down, where the lack of screen time for Bad News Barrett and the unresolved and overwhelming bullying storyline prevent it from being a favorite.

4. Fail: I’ve watched the show or read the book all the way through and I hated it. Very rarely will I finish a book or show that I hate, but it does happen, more often with TV and movies than with books. The last time I gave a failing grade was when I was reviewing a UFC lightweight bout between Clay Guida and Gray Maynard. While Gray was swinging away, Clay was evasive and timid, which made a brutal brawl an impossibility between these two. Clay Guida almost got points taken away by referee Dan Miragliotta for being a cowardly fighter. Almost is not enough.

5. Did Not Finish: In other words, the medium was so bad that I couldn’t stand to see it all the way through without having my brain explode. Normally when I can’t finish a book, I put it down and that’s the last you’ll ever hear from me. No reviews, just a brief show of frustration in a few characters or less. An example of a book I would give a DNF grade to is “Fifty Shades Darker” by EL James. Christian Grey is an unbearable asshole who doesn’t deserve to have a girlfriend in the first place, and yet, Anastasia Steele is so love sick that she’ll shack up with anybody at this point whether they’re nice or mean.

　

Five different grades for my reviews. Good Reads ranks books on a five star system. Coincidence? Probably not.