Jules Winnfield (Pulp Fiction) vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin (WWE): "WHAT?!"

 

Vincent Vega from Pulp Fiction vs. Sheetal Awchar: "It's the Same Ballpark"

 

Pulp Fiction: What Does Donald Trump Look Like?

 

Butch Coolidge from Pulp Fiction vs. The Quartering: Happy Belated Pride Month!

 

Maynard from Pulp Fiction vs. Todd Akin (Rest in Piss, Teabagger!)

 

Jules Winnfield from Pulp Fiction vs. Tim French

 

His last name is French, but he doesn't know why France calls it a Royale with Cheese instead of a Quarter Pounder.

Marcellis Wallace vs. Zed (Rest in Peace, Peter Greene)

 

Hulk Hogan

 

The Marsellus Wallace Speech: AEW Edition

 (OOC: I read a blog post today about how Marsellus Wallace's speech to Butch in Pulp Fiction can be applied to any relatable scenario, so I did a parody myself, just like the author did. Ready? Here we go:

We fade in on Bryan Danielson, a 44-year-old pro-wrestler who’s one broken neck away from being confined to a wheelchair. He sits across the table wearing a plain white T-shirt (because he doesn’t believe in consumerism). Sitting on the opposite side off screen is Tony Khan, the Head Honcho at All Elite Wrestling, where Bryan works. Tony sounds like a cross between a delusional billionaire and a giddy fanboy.

TONY (O.S.)

What do you think you’re gonna find when your decades-long career is over? I think you’re gonna find yourself one broken down, sad-ass motherfucker. The thing is, Bryan, you have a shitload of five-star matches. But as painful as it may seem, five-star matches won’t save your life, and yours is over the minute you take another bump. That’s a hard motherfucking fact of life, and it’s one your ass is gonna have to get realistic about. The wrestling business is filled to the brim with unrealistic motherfuckers who say they’re gonna retire but never do. Motherfuckers who thought their asses would age like wine. If you mean it turns to vinegar like Ric Flair and Chris Jericho, it does. If you mean it gets better with age like R-Truth and Trish Stratus? It don’t. Besides, Bryan, how many five-star matches do you got left in you? Two? Wrestlers don’t have an Old-Timer’s League. It was called Heroes of Wrestling and it sucked ass. You came close, but you made it only a handful of times. If you were gonna make it again, you would have done it already. 

Tony holds release papers just out of Bryan’s reach.

TONY (O.S.)

You actually gonna retire this time?

BRYAN

Certainly appears so.

Bryan takes the release papers from Tony’s hand.

TONY

Night of your final retirement speech, you’re gonna feel a slight sting. That’s pride fucking with you. Fuck pride! Pride only hurts, probably about as bad as Jon Moxley suffocating you with a plastic bag. It never helps. You gotta fight through that shit. ‘Cause a year from now when you’re at home banging Brie Bella and hanging out with your two kids Birdie and Buddy, you’re gonna say to yourself, “Tony Khan was right”, which is something I hear from Dave Meltzer pretty much regularly. 

BRYAN

Yeah, me too.

TONY

At AEW Revolution, you job to Jon Moxley. Say it.

BRYAN

At AEW Revolution, I job to Jon Moxley.

The original blog post: https://www.kingdomoffailure.com/post/f-ck-pride-it-only-hurts-it-never-helps

Characters Going to the Bathroom

***CHARACTERS GOING TO THE BATHROOM***

When I was little enough to think that piss and shit were funny, I watched movies and TV shows with one burning question in mind: “Why don’t these characters ever go to the bathroom?” Or a more appropriate question for my age group would have been, “Why don’t these characters ever make pee-pee and doo-doo?” This question would continue to burn like an asshole after eating too many spicy wings, something I have too much experience with. It’s true, though, even after all these years of maturing (somewhat): characters never seem to have to go to the bathroom even after eating questionable food. You know why? Because nobody wants to see it, that’s why!

It’s like George Carlin once said: “I’ve never really understood it nor have I really cared for it.”

“I’m going to the bathroom to take a shit.”

“NEVER MIND! Do what you have to do in the bathroom and leave me out of it! And don’t describe it when you come back!”

“Boy, you should have seen it…”

“NEVER MIND!”

“It set off the smoke alarm.”

“NEVER MIND!”

If a character is going to make pee-pee and doo-doo, there better be a plot-related reason for it. Sure, constantly visiting the john would make for realistic storytelling, but not necessarily good storytelling. For instance, let’s say in my rewritten novel Beautiful Monster, Shelly had Windham shackled to her bed and suddenly had the urge to take a wee-wee tinkle. Let’s say she drank too many of her signature milkshakes, without the sedative drugs, of course. How exactly would her urinary needs be met in a way that moves the plot along quicker than her digestive system moves things along? Let’s say she relieves herself over Windham’s face like a Russian prostitute. Does this help the story? No, it doesn’t. Does it turn the reader off and not take Shelly seriously as a femme fatale? Absolutely!

I can only think of a handful of times where bathroom trips helped advance the story along without being disgusting as fuck (most of the time). Quentin Tarantino used bathroom trips as a plot device for Pulp Fiction at least three different times. Vincent had to go to the bathroom when he took Mia Wallace home, leaving her all alone to OD. Had he not gone to the bathroom, the overdosing could have been prevented and therefore, there’d be no infamous scene where Vincent stabs Mia in the chest with an adrenaline boost. Vincent also happens to be on the toilet when Butch goes back to his apartment to get his father’s watch. Had Vincent not been in the bathroom, he would have killed Butch and there’d be no infamous dungeon scene later on. And finally, Vincent goes to the bathroom during the restaurant robbery scene. Had he stayed at his table, he would have thwarted the robbery and Jules wouldn’t have his come to Jesus moment of clarity.

Another example of bathroom plot devices being used to full effect comes from Tales From the Hood. No, I’m not referring to any scene where Crazy K shits himself on the spinning table, because that never happened. I’m talking about the first story, which deals with racist cops. One of the cops urinates on a civil rights activist’s grave. Had he not done that, the zombie wouldn’t have risen from the grave to rip the cop in half and therefore, there’d be no comeuppance for the rest of the cops.

In short, the whole reason why you never see characters going to the bathroom at inconvenient times is because nobody wants to see it. Nobody wants to see Gimley from Lord of the Rings taking a massive dump nor do they want to smell it. Nobody wants to see WWE wrestlers have accidents in the ring, which has happened before, regrettably. Stone Cold Steve Austin once shit his trunks while getting body slammed by Yokozuna in a match in South Africa. Good thing his trunks were black.

Are you sick and tired of all of this middle school toilet humor? If so, you’ve just confirmed your own reason why you don’t want to see toilet breaks in movies and TV shows unless they serve a bigger purpose. Rarely does it serve that bigger purpose, though. If bathroom breaks were as random and haphazard as they were in real life, it would border on Deus Ex Machina storytelling and that’s a big no-no. Suppose Darth Vader had food poisoning at Taco Bell right before his light saber fight with Luke Skywalker in The Empire Strikes Back. If Vader went to the bathroom, Luke could get an easy kill and wouldn’t lose his hand nor learn that Vader is his father.

I feel disgusted for having written this blog entry, but it’s a topic that I’m sure was on everybody’s mind at some point in life, whether in middle school or adulthood. We’ve all thought it, but we’ve never actually dug deeper into the question. Maybe it’s best that we haven’t. Maybe this controversy should be put to bed once and for all. I’m Garrison Kelly! Until next time, try to enjoy the daylight!

***SONG DIALOGUE OF THE DAY***

NURSE: Excuse me, doctor? Do you have a moment?

DOCTOR: A moment? What’s the question?

NURSE: More like a situation. A gentleman in exam three.

DOCTOR: What’s the problem?

NURSE: That is the problem: we’re not sure.

DOCTOR: Do you have the chart?

NURSE: Right here.

DOCTOR: Hmm…not much here, is there.

NURSE: No, doctor. No obvious physical trauma and vitals are stable.

DOCTOR: A name?

NURSE: No, sir.

DOCTOR: Did somebody drop him off? Maybe we can speak to them. Let’s get some background on this fellow.

NURSE: No ID. Nothing. He won’t speak to anyone.

DOCTOR: Well, let’s go and say hello.

PATIENT:…

DOCTOR: Good morning, I’m Doctor Lawson. How are you today?

PATIENT:…

DOCTOR: How are you today?

PATIENT:…

DOCTOR: Look son, you’re in a safe place. We want to help you in whatever way we can, but you need to talk to us. We can’t help you otherwise. So what happened? Tell me everything.

-“Lost Keys (Blame Hofmann)” by Tool-

Silent Warrior, Chapter 9

Out of one dark abyss, into another. The George household bathed in blackness while Beth’s snoring rattled the walls. She didn’t even wake up when Scott walked through the door. He never had to be light on his toes when he entered the kitchen looking for a bite to eat. Through all of the fury, tears, and insanity, Scott just now realized he had only eaten one meal that day. His ribs were sore for more reasons than the constant use of his diaphragm.

Every Tupperware meal in the refrigerator was crawling with worms and maggots, at least in Scott’s mind. He shook his head to try and free his mind of that image, but the little bastards slithered even more and grew as big as snakes. He slammed the refrigerator door shoot and there was a slight disturbance in his mother’s obtrusive snoring. And then the tiny motor in her closed throat wailed once again. Scott breathed a sigh of relief and reopened the fridge door.

Still they crawled with worms. Slime and shit covered the mashed potatoes and gravy. The macaroni and cheese moved by itself, as if the little pasta bites were necrovores themselves. The milk jug had more worms at the bottom than a bottle of tequila. Scott knew this was just an illusion and took a deep breath to calm himself. He closed his eyes and tried to remember what Adrienne told him: replace the worms with something more pleasant. Something delicious. Something that made eating enjoyable again.

With his eyelids still clamped shut, Scott pulled out a Tupperware container of meatloaf and ate it cold. As he slowly chewed and suppressed his gag reflex, he could feel something moving around between his maulers. The thought of worms moving around wouldn’t be allowed to surface and instead the little creatures were replaced with gummy worms. Meatloaf and gummy worms: the dinner of champions. He took another bite. And another. His eating speed became so rapid that he bit down on his tongue and suppressed a scream.

For the first time since having those Aloysius Striker dreams, Scott finished a meal without getting the urge to vomit himself inside out. He breathed heavily after taking the last bite of meatloaf, his appetite satisfied only until he realized it was bedtime. The thought of going back into his subconscious theater made Scott lightly bang his head against the fridge door repeatedly. If biology was truly up to him, he’d drink Red Bull until the end of time and never fall asleep again.

But reality was always worse than the dream world. Scott’s day had been an exhausting one where he dealt with all sorts of jerk-off characters: Aloysius Striker, Alan Young, Tom Simpson, Beth George, and an undertaker and football jock who both went unnamed  None of these people deserved names in Scott’s mind; they were all just part of a community of worms.

But Adrienne was different from all of those conformists. She was beautiful in more ways than just her physical appearance. She too was hurting badly. She too loved creativity. She too resisted any attempts at breaking her spirit and bending her to the will of the corporate overlords. Those things made her the most beautiful woman on the planet. And yet, Scott wondered what she even saw in a man like him anyways. It wasn’t as though he had the dashing looks of a Hollywood actor or the charisma of a rock star. He was just Scott George. Plain old Scott George. Even his own name was boring to him.

All of these racing thoughts in his head blinded him to the fact that his mother’s footsteps were pitter-pattering across the wooden floor. He quickly closed the fridge door, dropped the meatloaf container in the sink, and bolted upstairs to his bedroom. One stupid fight was one too many for Scott, so he took the role of diplomat and tucked himself in bed, not even bothering to change into more suitable sleepwear.

Scott’s ribs ached like a motherfucker. His head exploded with pain and trauma. His blood was lukewarm. His eyes still burned hotly enough to make closing them a painful experience. Scott didn’t stand a chance when it came to fighting the forces of sleep. His eyelids burned like shooting stars, but his lids were heavier than a grand piano. He could have used such a gentle instrument to sooth his battered soul. Laziness took over to where he didn’t want to press play on his stereo. One slip and down the rabbit hole he fell…

Just a few moments of uninterrupted darkness was what Scott needed. His tortured mind rebuilt itself from a rock bottom foundation. His pain was numbed to the very last nerve. He forgot that a world of a shit existed outside of his aching brain. And it felt good. It felt more heavenly than an hour-long chair massage. It felt more soothing than a harp concert serenading his pounding ears. The nothing consumed every last bit of his body.

And then his temporary peace was shattered as he found himself on a football field with lightning and grayness in the sky. The rain poured down and smacked his skin like bamboo canes. Then the rain thickened into dreaded fucking worms and Scott danced around shivering in disgust. Rows of puppet cheerleaders, so flawless, yet so ugly by virtue of their perfection, twirled and flipped in the air with worm infested pom-poms. Scott swore he heard their chant somewhere before.

“Bring out the gimp! Bring out the gimp! Come on, everybody, let’s bring out the gimp!”

Scott tried to shout back at them, but his mouth was obstructed by a rubber object. He touched his face and scalp and sensed a leather presence covering his Sideshow Bob hair. He also felt a heavy dog chain digging deeply into his neck. He could panic, kick, and scream all he wanted, but it didn’t change the fact that Aloysius Striker owned him and was dragging him to the top of an Olympic-style platform. The puppets formed a semi-circle around the enslaved Scott and listened intently to Mrs. Striker’s oratory.

“You see this, everyone?!” she shouted in her signature ham voice. “This young man is an example of someone who doesn’t want to be part of our community! He wants to go his own way and leave his neighbors to drown in the worms! Well, if he must leave this community, it’s only fair that we give him a going away present!”

Mrs. Striker lifted up her own dress and pulled out a handful of the slimiest, nastiest worms she could, much to the cheerleaders’ giddy delights. The worms oozed with black oil, red blood, and white…whatever the fuck it was. The teacher unzipped the mouth on Scott’s gimp hood and prepared to shove the filthy fuckers down his throat.

“Stop!” shouted a female voice for a prolonged period of time. The cheerleaders and teacher alike stared down the one member of their “community” who dared defy them. The lone cheerleader threw down her pom-poms and ripped off her own head to reveal she was Adrienne Simpson underneath. The puppets and Mrs. Striker gasped in unison like good little conformists when Adrienne sprouted metal angel wings that shot flames in either direction.

“Don’t just stand there, you dolts! Get her!” shouted Mrs. Striker, to which the cheerleaders threw their pom-poms down and attempted to cannibalize the metal angel with shark-like teeth. Adrienne was one step ahead of them when she pointed the tips of her wings at her assailants and shot streams of fire at them. The cheerleaders squealed in agony as their wooden, worm-infested bodies warped and twisted into piles of ashes.

“What the…what have you done to my community? My poor, poor community!” cried Mrs. Striker while holding her dimply cheeks. Scott used this distraction to rip off his gimp hood and shove his “teacher” into the gigantic football field fire, barbecuing the bitch nice and crispy. Her screams were more music to his ears than anything he listened to on his MP3 player that day.

Adrienne flew over to Scott and scooped him up in her arms before floating into the heavenly sunrise of a newly pink morning. The rain had stopped, but the thunder remained, sending crashes of lightning onto the burning field of dead puppets. Scott didn’t want to relish on this recent war and instead relaxed in the arms of his beautiful angel. She sang to him lyrics that were once familiar in his dead father’s music collection.

“I bless the wings that bring you back across the shore. If I could touch you now, my darling, I’d love you just once more. If I could hold you…hold you…hold you…I know you’d understand…I know you’d understand…”

Her soothing soprano tones would have made the Moody Blues proud, but they made Scott relax even further in his girlfriend’s arms. She leaned her face down and kissed his mouth, no taste of worms, no embarrassing boner on Scott’s part, no awkwardness or disgust at all, just a moment of love that would last longer than any haunting trauma. Too bad Scott had to eventually wake up to go to school the next day. But if it meant Adrienne would be there and walk him home again, it would be worth all the heartache.

What would she think of the You Tube video that Alan Young posted in the graveyard? Would she see him as a weakling? Would she take pity on him? Would she break up with him before their relationship even got started? Scott tried not to think too hard about these circling questions and just enjoyed a moment in the pink and orange sunshine with his angelic girlfriend…while he still could.

Lonesome Town

***LONESOME TOWN***

Trust me, guys, I’d love to be able to stop talking about Western Washington University and how Bellingham is a dead ringer for “Lonesome Town” by Ricky Nelson (a song I first heard on the Pulp Fiction soundtrack). I’ve talked enough about it, so it’s pretty much a dead memory at this point. And then I get an email from WWU’s department of English asking me to take a survey as to how my experience was and how it could have been improved. If these surveys were written on paper, they would probably end up in a big fucking fire pit. But I took the survey anyways and gave them a piece of my mind. I told them about the lack of social programs, the lack of psychological counseling, the bias against introverted students, the shoddy public transportation system, the censorship of R-rated writing assignments, need I go on? No? Okay, I’m actually relieved. I open Face Book one day and I see that many of my classmates had the same vitriol to spew at their former school, so it feels good not to be alone. Perhaps the lyrics to Ricky Nelson’s “Lonesome Town” could sum up my classmates’ feelings as they did for me. Maybe they’ll relate to it in a non-romantic sense and I’d be inclined to agree with them. Want some lyrics? Here they are:

VERSE 1

There's a place where lovers go

To cry their troubles away

And they call it lonesome town

Where the broken hearts stay

VERSE 2

You can buy a dream or two

To last you all through the years

And the only price you pay

Is a heart full of tears

BRIDGE

Going down to lonesome town

Where the broken hearts stay

Going down to lonesome town

To cry my troubles away

VERSE 3

In the town of broken dreams

The streets are paved with regret

Maybe down in lonesome town

I can learn to forget

Got any more surveys for me to take, WWU? You want to ask me again to donate $50 to the English department? Sure, why don’t I give you a blank check while I’m at it. And my social security number. And the pin number and security code on my debit card. Go nuts! I really should stop talking about WWU. It’s ancient history. Eight years counts as ancient history to me. Truth is, I didn’t have any better ideas for a blog topic than those Ricky Nelson lyrics. I was exhausted all day today and got very little done in the way of creativity. Maybe when I snap out of my sleepy haze, I could do one of the following:

***AMERICAN DARKNESS 3***

Two stories down, forty-eight more to go. Clocking in at number forty eight is “Air Pain”. Clever title, huh? It goes like this:

CHARACTERS:

1. Andrew Gilbertson, Drunken Businessman
2. Zack Scott, Convicted Felon
3. Tony Battles, Zack’s Handler
4. Susan Martin, Flight Attendant

PROMPT CONFORMITY: To be announced.

SYNOPSIS: All four characters are taking a six-hour flight to the Paulson City Airport, which means nobody wants to be screwed with. Midway through the flight, Andrew gets drunk and verbally abuses Susan when she denies him more alcohol. Zack, a shackled criminal with Detective Battles watching him, considers bailing on his handler to confront the obnoxious drunk at the risk of losing his plea deal. The longer this flight goes, the more annoying Andrew becomes and the more Tony considers unlocking Zack’s shackles.

***DARK FANTASY WARRIORS***

Marie Krepps jokes with me all the time about how I mostly have fat male villains in my short stories and novels. This next Dark Fantasy Warrior will keep the jokes rolling. His name is Big Daddy X and he comes from a short story idea called “Sub-Culture Urban Marketing”. Anti-smoking commercial viewers from the early 2000’s will remember that title and what acronym it forms. “I’m sure they meant it in a good way.”

***ALLEY KAT BLUES***

Now that “No Cure for Cancer” by Denis Leary is in my rearview mirror, it’s time for a fictional book. I purchased “Alley Kat Blues” by Karen Kijewski (“key-EFF-ski”) at a book sale in Chehalis, Washington (another place that could be described by Ricky Nelson’s lyrics). It was a low-stress book sale that was void of pushing and shoving due to the wide selection of books and big open space in the Lewis County Mall. I was happy for the low stress. It looks as though I’ll be even happier with reading Mrs. Kijewski’s book. It’s a crime thriller with a fast pace and a dead body or two. I blame Brett Battles for getting me hooked on this genre. Thanks, Brett!

***WRESTLING DIALOGUE OF THE DAY***

FINN BALOR: Good luck tonight, Roman.

ROMAN REIGNS: Good luck to you, man.

FINN BALOR: Luck? I’m Irish. I invented luck.

ROMAN REIGNS: Well, I’m Samoan. Enough said.

Perfectionism vs. Word Vomit

***PERFECTIONISM VS. WORD VOMIT***

If you’re a budding author, you’ve probably heard this piece of advice before: “Write every day. It doesn’t matter if it’s carefully chiseled out or the worst thing written in the history of the world. Let the editors take care of your mistakes.” A lot of professional authors say this and for a lot of rookies this advice works. This is just my preference, but this particular piece of advice doesn’t work for me.

If I write something, I want it to be golden from the start. While it’s true that no first draft is perfect the first time around, I at least want to try to make it into the best thing I can. This is why I don’t write everyday: because there are some days where my brain is so foggy that I can’t produce that perfect piece of writing. To my way of thinking, if I can’t be good at what I do, then what’s the point? Do my editors really want to go through the nightmare of cleaning up my messes?

If you’ve ever seen my drawings before, you would ask why I don’t take the perfectionism route with them given their weird quality. Yes, it’s true that my drawings don’t always look like golden goose eggs. But that doesn’t mean I don’t try. That’s the important thing for me: while I’ll never be 100% perfect, I at least have to try my hardest. Editing will be much easier if I actually make an effort to produce a good piece of art.

But like I said earlier, this approach to art doesn’t work for everybody, but it works for me. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I used to have a huge ego back in my college days. It’s true: even the smallest criticisms would make me retreat into my safe place, and this was in my late teens and early twenties. When my creative nonfiction teacher asked the class, “How many people here don’t think their own writing sucks?” I was the only person who raised my hand. Of course, my big ego didn’t match up with my writing skills at the time, because I wasn’t a diehard reader yet. Instead of having high self-esteem, I was arrogant, both of which are two separate things.

As I got older, I realized that being overly arrogant was a terrible approach to writing, because I desperately needed to let my critics into my inner circle in order to get better. That’s when I reached out to Second Draft Critique Services (a subdivision of Writer’s Digest) for help. Of course, their services were quite expensive, so I could only submit short stories. I was nervous at first, but when I actually read their critiques, I was confident that I could make chicken salad out of chicken shit. That’s the difference between arrogance and self-esteem: arrogance means you’re the king of the world and self-esteem means you believe you can grow from anything.

But if it’s true that I don’t have a massively inflated ego anymore, why do I still feel the need to be a perfectionist? I guess the easy answer would be that old habits die hard. Then again, if I didn’t believe in myself at least a little, I wouldn’t be writing in today’s world. I’ve had my fair share of evil criticisms and it would have been easy to give into those people. But being stubborn and full of fire got me through those hard times. Only years later did I realize that positivity and kindness were the answers, not hatred and anger.

So it stands to reason that if I write word vomit as opposed to the perfect product, I would have sufficient self-esteem to believe that I can fix it and make it shine. I’ll grant you that, but consider this: if I write the perfect product, I won’t have nearly as much work to do when the time comes to edit. Editing can either mean a few grammar corrections or a complete overhaul of the story. To make the process less intimidating either way, I take the perfectionist approach to my writing.

I know full well that first drafts will always have mistakes. The current first draft versions of “Watch You Burn” and “Filter Feeder” read like acid trips. While being on drugs may or may not be a heavenly experience (I wouldn’t know), that’s not the feeling I want to give my readers. It may work for Pink Floyd’s music, but not me. I’m not Roger Waters or David Gilmour no matter how hard I try to be.

There’s another thing that I try to practice: not using other artists’ transgressions as excuses to do them myself. I watched Pulp Fiction as a teenager, so my very first movie script “Pumping Filter” had a bunch of swearing, violence, and racial slurs, all of which didn’t need to be there. Because it could never have been perfect, I abandoned the script altogether. Another example would be me listening to Immortal Technique’s music and thinking it’s okay to use homophobic slurs in my poetry. If you want to use creative fuel, make sure you analyze it first and run it through your mental filters. Because I couldn’t do that just yet, many of my hateful poems are no longer in my archives. Thank god.

So now the question of the day is, are you a perfectionist yourself or do you allow your writing to truly be a first draft? I’d love to hear other opinions on this subject whether you agree with me or not. We’ve got ears, say cheers!

***WEEKLY SHORT STORY CONTESTS AND COMPANY***

When my brain finally agrees to cooperate with me, I’ll write something for the “snow man” prompt called “The Theomancer”. It goes like this:

CHARACTERS:

1. Krimson, Red Ninja
2. Yeti, Mummy Giant
3. Seven, Prophet of Sevenism

PROMPT CONFORMITY: There are snowmen all over The Frigid Highlands, each of them with creepy decorations.

SYNOPSIS: The true identity of Krimson is unknown, but he is believed to be an emissary of the Raven Strike Society. They are a secret organization of atheists dedicated to disproving the beliefs of Sevenism, the religion of choice for oppressive authority figures in this dystopian fantasy world. Krimson ventures to the Frigid Highlands to assassinate Yeti, the gatekeeper to Seven’s paradise. The battle between these two warriors is fierce and intense, but Krimson is determined to get answers and revenge from Lord Seven himself. The red ninja is believed to be a deity in human form, which is why he’s having moderate success against Yeti in the first place.

FUN FACT: This story draws inspiration from the Mortal Kombat and WCW franchises from the 1990’s. Krimson is a red palette swap of MK ninjas Sub-Zero and Scorpion while Yeti is the direct theft of a WCW wrestler of the same name. Seven is also taken from a former WCW wrestler, this time one of the alter egos of Dustin Rhodes. All I needed was an excuse to use the title “Theomancer” and now I have a reasonable story idea.

***TWITTER WAR OF THE DAY***

TWITTER TROLL: You’re a professional wrestler. Lift some weights or do sit-ups. Good God!

BARON CORBIN: It’s your girl’s fault. She keeps bringing cookies over late at night.

Creative Fuel For Kids

***CREATIVE FUEL FOR KIDS***

When I was a kid and I got in trouble, I made no mention of the media I liked because if I did, that particular medium would get taken away from me. I’m sure we can all relate to this in one way or another. Let’s say for instance you and your older brother wanted to practice martial arts. One of you gets injured, so what do the parents do? They take away your Jackie Chan and Bruce Lee movies. As a kid, you keep insisting that those movies don’t make you act the way you do and there may be some truth to that.

However, there’s also a truth to the ratings they put on TV shows, movies, and videogames. If a seven-year-old watches the Faces of Death documentary from the late 1970’s, then he’ll grow up thinking those graphic images are a normal part of life. In some ways they are, but that mentality takes away from the beauty that life can become. That’s not to say that movies turn kids into murderous sociopaths, because that’s a stretch. Those same movies do however define normality for those kids for the rest of their lives.

Take me for instance. I didn’t become a fan of WWE until I was six years old and at that age, I didn’t want to believe it was scripted and that wasn’t how people fought in real life. Over the years, WWE started incorporating more disgusting storylines that involved racism, sexism, sexuality, and humiliation. I watched all of that until my mom banned wrestling from the house for the foreseeable future.

But that didn’t stop me from finding other sources of creative fuel that were to my liking. I watched Pulp Fiction when I was 11 and didn’t question any of that movie. I had it in my mind that you didn’t have to be a racist in order to use racial slurs. Boy, was I wrong. I watched Clerks when I was 13 and thought the words “cock” and “cunt” were exclusive to that movie. I was wrong again.

And then I was 14 years old when I watched my first soft-core porn movie. It was called Playtime and focused on female masturbation. Ever since watching that horny movie, I started looking for internet porn and somehow thought sticking a ball gag in a girl’s mouth and sucking her feet was an instant turn-on. It’s not. In fact, most girls I know think that’s weird.

So let’s take an inventory of all the horrible things I thought were normal: violence as a solution to everyday problems, women dressing in skimpy clothing, racial slurs with no racism behind them (or so I thought), instant lesbianism, gay jokes in public places, god knows what else. Good thing I’m not a sociopath or else this would have been a really destructive life.

In spite of all the misconceptions of what acceptability was, I’d like to think I’ve always been on the benevolent side of the spectrum. I got in so many fights in high school not because I was a psychopath, but because I wanted to end bullying and injustice. Ending those things is admirable on any level. So at best, my intentions were always pure, but my methods were questionable. Cussing out internet folk to end trolling? Doesn’t work. Using ball gags and duct tape during an internet version of “making love”? Doesn’t work without consent. Using the word “faggot” because Immortal Technique used it liberally despite being a leftist? Yeah, not going to happen.

I’m not trying to convey the message that media makes small children into school shooters. It doesn’t. It does however set the standards for what children perceive as normal and justified as they grow up into adults. Children absorb everything like a sponge. And I do mean everything. They don’t develop a strong filter for bullshit until they’re teenagers, where they rebel against everything that doesn’t agree with their lifestyles.

I suppose you could blame parents for allowing kids to see things they shouldn’t, but that’s not necessarily true. Kids today have access to materials that can be hidden from even the most watchful parent’s view. Even if parents could monitor their children 24/7 (which they can’t), kids can be sneaky and venture into worlds that nobody else can stop them from seeing.

Frankly, I’m more concerned about parents who abuse their children instead of parents who fail to catch their children watching a bloody kung fu flick. I was fortunate enough to have loving parents and a healthy childhood. No school shootings or other criminal behavior here. In fact, I have no criminal record at all, so that’s one less thing I have to worry about.

I was bound to have a wakeup call sooner or later on what was decent and what wasn’t. In the summer of 2014, I wrote an erotic short story for the WSS called “Tainted Love”, where the female protagonist was bound and gagged by a complete stranger and loved every minute of it. I’ve never felt so ashamed of myself in my life. No woman in her right mind would ever think being kidnapped by a criminal is sexy. But that’s what maturity is all about: having experiences, learning from the mistakes, and chipping away at the rough edges to make a beautiful sculpture.

I’ve said enough for today. I welcome all viewpoints and talking points as long as they’re decent and maturely presented. We’ve got ears, say cheers!

　

***WEEKLY SHORT STORY CONTEST AND COMPANY***

The new week started yesterday and the theme is “homeless”. My story, should I get around to writing it, will be called “I, Barbarian”. Yes, I get stereotyped by my family a lot for writing barbarian stories, so if you have a joke, let it out now or forever hold your peace. The story goes like this:

　

CHARACTERS:

　

Magnus Warcry, Bear Barbarian
Corey Darkside, Human Barbarian
Ace Hank, Sheriff

　

　

PROMPT CONFORMITY: Corey is being accused of vagrancy, which is defined as wandering around without a permanent address (aka being homeless).

　

　

SYNOPSIS: Ace brings Corey to the police station on charges of vagrancy and resisting arrest. While he’s interrogating her, she insists that her barbarian gimmick isn’t an act and that Magnus Warcry must be defeated. Ace is contemplating sending Corey to a mental institution when Magnus shows up to the police station and starts mauling everything and everyone in sight. Not only is Corey Darkside not crazy after all, but she might be Paulson City’s only hope in this battle of primitive warriors.

　

***AMERICAN DARKNESS***

Yes, I know you all were expecting three more edited short stories, but they won’t get here today or even tomorrow. I took a one-day vacation from editing today so that I could catch up on my reading obligations to Edward Davies, Paul McAvoy, and Daniel Bryan. I’ll probably take another one-day vacation so that I can concentrate on “I, Barbarian”. I can take as many vacations as I want, so suck it. Besides, I only have four more stories from American Darkness to edit, so I’ve pretty much got this in the bag.

　

***COMEDIC QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“Ladies, at least one time in your man’s life (at least once, don’t let him lie), he has stood in front a full-length mirror absolutely naked and he tucked his dick between his legs to see what he’d look like as a woman. And men, if you haven’t done that yet, you will now that I’ve mentioned it.”

-Tommy Blaine-

Wendi Kael

NAME: Wendi Kael
AGE: 10
OCCUPATION: Elementary School Student
CANON: Kill the Power Rangers


When my niece Reina was little and still living with me and my family, she watched a lot of corny cartoons on my TV, among them Spongebob Squarepants. Whenever she did something wrong, I would threaten her by saying, “If you do that one more time, I’m going to kill Spongebob!” She saw right through me. It’s not like I could leap into the TV and strangle the shit out of Spongebob and his friends right in front of Reina. Well, I could leap into the TV, but not only would I have nothing to watch my shows with, but I’d have glass cuts to show for it. Killing Reina’s favorite cartoon characters was a benign threat, but it was one that amused me to where I wanted to write a short story about it.

In the case of 10-year-old Wendi Kael, her favorite TV show was the early 90’s version of the Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers. The flamboyant martial arts, the giant dinosaur robots that could form into one badass (reminds me of Voltron), and of course, there was everybody’s favorite Power Ranger who would one day become a legitimate mixed-martial artist: Tommy Oliver aka The Green Ranger, played by Jason David Frank. Was Wendi old enough to have crushes on older gentlemen such as Mr. Frank? Maybe an innocent schoolgirl one, but nothing more.

In the end, it didn’t matter how emotionally invested Wendi Kael was in her show, because her mother’s boyfriend Chad was determined to screw it all up for her. All that fatherly anger over poor grades in school and Chad knew physical punishment would land him in jail. So what was the next way to break Wendi into becoming a serious student? Kill the Power Rangers, of course. But how was Chad going to do it? He can’t leap into the TV unless he wants to be slashed to pieces by the screen glass. Beating up a stuffed toy of the Green Ranger is even less convincing. In order to make the death of The Power Rangers convincing, Chad had to get disturbingly creative.

Wendi came home from school one day and went back to her room to find The Green Ranger’s rotten corpse lying in her bed gathering flies and bloodying the sheets. Then Wendi went into the garage and found the Yellow and Pink Rangers lynched from the ceiling. Then she went to the backyard and found the Black Ranger lynched from the oak tree (that’s not racist at all). And then she found the Blue Ranger in the tool shed bent over a saw horse with a rake handle shoved up his ass (that’s not homophobic at all). Okay, so these weren’t the real Power Rangers; they were just already dead bodies dressed in their uniforms, which begs the disgusting question of where Chad got the dead bodies.

I tried to pass this story off as black comedy and it would have succeeded in getting those due chuckles. But then the story had to be terminated due to its Deus Ex Machina ending. Chad gets into a standoff with the police and the Red Ranger’s sword miraculously flies through the overbearing step-dad’s throat. Did I also mention that next week the world will end? But don’t worry, because we’ll be saved at the zero hour by a mutant fish koala bird. Clerks came out in 1994 and the original Power Rangers show came out a little earlier, so I didn’t set my time machine too far back.

The black comedy of killing a child’s favorite TV characters could still work in some capacity and Wendi Kael would definitely be the one who took the burden of such heavy jokes. If anybody needs discipline in her life, it’s an obnoxious 10-year-old who doesn’t give a shit about school and watches more TV shows than she reads books. This is the kind of traumatizing tough love she needs to get back on track. But it has to be more convincing and more legal than what Chad did. Otherwise, the joke will fall on deaf ears.

I think I’ve found the perfect solution to “kill” Wendi Kael’s fictional characters: with drawings. So she has a crush on The Green Ranger? Fine. Let’s tie him down to a torture table and have Rita Repulsa put a spring-loaded clamp on the base of his penis. Okay, that might have been influenced by Tales From the Hood, another movie from the 90’s time machine. So let’s be original with our Rangers. Let’s have the Blue Ranger get sodomized by Zed and Maynard from Pulp Fiction, another movie from the 90’s. Let’s have The Black Ranger’s mouth get taken away by Agent Smith from The Matrix, here we go again with the fucking 90’s movies. Anachronisms aside, the point of these drawings is to put the Rangers in violent or sexual situations that would disgust a normal human being. I’ve drawn many pictures like that of Bugs Bunny and Inspector Gadget and showed them to my best friend Susan. She was horrified.

Okay, so we’ve sent poor Wendi Kael to therapy at least once during this rehabilitation process. Now what? Does she spiral into madness or does she become a respectable citizen in the making? A small part of me is leaning towards spiraling into madness. Children as young as 10 don’t have the mental toughness to question the bullshit they’re being fed. They’ll believe anything adults tell them whether it’s detrimental or beneficial. That’s why a lot of teachers get away with insulting their students into becoming soul-dead conformists: when the kids are that young, they’re vulnerable. Come to think of it, this might sound more like psychological horror than black comedy. The only way it could ever be black comedy is if Wendi Kael was on an episode of either Robot Chicken or Family Guy.

　

***MOVIE DIALOGUE OF THE DAY***

BARTENDER: How far are you willing to take this?

MARCELLUS WALLACE: I’m ready to scour the earth for that motherfucker. If he’s hiding out in Indo-China, I want a nigga hiding in a bowl of rice ready to pop a cap in his ass.

-Pulp Fiction, a movie from the 90’s time machine-

Atlas Venom

NAME: Atlas Venom
AGE: 53
OCCUPATION: Dragon Barbarian
CANON: Zeromancer (both incarnations)


It shouldn’t be a secret anymore that my favorite character class in any RPG setting is the barbarian. It’s been that way since I’ve played Hero Quest in the early 1990’s, Diablo II in the early 2000’s, and Dungeons & Dragons 3.5 Edition in 2010. I also happen to be a big fan of dragons. They’re big, they’re nasty, and they breathe fire. It wouldn’t matter if it was a real dragon or one in humanoid form, fuck it, I love them anyways.

What do you get when you combine a favorite class with a favorite race? You get Atlas Venom, Dragon Barbarian. He’s got the scales and fire breath of a dragon and the heavy metal armor and giant battleaxe of a barbarian. You talk about crossover heaven? That’s it, man. End of story. Atlas motherfucking Venom.

As you can tell from his canon, Zeromancer had two different incarnations. One of them was as a movie script in 2009, which served as a prequel to Tower of Heaven, Tower of Hell, and No Towers No Bullshit. Zeromancer explained the origins of the trench coat wearing and machete wielding magi assassins as well as those of the Demonic family bloodline.

But more importantly, it had Atlas Venom as a side character. He was everything you could ever want in a heroic ally: big, strong, powerful, and capable of mowing enemies down while creating a thunderstorm of blood around him. Of course, this was before I knew what a Gary-Stu was. Atlas was very much a Gary-Stu since he just appeared out of nowhere without a background story and only his fighting skills to lend to the party.

The other incarnation of Zeromancer was a four-act novel, each act containing a completely different set of characters only for them to come together in the fourth and final one. Atlas could have just as easily created a storm of blood with his battleaxe prowess and fiery breath. But since he was billed as the main villain of act one, if he did this, we’d have no characters. I often wondered what would have happened if Atlas just went nuts and flattened an entire continent full of people.

The heroes of act one were no slouches, don’t get me wrong. Kento Bladecaptain was a robotic knight who was just getting the hang of feeling emotions despite warnings against it from his dark magic masters Calco and Tazz. The two wizards were so pissed off with Kento that they actually aligned themselves with Atlas Venom.

So now we’ve got a pissed off dragon barbarian and two dark wizards who team up to kick the shit out of the good guys. If it wasn’t for the hyperbolic writing style I employed throughout this story, I could have had an epic confrontation here. Why would I ever think hyperbole was an acceptable writing style? Maybe in comedies, but not if I wanted to be taken seriously as an action-fantasy author.

If I ever decide to use this overly powerful Gary-Stu in my novels again, he’ll definitely be a villain and he’ll need some personality. It’s not enough for him to be a pissed off dragon barbarian who rages through entire planets and slaughters everyone in his path. He needs a reason. He needs strategies. He needs minions. If he was just a mindless berserker, he wouldn’t need to be called Atlas Venom. He could just be a nameless force of nature. But I don’t want that for Atlas. I want him to be a respectable villain.

For a villain of that power to be believable, we have to go back to his barbaric roots. I know I mentioned Hero Quest as one of my influences, but Diablo II was the biggest influence I had when it came to my love of barbarians. And Diablo II had a pain in the ass mega demon for a final boss: Diablo himself. This guy would shoot flame circles and streams of lightning at the players and kill them off instantly. He could do it forever and ever since enemies don’t have a mana pocket.

What made him even more dangerous was Diablo’s motivation: bringing evil to the world. The middle ages were already a tough time for a lot of people, but with Diablo at the helm, it’s nonstop hell. What if Atlas Venom had a similar motivation? What if his form of hellish evil was his barbarian tribe of disgustingly powerful monsters? He might even be able to steal a catchphrase: “Not even death can save you from me!” It’s not enough just to kill someone; Atlas has to send chills down their spine. He can do that if I give him the breathing room to.

One of the ways I made Atlas creepy in the second Zeromancer was by giving him the facial features of a clown. He was still a hideous dragon, but he had clown features as well with white face paint, a goofy nose, and colorful hair. As if clowns needed more reasons to be scary, right? Perhaps it was overkill. Perhaps it was me trying too hard to make him an intimidating villain. If I actually believed the latter, then that’s basically me surrendering to the idea that we can’t have dragon clown barbarians. I say we can. It’s possible if you picture it in your mind. Pennywise and Ronald McDonald would shit their pants at the sight of Atlas Venom if he adopted a clown gimmick. Ooo, talk dirty to me!

If I reincarnate Atlas Venom, I’m going to attempt to have my cake and eat it too. He fits every archetype I could ever love in a dark fantasy character, dragons, clowns, and barbarians aside. With this many archetypes, he could actually be a believable villain with the creepy dialogue and disgusting facial expressions. I believe in him!

　

***MOVIE DIALOGUE OF THE DAY***

RESTAURANT MANAGER: Quit being a hero! You’re going to get us all killed! Give him what he wants so we can all get out of here!

JULES: Shut the fuck up, fat man! This ain’t none of your goddamn business!

-Pulp Fiction-

Pulp Fiction

MOVIE TITLE: Pulp Fiction

DIRECTOR: Quentin Tarantino

YEAR: 1994

GENRE: Crime Drama

RATING: R for violence, blood, frequent vulgar language, and sodomy

GRADE: Extra Credit

The overall Pulp Fiction story is a telling of four different crime stories and how by the end of the movie they all intertwine into one underbelly tale. The first quarter of the movie sees low-rent hit men Jules and Vincent retrieving a valuable briefcase for their boss Marcellus Wallace at the expense of the punk kids who stole it.

The second quarter sees Vincent taking Marcellus’ wife Mia out for dinner and dancing at Jack Rabbit Slims and then having to revive her after an overdose.

The third quarter sees heavyweight boxer Butch Coolidge double-crossing Marcellus and then having to secretly retrieve a valuable golden watch from his apartment.

The final portion of the story goes back to the first where Vincent accidentally shoots an informant in Jules’ car and the two of them need to get off the road for a while. Four tales of bloodshed, forced sex, and drug abuse; what else could you ask for in an R-rated crime drama?

There are many theories as to why Pulp Fiction isn’t shown chronologically. My personal theory is because of each character’s path to development. The further the movie goes, the more personal and profound the development.

The first story shows Jules and Vincent doing their job successfully and retrieving a stupid briefcase. It’s early in the story, so not a lot of development will take place.

The second story sees Vincent shooting adrenaline into Mia’s heart and the two of them going from being awkward strangers to the best of friends.

The third story sees Butch rescuing Marcellus Wallace from being sodomized in a pawn shop and the two of them resolving their differences.

But the fourth story, as in the middle of the chronology, is where Jules transforms from a heartless mafia grunt to a soldier of God and the spreader of peaceful messages. We start off with retrieving a stupid briefcase to a total heel to face turn, with some friendships made in the middle. It doesn’t get more developed than that.

The one element of the story that really turned this movie into a cult classic was the dialogue Tarantino wrote for each of his characters. The director grew up in the underbelly of society and absorbed a lot of the vulgar, racist, and sexual dialogue that was used by those criminals.

Criminals have no need for class or political correctness, so the dialogue is perfect for this movie. I’ve personally tried to adopt Quentin Tarantino’s style of speech into my own writing and it sounded sloppy. Mr. Tarantino is the master of what he does; often imitated, never duplicated.

Because of such colorful and creative language, Pulp Fiction is easily one of the most quotable movies of all time. To me and my family personally, quoting this movie is a tradition. There was even a time when I had the entire movie memorized.

Every conversation in this movie counted for something whether it was the sensuality of foot massages, the absence of a certain “sign” in front of Jimmy’s lawn, pigs being filthy animals and therefore inedible, or two rapist serial killers using a child’s nursery rhyme to randomly determine their next victim. If your ears aren’t open for this kick-ass dialogue, then you’re missing out on a huge portion of what makes this movie special.

After hearing everything that needs to be heard, do you at all feel like taking out your wallet (the one that says “Bad Motherfucker”) and forking over some cash to see this 90’s classic? Not only will you say “yes” one time, but you’ll watch this movie over and over again until every last word is etched in your mind and you can recite the whole thing by heart.

It should be no surprise that a movie with this much of a lasting effect would get an Extra Credit grade not only from little old me, but from every movie critic on the planet. That is, unless of course you have a 5^th grade point of view and are too grossed out by the sodomy in the third story (but are perfectly okay with Butch performing oral sex on his girlfriend).

"So Long" by Saliva

It seems as though every time I write a blog entry about one of my favorite songs, there are several recurring themes: regret, loss of friendship, trauma, loneliness, depression, anger, madness, god knows what else. It would appear this entry about “So Long” by Saliva is more of the same. I listened to this song a lot in college because it was there to comfort me when I was lonely. Nobody to come visit me in my dorm, no family to be around, no animals to take care of, just me and the soothing vocals of Josey Scott, who’s normally known for being a badass redneck on the microphone. He and Saliva write this one song together and the waterworks are almost there once again.

You’ve been reading my blog for a long time and I appreciate that. But I sense you’re getting tired of the constant themes of sadness and anger. It feels monotonous. If it ever does feel that way to you, it’s because my life is monotonous. I wake up, put my time in on the computer, go shopping, and go back to bed. Rinse, lather, repeat. Rinse, lather, repeat. Nothing changes. I could make some changes myself if I wanted to. I could stop being afraid of the consequences of stress. I could take driving lessons and not be dependent on others. I could get a part time job doing something I actually enjoy. While there are forces in place that keep me from changing my life, most if it is because I’m afraid of being stressed out to where I can’t take it anymore.

“Pushing forward in reverse, it gets better then it gets worse, I’m tied for last place when you taught me to be first.” You know what that phrase means to me and my monotonous life? It means I have all of these creative skills and yet I don’t use them in a way that moves my life forward. Yeah, I can self-publish all the e-books I want. I can write as many blog entries as I want. I can draw all the cartoonish pictures I want. If nobody notices, I’m merely kidding myself when it comes to the American Dream coming true. My career is at a crossroads right now. I have both the fear of being noticed and not being noticed. One of these roads leads to boredom. The other could lead to humiliation and vilification.

“So long. When will I see you again? It’s been so long I don’t know where to begin.” That’s the question I pose to all of you right now. When will I see you again? What do I have to do to see you again? What could I possibly do for you that will grab your attention and never let go? Do you want to be showered in compliments? I can be sweet if you want me to. In fact, being sweet has gotten me to great heights in my life. The fact still remains it’s not enough to be a good person. Then again, if being a villain is what it takes to move my life forward, then I don’t want that either.

If you’re looking for a song to be there for you when you’re down, try “So Long” by Saliva. It won’t judge you. It may hurt for a little while, but then again, you’re already fucked up in the head anyways. You’ve probably gone insane from doing the same thing every day and expecting different results. That’s okay, I have too. Then again, I don’t know what about my game needs to change for things to happen. Should I be more open with the people I meet? Should I talk to people and hope at least one of those people has the keys to the kingdom? If I ever get those keys, what door do I have to unlock? If this ever feels like your own thought process, go to iTunes and get this song.

　

***MOVIE QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“If I’m curt with you, it’s because time is a factor. I think fast, I talk fast, and you guys had better act fast if you want to get yourselves out of this. So pretty please with sugar on top, clean the fucking car.”

-Winston Wolf from “Pulp Fiction”-

Daniel McBride

As a writer, I draw inspiration from pretty much everything around me. Drawing inspiration from the movie Pulp Fiction as a teenager was probably not the best idea. Don’t get me wrong, Pulp Fiction is a badass movie and Quentin Tarantino will always be remembered for it. It’s just that Quentin Tarantino is really the only person qualified to write anything in his own style. I tried copying his style and it was a fucking disaster. That’s where we get the character Daniel McBride. The reason he’s called that is because I didn’t know at the time of creation there were already people named Danny McBride. I thought I was being original, but it turns out I’m not. You want to know what made Daniel so special? He used racial slurs despite not being a racist. He was first introduced in a Play By Web college RPG as a freshman art major. He got in a rivalry with another kid named Shawn Rawlins because Shawn’s player controlled Daniel’s actions and used him to trip Shawn accidentally. Folks, if you’re ever in an RPG, don’t control anybody’s character but your own. That’s a huge pet peeve of mine. But instead of complaining to the admin of the game, I tried to make lemonade out of lemons. Daniel tried apologizing to Shawn, but Shawn pulled a gun on him and shot him in the leg. Daniel then shouted a whole bunch of KKK jokes at him (Shawn was black) and got beaten up even further for it. That and the wannabe thug stole Daniel’s girlfriend away from him in the process. I can safely say I’ve never been traumatized by an RPG before that moment, so I left for greener pastures. Years later, Daniel McBride became a character in a movie I wrote called Pumping Filter, where his old rivalry with Shawn Rawlins was relived. Pumping Filter had a whole bunch of racial tension with no real reason for it. The way I justified it back then was the whole idea behind insulting someone was to get them angry and nothing made an opponent angry like an attack on their culture. As I got older, I realized that simply using those attacks is enough to be deemed racist and rightfully so. These days, my works don’t resemble Pulp Fiction on steroids. Quentin Tarantino was a staple of the criminal underworld, so he has all the tools he needs to write these kinds of movies. Me? I’m just a suburban white kid who had a generally easy life. But as it stands, Daniel McBride needs a new home, either as a college or high school kid. Maybe this time his martial arts skills will come in handy and he’ll actually win fights. His martial arts skills didn’t work too well in Pumping Filter and that college RPG. Can I really make chicken salad out of chicken shit and turn Daniel McBride into a respectable human being? I hope so, because my imagination is getting to be too lonely for him.

　

***JOKE OF THE DAY***

Q: What grades do racist skinheads get in school?

A: Not C’s.

"Go the Fuck to Sleep" by Adam Mansbach

Getting a child to sleep is one of the most difficult tasks in the modern world. Sure, you can try rocking him back and forth, giving him a glass of warm milk, or even dipping his pacifier in a bottle of cough syrup, which I don’t recommend. But sooner or later, probably at 3:00 in the morning, you’re going to hear a combination of teeny tiny footsteps and either crying or pleading. When all else fails, there’s one more solution you can turn to in order to salvage the remains of your sanity. It’s a bedtime story parody for adults called “Go the Fuck to Sleep”, written by a father who went through all of the BS that comes with raising a child. In a tender daddy voice, the author, Adam Mansbach, lets the child know that he doesn’t give a crap if you’re thirsty for water, hungry for a snack, desperate for a bathroom trip, or bored without having a Disney movie playing in the background. One way or another, you’re going the fuck to sleep. And if the idea of a tender daddy voice reading this blunt story isn’t satisfying enough, then feel free to get on You Tube and search for a video where Samuel L. Jackson reads it out loud. Yes, that video exists. The same guy who dared Brett to say “What?” one more time, motherfucker, is narrating this harshly honest book of what all parents are thinking when putting their kids to bed. That way, if your child can’t sleep because he’s hungry for a snack, then he and Mr. Jackson can share a giant bag of Big Kahuna burgers together before washing them down with a tasty Sprite. But since Samuel L. Jackson is a little bit difficult to find these days, you’ll have to buy the book and have the cathartic experience yourself. Come to think of it, it’s probably not a good idea to read this story to your kids because of the language. If nothing else, it’s a very satisfying and giggly book. It goes by excessively fast, but only because it’s a parody of what impatient children love to hear at bedtime. Keep this book proudly in your own personal library. It just may be a better form of birth control than condoms and pills put together. What’s that? You already have children? No worries, it just means you can relate to this wonderful piece of literature even more. Thank you, Adam Mansbach, for saying what we’re all thinking deep down inside.

　

***REAL LIFE DIALOGUE OF THE DAY***

ME: Have you ever wondered why your parents fed you corndogs, popsicles, and tacos?
FRIEND: Because they wanted me to grow up big and strong.
ME: Oh yeah! They love watching you eat your favorite foods!
FRIEND: Garrison, that’s sick!