Larry David vs. Waldo: Blending in with the Crowd Isn't the Flex You Think It Is

 

Shane Gillis: a Brave Free Speech Warrior Who Wets His Pants at Cancel Culture

 

Spoon Feed

The yellow monkeys love to do kung fu

The curtains are blue, because they set the mood

The diamonds are red, they adorn your boobs

Some food for thought that’ll put you off food

 

What’s the matter? Didn’t make a lick of sense?

You’re a fickle motherfucker, always on the fence

Do you want to be fed with a silver spoon?

A jar of Gerber, hope your tummy has room

 

I can’t make heads or tails of my own symbolism

I threw it all together, ‘cause I thought I had a vision

Come to think of it, I need to be spoon fed too

Open up the hangar for an airplane or two

 

Open wide like you’re taking a trip to the dentist

Here’s an infodump to overload your senses

Dumping is something you do with your ass

Any wonder why we’re stuck in a middle school class?

 

I hope I’ve got an out, because I’m on the spectrum

I know it could never be a shield or a weapon

When the C+ stares into my eyes like a demon

I don’t get mad or rich, I want to get even

 

It’s me and my madness against the world

Some authors wear pentagrams, some authors wear pearls

How do I stand out a cut above the rest?

Do better on the scan sheet bubble filling test

 

But that shit don’t work, they just laugh

They always remind you to forge your own path

When tax time comes, you got to do your own math

They put you through the wringer, leave you crawling with your fingers

 

I don’t expect the world to know what it’s like

To feel like a stranger at an open mic night

To feel like puking at the thought of being famous

Keep thumbing your nose, go ahead and shame us

Jealousy

***JEALOUSY***

In the age of social media, it’s easier than ever to compare and contrast yourself to other people. When you see one of your friends on Face Book getting married, you wonder why it’s not happening to you. When you see a Deviant Art buddy getting an ass-load of faves, you wonder why you don’t have any at all, let alone any views. When you see a Good Reads author achieve an average rating of 4:5 stars on one of their novels, you wonder why yours is below the 3.0 mark. The more we subject ourselves to this kind of comparative thinking, the more depressed we become. The easy solution would be to just stop comparing your life progress to your friends.

In the words of whoever sang the theme to Kingdom Hearts, “I don’t think life is quite that simple.” In the writing world, jealousy works both ways. I’ve had authors be jealous of me and I’ve been jealous of other authors. It’s perfectly natural to feel this way as long as it doesn’t consume you and turn you against the people you love. But that’s the thing: it is all consuming. It does eat away at the soul. I even have examples from my own life to prove this.

There are plenty of reasons to be jealous of another writer, but the one thing I envy above all others is the ability to write god knows how many words in the span of one day. Or one hour. Or half an hour. Or fifteen minutes. I get on Face Book all the time and see that this author is bragging about writing fifty thousand words in the span of a week, thus completing their novel. This author I speak of has an ass-load of books to their name too, each with high ratings on Good Reads and Amazon, so it’s not like any of this hard work is going to waste. Me? I consider myself lucky if I’m in the mental state to write a five-paragraph review for a forty page book. My foggy state of mind is a constant source of ire for me, so when I see other authors pumping out novels like hotcakes, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t jealous.

And then there were times when other authors were jealous of me (I can’t imagine why). Those who have followed me on social media for a long time know that I like to write blog entries about vacations I’m going on or rock concerts I’m attending. Last year in 2018, I’ve been to eight different concerts. This year, I’ve already seen three and I have four more in the future. And yes, I’m as braggadocios as the Face Book author who boasts about writing a gazillion words in three days, or whatever the statistic was. Going to rock concerts is something not everyone can afford to do on a regular basis, whether it has to do with work/school schedules, family emergencies, physical disabilities, or just not having enough money for it. So I’m going to try my damnedest to keep my concert talk to a minimum. I’ll still post them as life events on Face Book, but that’s all you’ll get from me.

While it is natural to feel jealous of other people in your life, the one thing you should never wish for is to swap lives with your friends or family. The one thing we all have in common is our pain. When you ask to swap lives with someone you’re jealous of, you take the bad with the good. Suppose you’re jealous of a friend who got married during a seven day trip at Universal Studios. That sounds like a shit-load of fun, but there’s a whole lot going on with that person that you don’t know about. He could be depressed and hiding it really well. He could have mountains of college debt. He could be a pariah in his neighborhood. Just because you see the best version of another person on social media, doesn’t mean you should wish for his life. Everyone has their pain and we all deal with it in our own unique way.

I don’t talk about my personal pain a lot on social media, so when I do it this time around, I hope it’ll ease some of the jealousy you have of my concerts, vacations, or whatever else is going on. You all know by now that I’m schizophrenic, overweight, and constantly tired all the time, right? Now here are some things you probably don’t know. I’ve been unemployed all of my life (except for volunteer work). My mother is having severe mobility issues and needs a walker to get around. I don’t know how to drive a car nor do I own one myself, so I’m confined to my bedroom most of the time. I’m painfully shy in big social situations, so my friends in this town are few and far between. My brother is dealing with bipolar disorder and had a few breakdowns recently. Okay, that’s enough for now. This isn’t a pain contest, but you get what I’m saying. You don’t want my life and I don’t want yours. We all have our own stories to tell and our own destinies going forward. Let it be that way.

If you’re going to be jealous of another person, don’t let it consume your life. The one thing authors need to remember is that we’re one big family who helps each other during the toughest times. This isn’t a competitive field. This is a tag team main event. That’s why I didn’t use names when I gave examples of jealousy, because those people are my friends through and through and I don’t want to paint them in a negative light. We can get shit done together if we put our minds to it. What’s that I always say at the end of my blog entries? Oh yeah, it’s…even when you feel like dying, keep climbing the mountain!

***LYRICS OF THE DAY***

“You’re giving me too many things. Lately, you’re all I need. You smiled at me and said, “Don’t get me wrong, I love you, but does that mean I have to meet your father?” When we are older, you’ll understand what I meant when I said, “No, I don’t think life is quite that simple.” The daily things that keep us all busy are confusing me. That’s when you came to me and said, “Wish I could prove I love you, but does that mean I have to walk on water?” When we are older, you’ll understand it’s enough when I say so. And maybe some things are that simple. When you walk away, you don’t hear me say, “Please! Oh baby, don’t go!” Simple and clean is the way that you’re making me feel tonight. It’s hard to let it go. Hold me. Whatever lies beyond this morning is a little later on. Regardless of warnings, the future doesn’t scare me at all. Nothing’s like before.”

-“Simple and Clean” from Kingdom Hearts-

Believe

Believe in the beauty of rock bottom failure

Believe you can cross rough waters like a sailor

Believe this world is yours for the taking

Believe in the beauty of the art you’re making

Believe your heart is made of pure gold

Believe you can crush the lies you are told

Believe your soul can never be sold

Believe the fire inside can never go cold

Believe in your own battle-tested story

Believe normalcy is so damn boring

Believe conformity is never the answer

Believe indifference is the ultimate cancer

Believe passion is more powerful than a pistol

Believe true love is stronger than a missile

If you know something in your heart to be true

Sitting back and watching isn’t the thing to do

You have a voice; it’s time to make your choice

Make a bold statement or just make some noise

Believe in your power to shake the landscape

Look beyond the train wrecks and bad days

Believe in your power to never give up

Despite the many days that just might suck

Believe the end is only the beginning

Believe this is truly a life worth living

Pull You Under

Spencer Henry spent what seemed like hours at his apartment staring angrily at a photo of himself. His cheeks were trembling. His eyes were burning and watery. Every muscle in his body tensed up. The picture he held in his hand was taken at the age of 21, when life was beautiful and happy. At age 40, all he felt was the fiery sensation building in his belly.

“I hate you,” he finally said to the picture. He said it again. And again. With every repetition came more fire and volume in his throaty voice. He said it so many times that his hot breath started to resemble that of a dragon. He couldn’t care less how thin the walls in his apartment were. He didn’t care how many warnings he got from the superintendent. There wasn’t a whole lot about life that Spencer cared about. Just rage. More and more rage.

“I’ll pull you under, motherfucker!” he suddenly screamed before punching the glass-encased photo. Punching glass probably wasn’t the wisest move of Spencer’s life, but a middle-aged man’s wisdom went away a long time ago when the hateful dialogue poured from his mouth like snake’s venom.

The shattered glass cut deep into Spencer’s fingers, splattering blood all over his carpet. The screams were much louder and more barbaric, but this time it was out of mind-blowing pain. He wrapped his hand in his burgundy polo shirt, but the bleeding wouldn’t stop. It kept pouring like a raging river and all Spencer could do about it was kneel to the ground and wait for help to arrive. Someone must have heard him and dialed 911 by now. The walls were thinner than a Catholic wafer sometimes.

The last few minutes of Spencer Henry’s consciousness were spent bleeding all over the floor and adding tears and snot to this hodgepodge of emotional fluids. Fading to darkness was probably the best thing that could have happened to him at this point. He wouldn’t have to think those hateful thoughts of himself any longer.

But the thing about being rescued by first responders was that the patient eventually had to wake up. The fuzzy brown and white-haired Spencer awakened slowly and painfully while wearing a paper thin hospital gown. He had wires and tubes going into his body as he lay there on a semi-comfortable bed. His previously bloody hand was covered thickly in white gauze and showed no distinction between fingers, like a mitten of sorts.

“I’m glad to see you awake, Mr. Henry. We thought we’d lost you there for a minute. I’m Dr. Josie Cosgrave. I was in charge of your hand surgery.” The good doctor sat at the edge of Spencer’s bed with a hunched over posture and her chin on her arms. Her pose suggested that she wanted to talk about more than just a few stitches or some medication. The look on her darkly-complexioned face suggested something far more serious. “Is there a reason why you punched a picture of yourself, Mr. Henry?”

He let out a sigh and shrugged his shoulders before saying, “I’m just a little stressed out right now.”

“Yeah, I can tell,” said Josie with a hint of sarcasm in her voice. “There’s just one problem. People who are just a little stressed out don’t unleash a Mike Tyson assault on a piece of glass. They also don’t cry incessantly and fight the same EMT’s who are trying to load them into the ambulance.”

“Wait a minute…I did all of that?” asked a weary Spencer.

“All that and more,” answered Josie. She meandered over to the side of her patient’s bed and held his good hand in a semi-affectionate way. “Something’s bothering you, Mr. Henry. I don’t know what it is, but I’m going to find out one way or another. The answer just might determine if you need psychological counseling or not.”

“Yeah, like my insurance is going to cover that,” said Spencer while throwing his bad hand in the air sarcastically. “Oh wait, I forgot. I don’t have insurance. People who fry fish in the afternoon and write crappy novels at night don’t have that kind of luxury.”

“So is that why you’re so angry at yourself?” asked Josie. “Because you’re pissed off about how life has treated you?”

“What a mind,” said Spencer with even more sarcasm in his voice.

“You don’t have to be a wise-ass with me, Mr. Henry. I’m not your enemy here. I’m your friend. Yes, the hospital bill is going to be expensive, but I personally didn’t take this job as a doctor for a paycheck. It took it because that’s what I love to do. I love helping people like you get through their worst moments.”

Spencer shook his head and smiled unconvincingly when he said, “That’s it, huh? That’s the answer to my problems? Just love what I do and do what I love?” Silence overtook the room before it was broken with a sad sigh. “I really thought I could do it. I thought writing a novel and getting my name out there would give me a comfortable life. I thought I’d be a rock star by now. My novel, ‘Pull You Under’, has been edited countless times by countless people. God knows how many drafts I’ve got.”

Instead of interrupting the flow of the conversation, Dr. Josie Cosgrave squeezed Spencer’s good hand and gave him a look of concern. She didn’t want to talk at that moment, just listen. And damn, did Spencer have a lot to say.

“And then…just when I think I’m finally getting a big break…” A solitary tear rolled down his cheek. “Those asshole editors take their rubber stamp and brand my manuscript with the word ‘reject’ in beg red letters. Reject! That’s what I am to these people! I’ve spent the last ten years sending in that novel and all I ever got was a mouthful of battered fish and French fries for lunch! Every damn day! Every day, another fucking stamp! How many more times are they going to do it?! Why can’t they just say ‘yes’ for the first time in their lives?! Three fucking letters, one fucking word! Yes! Yes! Yeeeeeeeees!!”

The rage has finally boiled over for Spencer Henry. He ripped his good hand from Dr. Cosgrave’s clutches and tried to rip at the bandages and stitches in his hand. Josie tried to pin the furious man’s arms down, but he was much too powerful for her and shoved her to the floor. The man was so pissed off that he started foaming at the mouth with saliva. He was determined to rip his hand to shreds and put an end to his lackluster writing career forever.

Once again, the power of his fiery vocal cords brought help when he needed it the most. Dr. Cosgrave got up again and along with a team of blue scrubs nurses who just came rushing in held Spencer’s tensed up arms down. He put up a wilder fight than a raging bull being lead to the slaughter. Nurses were shoved backwards and more foam poured from Spencer’s mouth.

In one quick motion, Josie stabbed Spencer in the arm and pumped his bloodstream full of sedatives. He fought like a rabid wolverine for a few more seconds and then slowly, but surely descended into darkness once more. By the time he was knocked out, the spittle on his chin looked like he had a Santa Claus beard. The nurses all breathed sighs of relief while Dr. Cosgrave took a napkin and wiped the spittle off.

Spencer Henry didn’t wake up for another hour or so. When he did, his head was pounding and his jaw felt like he’d taken one of his own right hooks. His vision was blurry, mostly from the tears he shed, but it was eventually restored to where he saw Dr. Cosgrave at the foot of his bed again along with a team of nurses in the background.

“Truth is, Mr. Henry,” said Josie in a much more stern voice. “The writing business isn’t all frills and gimmicks. Rejection is common even for the most popular authors who are drowning in a sea of revised drafts. They have a name for going through that kind of hell: it’s called paying your dues. I know you felt like you’ve paid yours with one hundred percent interest, but you have no idea how much further you have to climb.”

“I…I didn’t mean to scare you guys like that,” said Spencer with a weak voice.

“I’m sure you didn’t, Mr. Henry,” said Josie with her arms tensed at her sides. “But we all know why you did it. You did it for the same reason that me and my nurses have: because you feel underappreciated. You’ve paid your dues time and time again. Well, guess what? So have we. So has anyone else who’s ever had a career. We as a society are all in this together. The sooner you let us into your world, the better off you’ll be. Whether you’re a writer, a doctor, a construction worker, a teacher, or otherwise, the struggle and the stress are both real. How will you respond to yours, Mr. Henry? Are you going to give up and flat line in that bed of yours? Or are you going to keep on fighting this endless war? We’ll fight for your life, but only if you fight for yours too.”

Spencer let out a deep sigh and said, “I want to keep going on. I want to believe there’s something out there for me. I just don’t know what it is and how I’ll get there.”

“That’s the beautiful thing about life: you don’t have to know, because it’s not laid out for you. You have to make your own destiny. Your medical chart says you’re 40 years old, but your life is far from over, my friend,” said Josie. She let her words resonate with Spencer for a minute and then she continued. “I’ve been saying that shit for a long ass time now. Some of my patients believed it, some of them didn’t. Those who believed it became successful in their lives or at least happy with what they’ve got. Those who didn’t believe it eventually grew up to be stored in our morgue’s body lockers.”

Spencer tried to calm himself with some basic breathing techniques as he thought about what the good doctor said to him. Was she right? She could be. But she could also be someone collecting more money than a professional fish fryer. Either way, it didn’t matter. The pissed off author was now calm enough to make his decision in his 40 year old crossroads. “Does anybody here know of a good editor I can hire?”

“Not off the top of my head,” said Josie with a satisfied smile. “But I can look it up for you.” As she pulled out her smart phone and did a Google search, Spencer relaxed into his pillow and let out a deep breath, thinking at last that he was on the right path once again.

Underdog

VERSE 1
Nothing in this life was ever handed to me
Except for Uncle Sam’s wad of hush money
“Stay on the sidelines, don’t get yourself hurt
Don’t get mud on your shoes or blood on your shirt
The workplace has nothing for you at this time
In social development, you’re ten years behind”
Underdog has always been my middle name
Would you trust me with fortune and fame?


CHORUS
The lower tier is for those with tears
Stemming from their greatest fears
It may take months, it may take years
To get the underdog on out of here


VERSE 2
2.75 or the 666?
To me it’s all just stones and sticks
62 or is it all about you?
Are those childish insults really true?
99-percent and barely paying rent
For an underdog driven and hell-bent
Knock me down as many times as you’d like
Because I’ll always get back on my bike


CHORUS
The lower tier is for those with tears
Stemming from their greatest fears
It may take months, it may take years
To get the underdog on out of here


VERSE 3
You’re a nonbeliever in the overachiever
You blame the poor and label us whores
Do you know what it’s like to be underrated?
To become the background so gray and faded?
Everything I have I earned in spades
I don’t measure success on how much I’m paid
I don’t measure my love on orgasmic trances
I take control by exploiting my chances


HOOK
Everybody has their own opinion
It doesn’t mean I’ll become your minion
I know I’ll make it one of these days
My future is another conquerable maze


CHORUS
The lower tier is for those with tears
Stemming from their greatest fears
It may take months, it may take years
To get the underdog on out of here

Work Ethic

On my Facebook page, I follow a group called “The Writer’s Circle”, which posts quotes from various authors about their work ethic when it comes to piecing together a novel. They love to use words like “creative spark” and “white heat” while driving home the point of never taking a vacation from writing. These are all very inspirational and true quotes, but here’s where I’ve got a problem. There used to be a time in my life where I would write every single day like an endless dynamo of creativity. There used to be times when the words “white heat” meant something. Those days are over, though I hope they return soon. The reason those days are over is because my schizophrenic brain began to grind so slowly and painfully on me to the point where I’m always mentally exhausted. I’m exhausted when I wake up in the morning and I’m still seeking answers on how to get out of that hazy state. The things I do to try and wake my brain up include going for long distance walks to the grocery store, drinking caffeinated diet sodas, eating meaty foods to get by blood sugar up, etc. Even then, there’s no guarantee that when I get on my computer to write something I won’t be stuck sitting there like a complete idiot while I stare at my screen. Some say it’s writer’s block, but I blame it on my overly exhausted schizophrenic brain. Instead of getting everything down on the computer screen in one epic fiery flow, I have to pace myself to the point where it’s several days before I write anything again. Mind you that this only applies to three-page chapters of Hardcore Hate 2 and not to blog entries and DeviantART journals. Knowing that I’m not a mental or creative superman, when I see these quotes about work ethic on my Facebook page, I always think that they’re secretly implying that I’m a lazy bum because I don’t pump something out every single day. Let me ask you this, Writer’s Circle: do lazy bums have multiple first draft novels to their name? How about double digit short stories? Didn’t think so. My work ethic is unquestionable. My desire is even less questionable. My mental endurance, on the other hand, is extremely doubtable. There’s a difference between desire and endurance. If you don’t have the endurance, desire means nothing. That’s why I’m always giggling through my nose whenever I hear about a pro-wrestler or MMA fighter who is “struggling through the pain”. Eventually, the pain will be too much to bear and there will be no choice but to either tap out or lie down. It has nothing to do with desire and everything to do with science. Get it? Good. I’m out of here.

　

***COMEDIC QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“Bobby’s parents don’t understand why he can’t hold a job, because in school he was always on the honor roll. What Bobby’s parents don’t realize is that in today’s schools, everybody’s on the honor roll, because in order to be on the honor roll, all you really have to do is maintain a body temperature roughly in the 90’s.”

-George Carlin-

Books Made Into Movies

With this huge abundance of movies based off of books, there always seems to be an active debate going on about faithfulness to the original medium. Whenever something is slightly off-key, fan boys and fan girls fly off the handle and take to Twitter for a war of words. Then again, I’ve also heard arguments about how the director should have some control over the movie seeing as how he’s just as important as the writer. It happens in theater productions all the time. Sometimes the adjustments are agreeable, other times they’re nowhere near negotiable. I remember hearing a story about how the writer for a pornographic movie called Wild Side killed himself because the director changed the script drastically from its original intentions. Suicide because a script was butchered? Well, I’ve always heard about how artists can be insane sometimes. If you ask me for my opinion, I think there should be equal cooperation between writer and director. The director should be asking the writer about the way he wants the movie done and the writer should be flexible about the changes to be made. Writing and filmmaking are two very different mediums and therefore require completely different sets of skills. Wouldn’t you feel better if your project was in the right hands? The trust between two people is ultimately what will drive them to success whether it’s in a business, personal, romantic, or other kind of relationship. But of course, the tendency to dominate the project is ever present in today’s world. Wild Side is an extreme example of what could go wrong with domination. It typically doesn’t result in a suicide, but it can be struggled over in the court systems. If one thing goes wrong, a lawsuit will be ignited. It doesn’t matter who wins the lawsuit or even if it’s thrown out. Even if there’s no settlement to be gained, the money spent on lawyer’s fees and the delaying of the project will grind and wear on the people involved. Is it really worth suing over? We all know it’s not worth killing over as evidenced with Wild Side. If somebody wanted to make a movie out of “Red Blood, White Knuckles, Blue Heart”, I wouldn’t be heartbroken over the choices the director made. I would just be fucking thrilled to know that people care enough about my book to make it into a more relatable medium. Reading is fun, but then again, so are movies. When these schools of thought come together, it should always be a beautiful thing. Nothing more, nothing less.

　

***COMEDIC QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“People got mad because Barack Obama thought mind-melding was from Star Wars instead of Star Trek. And I say to them, ‘Congratulations, you’re experts in every world except the real one.’”

-Bill Maher-