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Friday, January 27
Zero's Friday Five
You've all heard a variant or two of this question before. If you were stranded on a desert island and you could only bring... etc, etc. It's a pretty stupid question, actually. If I were stranded on a desert island and, for example, could only bring one book with me, it wouldn't matter what it was because I'd be effing dead. Though I guess taking one more romp through Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett's Good Omens might at least let me die with a smile on my face... make it easier for the vultures to pick my teeth out.
This week, I present to you a Zero's Friday Five Survival Guide: 5 Must-Have Things for Your Own Private Desert Island. Enjoy.
1. Whores - This goes without saying really. I mean, being stranded on a desert island and all, you're basically screwed (and you can see where I'm going with that one). But, as an added bonus, you can also kill and eat whores once they've outlived their usefulness. I hear the crack addicted variety make excellent stew.
2. Whiny Douchebag Liberals - We all know that leftist, crybaby liberals can never do anything except complain and cry. You can gather their tears for fresh water, snuggle up with them at night to keep warm (they love to hug and cuddle), and since most of them don't believe in capital punishment, you can get away with the killing and eating of the whores. Even better, since most of them are stiff, two dimensional things that never seem to do anything but lay around and moan, you can build a sturdy shelter out of them.
3. Militant Psycho Neo-Conservatives - These nutbag Hitler youths are just what you need to help fend off communist vulture and terrorist coyote attacks, as well as sandstorms, extreme heat, and anything else you don't much like about being on a desert island. Basically, they'll pretty much declare war on anything and everything (and they'll find a way to make weapons out of sand if they have to). It's really the only solution, after all. They'll say it was the last thing they considered, but we all know it isn't true. You can also get them to dig for oil... not that you'll really need that since there are cheaper, more abundant alternative power sources available to you. Extra bonus: They'll make the liberals cry more which equals more fresh water.
4. Corporate Sponsors (aka Lobbyists) - Now, to motivate your douchebag liberals and psychotic neo-cons, you're going to need money, lots and lots of money. Neither of these groups will do a single beneficial thing unless they're paid tens of thousands of dollars to think about it. So, you're going to need huge corporate backing. Just be careful that the corporations don't go running their own ideas past the peanut gallery, or you could find yourself stranded at the bottom of the ocean with nothing but some nice concrete shoes.
5. A Radio Transmitter - Obviously, you're going to want to be able to broadcast your need for help. I mean, nobody wants to die stranded on a desert island. So, make sure you have a powerful enough tower to send out you calls for rescue, and to report on the general state of affairs. Make sure to fill your signal with lots of double talk and propaganda, and make sure that whoever receives the signal knows that you pretty much blame them for everything that is wrong with your life.
And there you have it. You have to admit it worked well for a bunch of British separatists who found themselves stranded in a strange land a couple hundred years ago. It should work well for you to. Good luck, suckers.
You are now free to vote around the TKOP.
posted by: Zero @ 9:30 AM
Thursday, January 26
It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.
The title of this blog owes it's origins to the very late, great, Mark Twain. A writer, American icon, and incredible wit which I admire profusely. I recently heard the above quote, and immediately identified with it. I often find the most (to put it mundanely) stupid things slipping past my lips and into the air. Words which, if they had some amount of tangibility, I would grab at franticly and shove in my pocket before they landed upon any pair of ears. I've discovered keeping one's mouth closed, save for eating and breathing for a stuffy nose, eases my passage through most social occasions.
This does not exclude blogging.
Since I have quite little to say this week, my mind drained of all creative impulses from a month doing nothing but playing World of Warcraft, I will let Mr. Twain do the talking. Below are a few pleasantries which escaped his lips and landed upon the pages of history. Enjoy.
Always acknowledge a fault. This will throw those in authority off their guard and give you an opportunity to commit more.
Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.
Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.
Grief can take care of itself, but to get the full value of a joy you must have somebody to divide it with.
Honesty is the best policy - when there is money in it.
I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.
I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him.
If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and a man.
If you tell the truth you don't have to remember anything.
In the first place, God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made school boards.
It usually takes more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech.
Let us so live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry.
Most people are bothered by those passages of Scripture they do not understand, but the passages that bother me are those I do understand.
Often it does seem a pity that Noah and his party did not miss the boat.
Part of the secret of success in life is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside.
The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.
The man who doesn't read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them.
There are people who strictly deprive themselves of each and every eatable, drinkable, and smokable which has in any way acquired a shady reputation. They pay this price for health. And health is all they get for it. How strange it is. It is like paying out your whole fortune for a cow that has gone dry.
When people do not respect us we are sharply offended; yet deep down in his private heart no man much respects himself.
I cannot call to mind a single instance where I have ever been irreverent, except toward the things which were sacred to other people.
A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.
You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.
There are several good protections against temptations, but the surest is cowardice.
It takes your enemy and your friend, working together, to hurt you: the one to slander you, and the other to get the news to you.
All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.
Familiarity breeds contempt - and children.
The holy passion of Friendship is of so sweet and steady and loyal and enduring a nature that it will last through a whole lifetime, if not asked to lend money.
posted by: Zung @ 8:08 AM
Tuesday, January 24
Fighting radio silence
It's been a long long week.
And it's only Monday.
Last week was extra busy. Way too much going on. Nothing went as planned. Not as much got accomplished. And Thursday night I got very very ill.
That's still passing. I'm up now because my body wants to cough more than it wants to sleep.
My house is a disaster area. I don't have the strength to clean it. Work is getting heavy. The pressures to get the new webserver up and running are heavy.
All of this makes me just want to curl up somewhere and hide for a few weeks. But I can't. If ever before in my life I couldn't succumb to this seasonal depression it's now.
So, I'm staying. Hard as it is... I'll stick it out rather than hide from it.
Spring better come soon.
posted by: Skeeve @ 12:38 AM
Friday, January 20
Zero's Friday Five
This week, I'd like to continue with the WoW theme, since you all insist on playing it, and present 5 things you should avoid when playing WoW. This list is probably adaptable for any MMOPRG, but WoW is all I know. It is (was) my digital crack of choice. It's the MMORPG that Goldilocks chose. Ok,... on with the list.
1. Peeing - If you get up to pee, the skeletal horrors in Raven Hill will kill you. Keep an empty pop bottle near your desk if you think you're predisposed to urinate during your 8+ hours of grinding, questing and avoiding your real life... Hey, Azeroth isn't going to save itself!
2. Sex - If you have to cyber in game, do it with a night elf female, because they're the sexiest dancers. But, never attempt to do the real nasty and raid The Molten Core at the same time. If you do, especially with frequency, you'll eventually become confused and start running instances alone while inviting all your friends over for a 20-man raid on your sigoth's privates.
3. Eating - Crumbs can get in your keyboard and prevent you from hitting a crucial keystroke during combat. This is life and death, people! You don't go messing around with a cheese sandwich when death is on the line. Now, put down those donuts and pick up that sword. There's work to do.
4. Thinking - Use the force, Luke. Reach out with your feelings. Don't think too long or you'll end up a bloody pancake on the end of a two handed mace. Just pick up and play. Let yourself go... There is no spoon.
5. Breathing - Face it... By now you've given up food, health, nookie and free thought. You might as well kill yourself...
...well... wait until you're level 60 and have some really sweet purple gear. Then look at the ruin your life has become and pull the trigger.
/endlife
posted by: Zero @ 3:44 AM
Wednesday, January 18
Watching paint dry on a rainy day
When we moved into our apartment a little over a year ago, Kate and I made sure to claim each room as our own. Careful attention was paid to the arrangement of furniture, choice of color schemes and selection of decor. The house itself, is nearly a century old and we tried to keep a slightly antique look to it. The previous tenants had not been kind to her, and plenty of fixing and touch-up work was required. All this came fairly easy in our spare time. It no longer looks like the beast it was when we first arrived. The bathroom in particular was assaulted with crusade-like vigor, physically tearing apart things and giving it a complete makeover. In a few months time, we had shaped each room with care to make this house a home.
Every room except one.
The bane of my domestic living experience, the scourge of my feng shui, my residential nemesis... was the kitchen.
Growing up, I resided with my parents in a ranch style home in the suburbs. That place is no longer in my life, but the memories of it still linger, good and bad. Colors especially have special meanings for me, like the deep blue of my childhood bedroom, the pale khaki of the living room, the cloud colored tile of the bathroom, and the putrid pastel orange of the kitchen. I hated that color. Despite the sadness of loosing my childhood home when I reached the age of 18, the age set down upon paper by divorce lawyers allowing my parents to sell and split the cost of the house, I was happy to be free of that hideous color which haunted my nightmares. I would never have to see it again.
And upon the age of 28, so happy to move into our home along the river, I walked through that double swing door into the kitchen, only to find that after all those years, the color had tracked me down like a lost dog in a children's movie. It lay upon the walls of my new kitchen, staring me in the face and wagging it's proverbial tail.
The awful orange color, the tiles, floor to waist wood paneling, warped and broken cabinets and tarnished and sullied hardwood floors made the kitchen the eyesore of the house. But unlike the bathroom, which we were able to transform on a budget, redoing the entire kitchen would be expensive. We agreed that if we were to fix anything in the kitchen, it would be all done at the same time, since so many revisions effected each other.
But that color has continued to mock me and torment me.
So last weekend, we went to home depot and picked out a new color. To hell with the fact that we'll have to paint again once the woodpaneling and tiles come down eventually. The orange latex devil must die! I spent yesterday and today applying a while primer. I believe I lost some brain cells today, after failing to ventilate the room. But it's the orange hell is nearly a memory. Tomorrow I shall finish off the beast, and slay it with a lovely coat of lemon cream.
I totally pwn3d my kitchen.
posted by: Zung @ 7:40 PM
Monday, January 16
WoW server crashes are natures way of saying "Write your Blog"
It's been a long and very busy week since my last confession. I've dealt with the resignation of a co-worker, Bliss getting a new job, unseasonably warm tempreatures, traffic court, estimates, tempreature drops, adjusters, aerver room rewiring and updates to the board.
It's just that kind of month.
I'm sure many of you are in similar things in your lives... But this blog isn't about you. Now sit back down and shut up.
So, I've been feeding my WoW addiction pretty hard. We're all playing it here lately. I know we're a day late and a dollar short when you compare us to a Penny Arcade or a PVP. But then OUR guild isn't called "Fancy Lads" either.
My New Years resolutions are coming to pass nicely. Just a few more underwear drawers to fill and I can call it a day.
But for now... COME BACK UP DARKIRON!!!
Sheesh.
posted by: Skeeve @ 9:12 PM
Friday, January 13
Zero's Friday Five
With World of Warcraft on everyone's minds these days, I felt inspired to do a WoW themed five. So, while you are all off fighting murlocs on the beaches of Westfall, raiding the Scarlet Monastery, and joining the Battlegrounds at Arathi, I'll be right here giving you the Top 5 WoW Patches You Never Saw...
1. The NLA Support Group - You've all seen them. These greedy, sneaky people that run up and Greed Roll everything or steal a chest after you've risked life and limb to kill off everything around it by yourself. Ninja Looters. These twitchy, sweaty, awkward people steal for a myriad of reasons, perhaps they were abused as children, or once saw their mother raped by a Kobold with a really big candle, who knows? Point is, we shouldn't ridicule these poor lads. We should embrace them and offer them support, get to the root of their problem and maybe turn their wasted, thieving lives around. The NLA (Ninja Looters Anonymous) Support Group (based out of Stormwind, Razor Hill, and Gadgetzan) would've done just that. Alas.
2. Pants! - The ultimate PVP move, this addition to one of the Rogue's talent trees would allow a nefarious leather wearing scamp to stealthily sneak up behind an enemy and yank his pants off. Oh, the humanity!
3. Sports - Orc vs. Humans, Night Elves vs. Undead, Horde vs. Alliance... You see it everyday. But, sometimes you want to take a break from the killing and slaughter and just have a good, old-fashioned, bloodless time with the many colorful races that make up your online world. That's why there might have been a new battleground in The Barrens or the Salt Flats... areas with unique geography, perfect for building soccer, football, and baseball fields for anyone and everyone. Of course, the fun wouldn't last very long once the Undead insisted on playing soccer with a severed head, the gnomes get all juiced up on Silverleaf steroids and everyone fights over who gets to have Leeroy Jenkins on their team.
4. Whores - Rumor has it that one Blizzard employee had suggested including prostitutes in some of the smaller, poorer towns on both factions. Paying various amounts of money for different services would give your toon a stat boost or two for a certain amount of time, but beware! There's a 10% chance that you'll be affected by a permanent disease that not even priest or potion can cure. Of course, Paladins are immune to the disease because their wangs are holy. This idea didn't fly though, and last I had heard the employee that suggested it was fired and now does a lame weekly top 5 list on some BBS themed web community.
5. Crime and Punishment - Is one of your Guild Members constantly ruining things for you? Don't take the law into your own hands... Take them to court. Run by 9 appointed GMs, the Supreme Court of Azeroth is located on the neutral grounds of Gadgetzan. There players can bring grievances against other players. For example, maybe Zung is in your guild and keeps showing up for raids on Thursdays instead of Wednesdays, claiming that Wednesday doesn't exist for him, or that gnomes kidnapped him. The punishment would be swift and just, and probably involve community service of some kind, whereby he would have to log 60 hours of helping newbies slay Hogger or just get started in Northshire. Until those 60 hours are complete, he can do nothing else in the game. Yeah, that'd be nice. We could also make it so that a Rogue pantses him every half-hour on the hour, his whore and sports privileges are revoked, and once a day he has to hug someone coming out of an NLA meeting. Or, he just start showing up for raids on Wednesday before I get really pissed.
You are now free to draw aggro around the TKOP.
posted by: Zero @ 9:26 AM
Thursday, January 12
I'm going by the Inca calender this week.
Seriously. They don't have a wednesday. They call yesterday "Walla-Walla"
So you can see how I missed my blog yesterday.
Well, not to be left out this week, here's a little something for the "518" crew that I scraped off the bottom of a forwarded email...
You know you're from Albany Area when....
You still call the Pepsi Arena "The Knick".
You can correctly pronounce the words Kosciuszko, Cohoes, Coeymans, and Kayaderosseras.
You know what The Egg is.
You know what and where Nipper is.
You expect to see nothing but grey between the months of November and May.
You remember when Crossgates was only half as big as it is now. Bonus points if you know what store was there before Best Buy.
You've ever rooted for the River Rats.
You grew up on Channels 6, 10, and 13.
The word "dredge" immediately conjures up thoughts of GE.
You know the 3 closest Stewart's shops to your house.
You've never called I-87 anything other than "The Northway".
Okay, maybe you've called it "The Thruway", too. Depends which side of Albany you're from.
You know what a Karner Blue is.
The name Arbor Hill doesn't bring anything plant-related to mind.
You know which city is the Collar City and which is the Electric City.
You think Saratoga is classy.
If you're from Schenectady then Troy might as well be Mars to you and vice versa.
It doesn't bother you that the Northway has no Exit 3.
It also doesn't bother you that Central Ave. is State Street at the other end.
You know that somehow Sand Creek Road is the shortcut to everywhere.
You've argued with your parents to take the car out in the middle of a blizzard.
You have an ingrained taste for concrete architecture.
You know it's "Awl -buh-nee", not "Al -buh-nee" or, even worse, "All-ben-nee".
You know what "Harvard on the Hudson" is.
You know what a guy Ken Goewey is.
You know that AirTite Windows knocked Resnick's sign down (but then put it back up).
You know who Nina (of Manchester) and her husband are, and how they sell diamonds for less than 33%.
You know who likes Jack Byrne.
You thought Hoffman's Playland was the bomb as a child.
You know that "My dad Terry Morris is still number one!"
You're bummed that the Firebirds left.
If there's even a chance of snow Ichabod Crane will be closed.
You refer to Albany as "the 518".
You know what "I Love" is.
You know at least three people whose last names start with "Van".
You know who Neil Golub is.
posted by: Zung @ 7:51 PM
Monday, January 9
Monday blues...
In honor of my trip this afternoon to the Rotterdam Traffic court I regale you with:
Alice's Restaurant
By Arlo Guthrie
This song is called Alice's Restaurant, and it's about Alice, and the
restaurant, but Alice's Restaurant is not the name of the restaurant,
that's just the name of the song, and that's why I called the song Alice's
Restaurant.
You can get anything you want at Alice's Restaurant
You can get anything you want at Alice's Restaurant
Walk right in it's around the back
Just a half a mile from the railroad track
You can get anything you want at Alice's Restaurant
Now it all started two Thanksgivings ago, was on - two years ago on
Thanksgiving, when my friend and I went up to visit Alice at the
restaurant, but Alice doesn't live in the restaurant, she lives in the
church nearby the restaurant, in the bell-tower, with her husband Ray and
Fasha the dog. And livin' in the bell tower like that, they got a lot of
room downstairs where the pews used to be in. Havin' all that room,
seein' as how they took out all the pews, they decided that they didn't
have to take out their garbage for a long time.
We got up there, we found all the garbage in there, and we decided it'd be
a friendly gesture for us to take the garbage down to the city dump. So
we took the half a ton of garbage, put it in the back of a red VW
microbus, took shovels and rakes and implements of destruction and headed
on toward the city dump.
Well we got there and there was a big sign and a chain across across the
dump saying, "Closed on Thanksgiving." And we had never heard of a dump
closed on Thanksgiving before, and with tears in our eyes we drove off
into the sunset looking for another place to put the garbage.
We didn't find one. Until we came to a side road, and off the side of the
side road there was another fifteen foot cliff and at the bottom of the
cliff there was another pile of garbage. And we decided that one big pile
is better than two little piles, and rather than bring that one up we
decided to throw our's down.
That's what we did, and drove back to the church, had a thanksgiving
dinner that couldn't be beat, went to sleep and didn't get up until the
next morning, when we got a phone call from officer Obie. He said, "Kid,
we found your name on an envelope at the bottom of a half a ton of
garbage, and just wanted to know if you had any information about it." And
I said, "Yes, sir, Officer Obie, I cannot tell a lie, I put that envelope
under that garbage."
After speaking to Obie for about fourty-five minutes on the telephone we
finally arrived at the truth of the matter and said that we had to go down
and pick up the garbage, and also had to go down and speak to him at the
police officer's station. So we got in the red VW microbus with the
shovels and rakes and implements of destruction and headed on toward the
police officer's station.
Now friends, there was only one or two things that Obie coulda done at
the police station, and the first was he could have given us a medal for
being so brave and honest on the telephone, which wasn't very likely, and
we didn't expect it, and the other thing was he could have bawled us out
and told us never to be see driving garbage around the vicinity again,
which is what we expected, but when we got to the police officer's station
there was a third possibility that we hadn't even counted upon, and we was
both immediately arrested. Handcuffed. And I said "Obie, I don't think I
can pick up the garbage with these handcuffs on." He said, "Shut up, kid.
Get in the back of the patrol car."
And that's what we did, sat in the back of the patrol car and drove to the
quote Scene of the Crime unquote. I want tell you about the town of
Stockbridge, Massachusets, where this happened here, they got three stop
signs, two police officers, and one police car, but when we got to the
Scene of the Crime there was five police officers and three police cars,
being the biggest crime of the last fifty years, and everybody wanted to
get in the newspaper story about it. And they was using up all kinds of
cop equipment that they had hanging around the police officer's station.
They was taking plaster tire tracks, foot prints, dog smelling prints, and
they took twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy photographs with circles
and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one explaining what each
one was to be used as evidence against us. Took pictures of the approach,
the getaway, the northwest corner the southwest corner and that's not to
mention the aerial photography.
After the ordeal, we went back to the jail. Obie said he was going to put
us in the cell. Said, "Kid, I'm going to put you in the cell, I want your
wallet and your belt." And I said, "Obie, I can understand you wanting my
wallet so I don't have any money to spend in the cell, but what do you
want my belt for?" And he said, "Kid, we don't want any hangings." I
said, "Obie, did you think I was going to hang myself for littering?"
Obie said he was making sure, and friends Obie was, cause he took out the
toilet seat so I couldn't hit myself over the head and drown, and he took
out the toilet paper so I couldn't bend the bars roll out the - roll the
toilet paper out the window, slide down the roll and have an escape. Obie
was making sure, and it was about four or five hours later that Alice
(remember Alice? It's a song about Alice), Alice came by and with a few
nasty words to Obie on the side, bailed us out of jail, and we went back
to the church, had a another thanksgiving dinner that couldn't be beat,
and didn't get up until the next morning, when we all had to go to court.
We walked in, sat down, Obie came in with the twenty seven eight-by-ten
colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back
of each one, sat down. Man came in said, "All rise." We all stood up,
and Obie stood up with the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy
pictures, and the judge walked in sat down with a seeing eye dog, and he
sat down, we sat down. Obie looked at the seeing eye dog, and then at the
twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows
and a paragraph on the back of each one, and looked at the seeing eye dog.
And then at twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles
and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one and began to cry,
'cause Obie came to the realization that it was a typical case of American
blind justice, and there wasn't nothing he could do about it, and the
judge wasn't going to look at the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy
pictures with the circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each
one explaining what each one was to be used as evidence against us. And
we was fined $50 and had to pick up the garbage in the snow, but thats not
what I came to tell you about.
Came to talk about the draft.
They got a building down New York City, it's called Whitehall Street,
where you walk in, you get injected, inspected, detected, infected,
neglected and selected. I went down to get my physical examination one
day, and I walked in, I sat down, got good and drunk the night before, so
I looked and felt my best when I went in that morning. `Cause I wanted to
look like the all-American kid from New York City, man I wanted, I wanted
to feel like the all-, I wanted to be the all American kid from New York,
and I walked in, sat down, I was hung down, brung down, hung up, and all
kinds o' mean nasty ugly things. And I waked in and sat down and they gave
me a piece of paper, said, "Kid, see the phsychiatrist, room 604."
And I went up there, I said, "Shrink, I want to kill. I mean, I wanna, I
wanna kill. Kill. I wanna, I wanna see, I wanna see blood and gore and
guts and veins in my teeth. Eat dead burnt bodies. I mean kill, Kill,
KILL, KILL." And I started jumpin up and down yelling, "KILL, KILL," and
he started jumpin up and down with me and we was both jumping up and down
yelling, "KILL, KILL." And the sargent came over, pinned a medal on me,
sent me down the hall, said, "You're our boy."
Didn't feel too good about it.
Proceeded on down the hall gettin more injections, inspections,
detections, neglections and all kinds of stuff that they was doin' to me
at the thing there, and I was there for two hours, three hours, four
hours, I was there for a long time going through all kinds of mean nasty
ugly things and I was just having a tough time there, and they was
inspecting, injecting every single part of me, and they was leaving no
part untouched. Proceeded through, and when I finally came to the see the
last man, I walked in, walked in sat down after a whole big thing there,
and I walked up and said, "What do you want?" He said, "Kid, we only got
one question. Have you ever been arrested?"
And I proceeded to tell him the story of the Alice's Restaurant Massacre,
with full orchestration and five part harmony and stuff like that and all
the phenome... - and he stopped me right there and said, "Kid, did you ever
go to court?"
And I proceeded to tell him the story of the twenty seven eight-by-ten
colour glossy pictures with the circles and arrows and the paragraph on
the back of each one, and he stopped me right there and said, "Kid, I want
you to go and sit down on that bench that says Group W .... NOW kid!!"
And I, I walked over to the, to the bench there, and there is, Group W's
where they put you if you may not be moral enough to join the army after
committing your special crime, and there was all kinds of mean nasty ugly
looking people on the bench there. Mother rapers. Father stabbers. Father
rapers! Father rapers sitting right there on the bench next to me! And
they was mean and nasty and ugly and horrible crime-type guys sitting on the
bench next to me. And the meanest, ugliest, nastiest one, the meanest
father raper of them all, was coming over to me and he was mean 'n' ugly
'n' nasty 'n' horrible and all kind of things and he sat down next to me
and said, "Kid, whad'ya get?" I said, "I didn't get nothing, I had to pay
$50 and pick up the garbage." He said, "What were you arrested for, kid?"
And I said, "Littering." And they all moved away from me on the bench
there, and the hairy eyeball and all kinds of mean nasty things, till I
said, "And creating a nuisance." And they all came back, shook my hand,
and we had a great time on the bench, talkin about crime, mother stabbing,
father raping, all kinds of groovy things that we was talking about on the
bench. And everything was fine, we was smoking cigarettes and all kinds of
things, until the Sargeant came over, had some paper in his hand, held it
up and said.
"Kids, this-piece-of-paper's-got-47-words-37-sentences-58-words-we-wanna-
know-details-of-the-crime-time-of-the-crime-and-any-other-kind-of-thing-
you-gotta-say-pertaining-to-and-about-the-crime-I-want-to-know-arresting-
officer's-name-and-any-other-kind-of-thing-you-gotta-say", and talked for
forty-five minutes and nobody understood a word that he said, but we had
fun filling out the forms and playing with the pencils on the bench there,
and I filled out the massacre with the four part harmony, and wrote it
down there, just like it was, and everything was fine and I put down the
pencil, and I turned over the piece of paper, and there, there on the
other side, in the middle of the other side, away from everything else on
the other side, in parentheses, capital letters, quotated, read the
following words:
("KID, HAVE YOU REHABILITATED YOURSELF?")
I went over to the sargent, said, "Sargeant, you got a lot a damn gall to
ask me if I've rehabilitated myself, I mean, I mean, I mean that just, I'm
sittin' here on the bench, I mean I'm sittin here on the Group W bench
'cause you want to know if I'm moral enough join the army, burn women,
kids, houses and villages after bein' a litterbug." He looked at me and
said, "Kid, we don't like your kind, and we're gonna send you fingerprints
off to Washington."
And friends, somewhere in Washington enshrined in some little folder, is a
study in black and white of my fingerprints. And the only reason I'm
singing you this song now is cause you may know somebody in a similar
situation, or you may be in a similar situation, and if your in a
situation like that there's only one thing you can do and that's walk into
the shrink wherever you are ,just walk in say "Shrink, You can get
anything you want, at Alice's restaurant.". And walk out. You know, if
one person, just one person does it they may think he's really sick and
they won't take him. And if two people, two people do it, in harmony,
they may think they're both faggots and they won't take either of them.
And three people do it, three, can you imagine, three people walking in
singin a bar of Alice's Restaurant and walking out. They may think it's an
organization. And can you, can you imagine fifty people a day,I said
fifty people a day walking in singin a bar of Alice's Restaurant and
walking out. And friends they may thinks it's a movement.
And that's what it is , the Alice's Restaurant Anti-Massacre Movement, and
all you got to do to join is sing it the next time it come's around on the
guitar.
With feeling. So we'll wait for it to come around on the guitar, here and
sing it when it does. Here it comes.
You can get anything you want, at Alice's Restaurant
You can get anything you want, at Alice's Restaurant
Walk right in it's around the back
Just a half a mile from the railroad track
You can get anything you want, at Alice's Restaurant
That was horrible. If you want to end war and stuff you got to sing loud.
I've been singing this song now for twenty five minutes. I could sing it
for another twenty five minutes. I'm not proud... or tired.
So we'll wait till it comes around again, and this time with four part
harmony and feeling.
We're just waitin' for it to come around is what we're doing.
All right now.
You can get anything you want, at Alice's Restaurant
Excepting Alice
You can get anything you want, at Alice's Restaurant
Walk right in it's around the back
Just a half a mile from the railroad track
You can get anything you want, at Alice's Restaurant
Da da da da da da da dum
At Alice's Restaurant
©1966,1967 (Renewed) by Appleseed Music Inc. All Rights Reserved.
posted by: Skeeve @ 1:15 PM
Friday, January 6
Zero's Friday Five
No, you read that right. The Friday Five is back for 2006. Why? Because as a blogger I make a pretty good list maker. Go figure. It's looking like everything old is new again, and to usher in the new year I present to you the Top 5 New Year's Resolutions...
1. Lose Weight - This is commonly made by two groups of people. The first are teenaged and twenty-something women who, by fragile self-esteem or passion for fashion feel that their nearly perfect bodies just aren't perfect enough. These are sickening and somewhat broken people, who would be better off checking into a psycho ward than a gym. The other group are a subsection of obese people; the kind that carry all their belongings in a fanny pack (that often gets lost between their jelly rolls) so that their hands can always be free for holding food. They show up at the gym, break a sweat from the locker room to the gym floor, leisurely ride a stationary bike for 20 minutes while flipping through the pages of Food Magazine or a cookbook, then pack it up and head to McDonalds, blissfully content that the workout they just endured will be shedding those excess pounds in no time flat.
2. Find A New Career - Many, many people hate their jobs. A new year is the perfect time for quite a few of these people to finally admit that to themselves and attempt to seek out something better. A word to the wise: Leaving your go-nowhere job as a cashier at Best Buy to work the Digital Camera desk at Circuit City for an extra 50 cents an hour in starting pay is not 'a new career'. It's the same career with a different color shirt. This is also true of people who leave Kinko's for Sir Speedy, McDonalds for Burger King, an IT job for another IT job, etc, etc... If you have done any of the above with high hopes for a brighter, more content future (and especially if you've done it more than once), you need to kill yourself.
3. Kill Yourself - What better way to kick off the new year than by throwing in the towel. The only question is, how are you going to do it? Jump off a building? Buy a rifle at Wal-Mart and shoot yourself in the face with it? Drive your car off a cliff? Stick your head in the oven? (make sure it's a gas oven, and then none of your fat relatives are dropping by, because they may mistake your noggin for meatloaf if you try to do this with an electric oven), etc... There's a lot of planning that goes into this sort of thing. You've got to make sure it's fool proof or you might accidentally live. Don't forget to leave a note too. Frankly, if you have that much time and energy, maybe you can turn it into something other than your untimely demise. But, if you do go through with it, there's always the chance that your mother will discover your body. It'd serve her right for screwing you up the way she did.
4. Call Your Parents More Often - They miss you. They really do. They'll miss you even more if you do number 3, so skip that one and pick up the phone instead. Sure, by now your folks don't hear so good, and shouting at them on the phone can get annoying. But, you need to wake up to the fact that your dad is never going to use that computer you bought him. He's never going to figure out E-Mail, and pretty soon he's going to think the phone is just ringing in his head. Make the best of it while you can. And if your parents have passed on, call someone else's parents and pretend to be their kid. Chances are they're loony enough that they won't be able to tell the difference and if you're really crafty you can end up in the will. Bonus!
5. Fall In Love - People who make this resolution need to be made aware of something that everyone else automatically knows: You can't control this, and it certainly isn't going to happen to you if you never leave the house. Hot Canadian girls you met on the internet aren't just going to drop by and ring the doorbell someday, and the ones that do, despite what they may tell you, are all named Chuck. Seriously, go out more or you will be doomed to be alone for the rest of your pathetic, worthless life (see #3).
None of this matters anyway. Most people give up on their resolutions within the first 6 weeks.
You are now free to make yourself promises you'll never keep around the TKOP.
posted by: Zero @ 8:37 AM
Thursday, January 5
I was kidnapped by garden gnomes.
Was it Wednesday yesterday? I didn't even notice. I forgot to take out the recyclables too. You never forget that Monday is Monday, or Friday is Friday. Even Thursday gets some small amount of recognition. Saturday and Sunday are like celebrities. Tuesday gets remembered too, but usually only in the morning when a few think to themselves: "Oh man, it's still only Tuesday! I can't wait until Friday. Or at least Thursday!"
Wednesday is such a lonely day.
Anyhow, I'm reaching into my bag of tricks today and pulling out two pieces of poetry I worked on over the summer. You know there was a time, in my youth that I thought poetry was bullshit. Then I discovered the beauty of crafting thoughts that ran down the page like raindrops along your skin, and saying so much with so few words. And the best part about poetry, is all you need is your thoughts. Anyone can do it.
That's hip daddy-o.
Words scattered in a sun shower
I swam awhile
on foreign shores,
and beached myself
beside the roar
and misery
of the water that beckoned me.
Along her land
I did journey
in sun showers,
and returning,
I felt plundered.
Like poems chasing after thunder.
Distant finish line
My nemesis met me at birth.
He swore to unseat me from earth.
I inquired of his nature,
and prying query pre-mature,
caused a fright to my thinking limb.
And thus I lost a piece to him.
In youth, I did meet him often.
Slung threats caused my will to soften.
Yet over time did courage dent,
against that familiar intent.
I was a pupil to his flaws,
and shielded I from raging claws.
At my height of maturity,
our oft-quarrels lost their fury.
I kept my distance from his gage
for while he youthful, I gained age.
Our war was cold. Neither baited.
Within mindÃ’s eye sight, he waited.
The sunset of my life IÃ’ve seen.
Many thoughts and men have I been
hath proven I am not oppressed.
Twas a race gainst my nemesis,
of which neither wins. I am free,
and death, that runner dies with me.
-Zung
posted by: Zung @ 8:20 AM
Monday, January 2
Resolutions:
I resolve to post my blogs before midnight, or not at all!
I resolve to Mock the Cat at every turn!
I resolve to get the chat client installed... Eventually.
I resovle to give everyone on the board an electronic hug!
I resolve to put tacks on Zeros chair.
I resolve to get more nookie.
I resolve to fight with the Palestinians less.
I resolve to clean up my credit.
I resolve to play WoW until my eyeballs bleed.
I resolve to put live weasles in Zungs underwear drawer.
I resolve to never rely on a cheap tactic like a top 5/7/10 list each week.
I resolve to let the wookie win.
I resolve to make TKOP a fun place for you all to want to come back to!
posted by: Skeeve @ 10:17 PM
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