National Novel Writing Month

I'm currently hammering away on my novel for National Novel Writing month.

You can chart my progress and read an excerpt here:

http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/user/428593

This is a competition to see if you can bang out 50K words in one month. So be kind when reading the excerpt, I have not edited a thing. But then again, if you like it, then that's just the brilliance of me.

Predictions for Next Week

I predict that before the election, gas prices will dip drastically low.

Here in south east Denver, I have a gas station I go to where it's now close to $2.50 a gallon.

My prediction is that by next Tuesday, gas prices will get to $2.15 a gallon. Why? To fool people into voting for McCain. The thinking will be "hey, gas is back to what it was a year or two ago...things aren't so bad right? Right?"

Well they're still bad. And the completely arbitrary and staged fluctuations in gas prices are not indicative of how crappy things are.

So here's my other prediction: Once Obama is elected, gas prices will jump back up and will hit $3 a gallon by the next week or two. Why? Because the dip in prices is an illusion and once the need to artificially lower prices is over, they'll go back up to where they want them. And it makes Obama look bad.

It's all smoke and mirrors.

Eliminate our need for foreign oil? Great idea. But how about eliminate our need for oil all together?

It's very peculiar that Cadillac just came out with a Hybrid in the last month. The last month? Really? So, they didn't have the means to make one until gas his $4 a gallon? Amazing how that happens.

Push our dickhead politicians for alternative energy not just alternative oil sources. At least when I'm being lied to I like to have the illusion that someone is actually giving a shit.

So in closing, punish those responsible for the last eight years by voting Obama next Tuesday. And get ready to pay out the ass yet again at the pumps once he's elected.

Ass, grass or cash. No one rides for free.

JR

DNC Madness Continued

The DNC is in full swing and someone got busted for lugging around his own feces!!! That is such awesome news.

I have stayed out of downtown but I might swing down tomorrow with a friend just to see the craziness.

I'm sure some stories could be told but for the most part other than the whitest of white trash being busted for "organizing" an attempt on Obama's life, it's been fairly mellow. I say "organizing" because from the looks of these mammals I'm pretty sure scoring meth is a struggle.

I heard a hilarious thing on the radio today. It was audio of a Denver cop telling a crowd they needed to disperse. He politely told them they needed to leave or they'd be arrested. You can hear the crowd yelling at him and tell him to fuck off, but he remains calm and starts to finish what he's saying by noting the time: 4:20. When he says 4:20 the place erupts and you can't hear a thing. I laughed my ass off.

If I go down, I'll report back. But for right now, I'm going to shit in an empty Pringles tube and donate it to a worthy protester.

JR

The Listening Party

What I’ve been shoving into my ear hole lately:


Beck - Modern Guilt

I don’t know how these things happen, but somebody proclaims this Beck album “his best work in awhile” and everyone beats it into the ground like a Rosie O’Donnell fat joke. Yeah, it’s a pretty good album, but it’s no worse and no better than any of his recent work. It sells short Guero and The Information which were great albums and fine examples of the great tunes Beck continues to turn out.

Modern Guilt has a great tone that does sound different than his last two offerings, but I have two complaints: it delves into an almost Radiohead style noodling (which, if you know me, is not cool) at times, and it’s produced by DangerMouse. I don’t know how DangerMouse got so huge. His Beatles/Jay Z mash up was fairly revolutionary, but ultimately not very good. And don’t get me started on Gnarls Barkley. That shit sucks and I can’t understand how it got so huge. DangerMouse is known as a producer, but if his idea of “producing” is overdriving everything so it sounds distorted, then he’s the hack I believe him to be.

Over rated producers aside, Modern Guilt is a pretty good record, but really that’s what I expect from Beck. He never went anywhere, so be very wary of any “return to form” reviews you come across.

Tokyo Police Club - Elephant Shell

I loved TPC’s first EP (haven’t heard the second one) so I was happy that this full length grew on me immediately. If TPC sounded like they had been listening to a lot of Interpol when they created the sound on the first EP, they certainly have been listening to countrymen Arcade Fire for Elephant Shell.

That’s a good thing by the way. You’ll hear various influences in TPC’s music but it never clouds or saturates the sound they’ve made for themselves. Poppy and dark all at once, Elephant Shell (and anything else by these Canucks) is well worth hearing.

JR

Feces Bombs Banned During DNC...how about after?

So, I guess I have to get rid of all those "feces bombs" I've been working on?

No, fuck that. I think Bill O'Reilly will be here broadcasting for FOX News....there's a feces bomb with his name on it.


With DNC in mind, city bans carrying urine, feces

JR

DNC Madness

As you may or may not know...oh wait, as you may or may not CARE, the Democratic National Convention will be held in the wonderful city I live in: Denver, Colorado.

It's pretty cool. Obama will accept the nomination at Mile High Stadium and will recieve an ovation far greater than the Broncos have deserved in the 8-9 years the stadium has been standing. If only the coach wasn't such a Bush loving Republican, maybe they'd give him a jersey. Maybe they should just let Obama play this season. They couldn't do any worse and he's probably a far better punt returner than that grizzled mummy he's running against.

It's pretty cool. Denver will be the sight where hopefully, jesus, mary and Broseph HOPEFULLY! the long trek begins to punish all those responsible for the last 8 years.

It's pretty cool. Except for the fact that the city will be an unbearable cluster fuck for that week. It's already been announced that major roads will be closed, light rail won't run to select areas of town and every Prius driving wanker within the borders of our country will clog the streets spreading a virulent strain of Obama-mania. I hope there is no cure.

It could have been worse though: The Republican convention could have come to town and every gay bar in Denver would have to be on high alert for dangerous, sociopathic closeted homos looking to score to some ass; meanwhile putting on their delegate sash (nothing gay there) and insuring gay people can't get married. Hell, you can't have the dude who just blew you in the bathroom at the Wrangler wanting to get married now can you?

But I digress.

The city will be crazy and that's to be expected. What's unexpected is how Denver will deal with the craziness. I work the odd night downtown (will be avoiding the city center that week of course)and while lugging my equipment down the 16th Street Mall (pedestrian mall in the middle of the city) I took a look around. I saw nothing but homeless people and roving bands of shifty teens (black, white and brown) clogging up the sidewalks. The random tourist couple would walk by on their way to the Hard Rock Cafe and look reasonably terrified. If this is how the city of Denver plans to be seen when literally the whole country (if not the world) is going to be looking in on us, we're going to have a big fucking image problem on our hands.

I know the convention is a few weeks away, but Denver needs to get on the ball. The roving bands of teens will spoil the party real quick. I was wearing work clothes and covered in some substance (I was invisible and/or no one would fuck with me because they didn't want to get what was all over me on them) and I was still a little gunshy to walk through a large group of black kids who had taken up most of the sidewalk. Can you imagine the dilemma that "guilty white liberal guy from California" is going to be in?

A few weeks ago it was reported that all the homeless were to be rounded up and taken out of the city. Not a bad plan. But every city has homeless so it's not like the delegates from Portland are going to show up and say "oh my god! what are these dirty people doing sitting on street corners holding signs? Denver sure is gross and backward." No. Everybody has them. Who cares. If I went somewhere and didn't see them I would suspect some sort of third reich chicanery. Maybe they could offer the homeless a bed for the night, a hot meal and a bottle of Thunderbird to stay out of downtown. Hey, it's better than a gas chamber.

The convention should be a gas....wait, strike that. The convention is going to be a wild time and can only mean good things for Denver. I'm sure the parking Nazis are saving their strength to march their fat asses down every sidewalk in town to write extra tickets in the coming weeks. Part of me wants some crazy shit to go down just because that's what we all really want. Plus I'll see loads of footage of Denver on CNN...Hey! there's Rockbar (James Sharp's Regal Beagle every Tuesday night)And another part of me wants this to go off without a hitch because I want Obama to get down to business and put that scaly "war hero" in his place.

Just to be clear, I say "war hero" because while he may have been honorable in his captivity at the hands of the Vietnamese, he hasn't done too much lately to justify the title. It's like if someone saved a bus load of kids but then was arrested for molesting some of them...it kind of wipes out the first part right?

So, you can keep your closeted Republicans. I want my conventioneers to be fabulous and have an ever more fabulous time while in the Mile High city. It's what our late great homeless people would have wanted.

Coming soon: More on the convention from where's it's at!

JR

Hey Carlos, maybe it's just that you are terrible.

Wasting breath or infinite internet space on Carlos Mencia is really a shame. But that talentless hack has moved me to write something.

Mencia is the shitty comedian who hosts his show Mind of Mencia on Comedy Central. If you’ve ever seen it, you’re dumber for the experience. It’s a sloppy, half-assed and very racist rip-off of Dave Chapelle’s show. It seems that once Chapelle left the Comedy Central family, they were very desperate to fill that slot with something, anything, and Mencia took a dump in the right place at the right time.

This show is awful. Take away everything about how racist and “controversial” it is and it just flat out sucks. Mencia is the lowest grade comedian, it’s shocking that this is on the air. But apparently there are some really stupid people out there who eat this shit up. Go figure. I’ll guarantee the bulk of the audience for Mind of Mencia is white. And thus the trend of catering to a white audience while insulting them is played out further.

Watch just two minutes of it and you will understand. There are cheesy improv groups in the bowels of our country turning out better comedy than this man who has his own show on a popular cable network. It must get pretty good ratings because no exec at Comedy Central would have let this go on if it wasn’t making money.

With that said, let’s get to the racism. Mencia ended a recent show by saying “if you don’t think this is funny, then you are an uptight white guy.” Wow. Well, I am white. I’m not uptight. So where does that leave us? How about that it’s just not funny? Chapelle, who I consider a brilliant comedian, did a lot of racial humor and it worked well. He not only skewered white and black people, but Asian and Hispanics as well. Mencia might appear to lambaste his fellow Hispanic, but his bread and butter is sticking it to whitey.

It’s so easy and obvious to chalk up not liking something to being a certain color. How about if I said, “hey! Use these condoms. If you don’t want to, you’re an uptight Mexican!” Or “hey! Here are some smart economic decisions. If you don’t want to employ them then you’re an uptight black guy!” That’s pretty bad right? Well it’s really no worse than what Mencia shits out on a weekly basis on Comedy Central. But it’s ok to be racist to white people right?

No. Racism sucks no matter who it’s aimed at. It’s even worse when it’s used as a fall back when someone’s comedy is sadly sub-par.

Mencia’s life is unfortunately more funny than his show. He pretends to be Mexican but he’s really like half Honduran and half German. Not a lot of racist comedy gold to be mined when you’re actually half “white” yourself. He’s a joke stealer (famously documented by Joe Rogan in those YouTube clips), and did several painful Bud Lite ads focusing on his unique (read: bad) take on racial humor. I can’t express to you how terrible he is. Since I’m posing as writer, I should at least try: there is a dude with greasy hair and no teeth bagging groceries and busting better jokes down at the local supermarket than Carlos Mencia is right now.

Racial humor can be very funny. When it’s done right, it exposes the differences between us in a comedic way instead of the usual hateful way a lame racist joke is told by a creep at your local bar. I’ll bet that Carlos Mencia isn’t even a racist; he’s just using anti-white sentiments because he has nothing else. He’s the worst kind of comedian who’s running on fumes and the only thing he can do is crap out a weak “white guy” joke. And if that’s the best thing you can dig out of your comedic bag, you really and truly suck.

And if you don’t like what I’ve written then you’re an uptight (insert race and gender here).

JR

Chickens....coming home....roosting

The chickens have come home to roost.

All over Denver (and I'm sure it's the same in whatever city you live in), I see people riding bikes and scooters.

It's miraculous actually. I see people who look like they haven't been on a bike in years pedaling away their high gas price blues.

And I see the same assholes in their SUV's who still haven't removed their Bush/Cheney bumper stickers chugging away in their monstrosities, no doubt paying upwards of $60-$70 to fill their tanks.

Great work you fucking losers. You sank your money into that gas guzzler because it was the cool thing to do. It made you feel cool, important and better than all those "liberal" whiners who wouldn't shut up about global warming, conservation and sustainability. Well, you showed them didn't you?

Back when we printed the Hooligan (and t-shirts with catchy slogans for said magazine), we had a saying: FU SUV.

And while the drivers of those vehicles may be saying the same thing, the joke is squarely on them.

A big fuck you to all who blindly supported Bush and his buddies while they raped everyone up the ass to make a buck. The blinders you put on must have made it really easy to avoid seeing what was going on.

JR

If You're Going to the Olympics in China...

Do me a favor.

If you know someone going to the Olympics in China this year, I need you to do something for me.

When they ask you if they can get you anything while they are there, say "YES!"

"You can bring all of our manufacturing jobs back."

Chances are the won't be able to carry that back with them, but it's the thought that counts.

In five years when literally EVERYTHING will be made in China, where does the guy who was born to work in a factory go for work? Douchebag Republicans will tell you all about the "changing marketplace" and how "people have to adapt to the changing marketplace." And "we live in technology base marketplace now, people have to adapt to it!"

Yeah, tell that to the guy with the junior high education who has no clue about how to use a computer. He's going to adapt to smoking meth and robbing your house when things get really bad.

And the technological marketplace is a load of shit too. The U.S. outsources more and more technology jobs to places like India every day. When the asshole who tells you about the "changing marketplace" has his job downsized to India, does he change his tune?

I don't hate these countries. We've done the same thing for years. They're just feeding their families like everyone else. I do hate the fact that every day, more and more of our goods are made somewhere else and sold back to us. This should be the number one priority on any wannabe President's agenda. Because when there are no jobs left, who will be able to buy the cheaply made Chinese crap?

So ask anyone going to China this summer if they can bring back just a job or two. It may just keep some meth head from stealing all the Chinese made goods out of your house.

JR

No Surprise Here: NIN Still Sucks

The following link has a story about the new Nine Inch Nails album. If you want to spare yourself the agony of reading yet another Pitchfork article pumping up a major musical has-been, I’ll recap for you.

The title of the article says “Yet Another Surprise New Nine Inch Nails Album” and it goes on to talk about how Trent Reznor is giving it away for free. I don’t know why this is surprising. After Radiohead forged a bold new path by virtually giving away their last crap fest for free, it’s not surprising at all that Trent Reznor would knock over his own mother jumping on this bandwagon.

This is, after all, the same guy who became immensely popular by ripping off an already existing musical style being used by Ministry and repackaging it for dumb teenagers all across America. So it should come as no surprise that this hack would immediately adopt the flavor of the month as far as album distribution. But just like his music, bland honkies in the farthest reaches of our country will find this gimmick to be unique, original and trail blazing. Reznor will once again look like a hero by recycling other people’s ideas and making them Hot Topic Ready.

Reznor offers the free album “as a thank you to our fans for your continued support.” Yeah, he definitely owes the dolts who have kept him employed for the last 18 years because without those dim bulbs he’d be selling keyboards at a Guitar Center by now.

The best part of this is that Radiohead came out and said they didn’t know if their “pay as much as you like” gambit was even worth it; thus casting doubt on the whole scheme. I’m sure Reznor just about choked on his ball gag when he heard this, having already announced his plans to give away the album. If Radiohead included a free sample of Anthrax (the biological weapon not the band) in every CD or download, Trent Reznor and every other reactionary musician with no original ideas would start asking around about a how to get some for themselves. Maybe they should put some Anthrax the band in there just make it bearable.

In short, NIN has been making music for brainless teenagers for quite awhile now. Sad, lonely teenagers who are incapable of finding better, angst filled music for themselves. Fans of this band would be wearing Insane Clown Posse makeup if they hadn’t heard NIN first. This is just another marketing trick in a long line of tricks used by this snake oil salesman in black to convince dumb people that NIN is talented, viable and deserves your attention.

I’m all for free music, but if I took a shit in my hand and held out telling you it was free, would you take my hand?

JR

Content Migrating Soon

I will be sending everything from War Time Smile here very soon.

JR