Self Aggrandizement in the Form of a Pre-edited Music Review

This will come out either tomorrow or the following week in the FW Weekly, but I really like this band and really didn't want to wait in case anyone was on the fence about them and happened to be doing some searches.

Valient Thorr
Legend of the World
(Volcom)

Remember Nu Metal, that genre comprised of suckass Jock-Jam bands like Korn and Godsmack? When they weren’t busy making huge, multi-zippered, idiot-pants fashionable, they were supposedly breathing life into the tired, leathery lungs of Regular Metal. What they really did was ruin everything cool and dangerous about hard rock, in a much more damnable way than anything ever perpetuated by Sammy Hagar. In other words, they sucked the fun right out of it.

Fortunately, a handful of bands have managed to reset the whole genre through their own sweat, toil and blistering arpeggios. You’ve probably heard about Australia’s Wolf Mother, who fuse stoner rock and Kansas into fuzzed-out glory. Perhaps you’ve found Early Man on MySpace and added them as friends because they sound like Mercyful Fate covering Maiden. If you’re lucky, you’ve seen The Sword, who out-Sabbath Sabbath, making wolves and cursed blades the coolest hipster trend since PBR and mustaches. If you nodded your head to any of the above references, load your bong and cue up Legend of the World, the second album by Valient Thorr.

Valient Thorr are from Venus by way of North Carolina (which makes perfect sense when you think about it). They have a backstory. It involves a stolen time machine or something. Mostly, it’s amazing nonsense, but not as amazing as their serious devotion to anti-war politics and Southern Rock riffage.

Legend of the World opens up with the bombastic stomp of “Heatseeker,” a paranoid middle-finger to government intrusion, shouted by frontman Valient Himself over speedball blues riffs that sound as if they were made to chain someone to a nuclear missile. From there, it’s pretty obvious what the rest of the album is gonna sound like: basically, it’s a fantasy rock-genre draft combining a leftist punk singer with a Judas Priest tribute band and making them play Lynyrd Skynyrd songs at full-throttle. If not for obvious slashes at Dubya’s foreign policy, you’d swear this album came out thirty years ago. It makes you want to buy a case of the beer your old man used to drink.

Unfortunately, a lot of Legend blends together if you aren’t a fan of the solos-in-lieu-of-choruses formula chiseled by Black Sabbath in times of lore. The riffs are righteous: Guitarists Odinn and Eiden Thorr wield laser-perfect, harmonized shredding that wouldn’t be out of place on a Thin Lizzy album, but because it’s everywhere, it starts to become indistinguishable. Same for the earnest, sermonized shouting of Himself’s delivery, which is a bummer, because he’s shouting about ending the Iraqi war and cleaning up the planet. It’s not exactly Joan Baez, but a progressive message borne on high-octane cock-rock is paradoxically easier to hear. Why Venusian Vikings give a crap about American foreign relations is never explained, but at least somebody cares about this stuff. Add a song about the destruction of the primeval world (“Fall of Pangea”), and the record is pretty fun.

Legend of the World is the aural equivalent of a drinking a sixer of Shaeffer’s; it goes down easy and rocks hard. Your head might hurt later, but that’s the beauty of Valient Thorr—rock ‘n roll that doesn’t kick your ass a little is kinda lame. Luckily, Valient Thorr will kick your ass all the way back to ’76.

--The Robo-Pirate

Indestructible

So I went to Chipotle for lunch today and when I went to the bathroom, do you know what I found in the toilet? Lettuce. Just floating around. Like someone had been feeding a tiny manatee in there.

Which is funny, now that I think about it, because manatees do sort of look like poop.

--The Robo-Pirate

Oogh....

You know that song "Just Dropped in," about checking in to see what condition one's condition is in? Well, did you know that it was performed by Kenny Rogers? He of the Roasters and of the knowledge of appropriate times to hold and fold? Technically, it was a band called First Edition that recorded it, but those are his pipes on the track.

Boy am I hungover!

--The Robo-Pirate

My new power: Invisibility!

I was ignored today. I made what I thought was a valid suggestion and a viable offer of assistance, and I was directly ignored. So I've got that going for me.

--The Robo-Pirate

The Grampus, My Beloved Mobile Oven

I finally got around to taking the Grampus into the shop to get its A/C fixed, having been told by Will the brilliant but unreliable mechanic who works with my friend Cliff that it was likely just a short.

Quoth Ruben, who looked into the matter today, "I checked it all, but the compressor doesn't work."

Apparently, compressors do not grow on trees. Ruben told me it would be about $1,100 to get a new one and install it. Now I don't mind driving around sweating, as I have been doing it since May, but Kerry and Eric (said in that "duh!" voice children are so fond of using) think it's better to drive without losing ten pounds of water weight. Pussies, that's what I think.

Anyhow, there is no way I'm fixing that thing if it costs eleven-hundred fucking dollars. Now Kerry, who doesn't know how much this will cost said a month ago, "Maybe we should just buy a new one and make payments," implicitly expressing a rather optimistic view of our band's potential longevity. Ain't gonna happen, nor will fixing the A/C. Sweat we shall.

--The Robo-Pirate

Starry, Starry Night

Dear Dr. Berhard's Office,

You know how Canada's healthcare is supposed to be free, but the drawback is that you have to wait for a long time before you can get in to see a doctor?

WELL, I DON'T LIVE IN FUCKING CANADA!!!

I'm about to cut my goddamn ear off rather than wait for my appointment tomorrow morning!

Sure, I guess I should have gone to the appointment I made for last Monday on the PRECEDING FRIDAY, but my ear ache went away over that weekend. Bank hours are more accessible than yours. And why was the office closed after noon? Was there a holiday I was unaware of? Why couldn't I have been passed on to the partner? Have you seen Resevoir Dogs? Because I'm about to tie myself to a chair and call Michael Madsen.

I'm just saying is all.

Maddeningly yours,

--The Robo-Pirate

A conversation I had a couple days ago.

I finally made it into the doctor's office. As I suspected, I have a very busy case of swimmer's ear. He prescribed some drops. While there, I read an article in Time about why the Middle East is never going to to quiet down, and it reminded me of a Yahoo article I read and a blog I wrote in response, which mysteriously went unpublished. So here it is again.

A Conversation with God

"Hey, God?"

"What, Steve."

"Um, I bought another lottery ticket."

"The answer's no."

"Hahahaha--no no, see I'm not wanting to win the money. This one's a PAC-MAN lottery ticket, and if you scratch off the ghosts and uncover a Pac-Man, you win a Pac-Man cocktail. I want to use it as a coffee table."

"Look, Steve, first of all, you have a perfectly good coffee table."

"But the legs are all wobbly!"

"Second, you're really not my favorite person right now. I know you went to that titty bar the other night, and I caught you looking at pictures of that Hindu deity."

"But she's rad! She has a sword and a trident and she's riding on a tiger. You have to admit that Jesus is pretty boring, compared to her."

"Did she die for your sins?"

"no....."

"All right then. Look, I'm really kind of busy right now."

"Doing what?"

"Helping Hezbollah fire rockets on Tel-Aviv. Apparently they aren't able to do this on their own."

"Oh. Um, don't Your chosen people live in Tel-Aviv?"

"Yeah, but it turns out the Muslims are right."

"Right about what?"

"Everything."

"Oh."

--The Robo-Pirate

Sorry mom, but I have to talk about this because it's kind of cool.

Darth Vato has been in the studio this week recording two new songs. They sound pretty good. For me, recording bass tracks is little bit like taking off all my clothes, putting a flashing light on my head and trying to read Mandarin while being simulcast across the globe. And of course, hearing my tracks over the expensive and super crisp (but not super golden crisp) studio monitors is a great way to remind myself of why I have a day job.

Anyway, I did my best.

The best part about this week is that I have taken most of it off from work, which means I have spent considerable time reddening beside various apartment pools and drinking beer. If there is one thing I am getting good at, it's getting sunburned and fatter. Seriously, I'm glowing like a brake light.

In other news, something really special happened on Monday night, and it happened at the naked lady bar. Now, I want to make it clear that I don't normally frequent gentleman's clubs, as great as their promises of low-priced steaks and Def Leppard sound. It's because I'm not interested in paying money for something I could see in my imagination for free. Also, I'm never sure what sort of face I'm supposed to make while standing in front of a naked lady displaying ultimately impractical limberosity. Do I grin? Do I make eye contact? Do I manifest an aura that obviates the fact that my personal vehicle is a van whose side doors do not open from the inside? In any case, I went with Eric, our rockstar/producer friend Jordan and Maunder, who owns the Moon. Prior to leaving, we speculated on the hats allowed/not allowed policy, deciding that they probably weren't. Eric said, "Crap. Now I'm gonna have to fix my hair," to which Jordan said, "You don't have to fix it, you just have to pay 'em." Truer words were never spoken. Except for in the Bible, of course. And on FOX News--BA-ZING!!!

Anyway, we get there and fork over a bunch of money for over-priced unleaded Buds and the privilege of ogling cheerfully naked ladies. We had heard from the girlfriend of this dude we know who's in a different band that "strippers fucking love guys in bands," so of course, we bided our time for the perfect moment, and then played that card like an UNO Draw Four Wild. Eric gave "Jo" twenty bucks to ask the DJ to play a song off the EP we made last summer, telling her that if the DJ didn't want to, that she could just give him another lapdance instead. So she did, and the DJ loved it, and Maunder got a lapdance to the tune of "Seven Seas." Naturally, we thought this was the most fantastic thing in the history of the universe, and I sent a confusing mass text message to a bunch of people who mostly replied with, "What are you talking about?" What was really cool, however, was that he went on to play two more of our songs free of charge and asked for more CDs to pass out whenever he played it at the club, which we did the next day during happy hour. Predictably, the parking lot was at 5:15 already filling up with trucks sporting rebel flags and Calvin-Peeing-On-Things stickers.

"Man, the creepy pervert factor is pretty high," I said.

"Yeah," said Eric, "and it's about to increase by two."


--The Robo-Pirate

A Partial Retraction: Ken Jennings is not an asshole. He has been downgraded to a tool.

Well, I actually bothered to read Ken Jennings's blog about Jeopardy. I concede the following points:

1. It appears that he is not ungrateful to Jeopardy!, remarking that it is putting his kids through college. That sounds grateful enough, I suppose.
2. His other blogs are kind of funny.
3. His thesis, buried under lame cracks about the show being stuck in 1984 (a pretty good year, as I recall), is really that Americans are idiots.

He is still beneath my contempt for his disparaging remarks about Alex Trebek.

I will not be deleting the post below, nor will be changing my practice of "take umbrage first, fact-find later."

--The Robo-Pirate

p.s.

He is probably not a polygamist, as I only found references to one wife. He also no longer lives in Salt Lake City, but instead lives outside Seattle, which technically could be in Idaho, which has a pretty big Mormon population, relative to say, Mars.

p.p.s.

But not Tonga. Apparently there are lot of Tongans who get married wearing Holy Underwear.

Ken Jennings is a Fucking Asshole

My dear friend Billy sent me this thing, about Ken Jennings unfunnily ripping on Jeopardy and Alex Trebek.

In case you don't know who Ken Jennings is, he's the guy who won 74 straight games of Jeopardy! and walked away with two and-a-half million dollars. In a perfect example of biting the hand that fed you, he posted recently on his website a bunch of unfunny comments about Alex Trebek being a robot because he doesn't age and how the Jeopardy set is rarely updated.

Well you know what, Ken Jennings? Who fucking cares what the set looks like? It's a game show. Part of a game show's charm is its dated look, and frankly, I think it looks great. Furthermore, you are a software engineer, and as such, your ideas of what of an attractive visual aesthetic should be are automatically supsect. And then you attack Alex Trebek for appearing as if he has not aged? Clearly, you have not watched the show as consistently as the rest of us have. Though his journey through life has been graceful, Alex Trebek shows the wear of the years just like the rest of us do or will. His hair is considerably grayer than it was when I was a kid, but apart from shaving his mustache, I think he has remained a dapper and tasteful fixture of afternoon television. I will be very grateful to Jesus if I have held up so well by the time I am 66. And what's so bad about being a young-looking gameshow host anyway? Do you also find fault with Pat Sajak and Vanna White? Looking young comes with the territory. Hosting a gameshow is a ticket to eternal youth, as opposed to whatever nerds in Mormonsylvania like you do.

But why stop at affonting Alex Trebek's youthful handsomeness? You also mock the "effete, left-coast" categories. Well, Ken Jennings, the categories are geared to challenge contestants' mastery of intellectual traditions and disciplines, as well as their familiarity with pop culture. In other words, they seek to find an agreeable balance between the high brow and the middle. This is why its contestants come from a pool that includes everyone from professors to unemployed pony-tail guys who play video games all day. I will concede that "effete" might be an acceptible modifier on a technical level, but I do not think the show's categories carry the prissy elitism that your use of the word implies. As for your left coast-centric allegations, Jeopardy! has to plead guilty, seeing as how it is written and filmed in Burbank. On behalf of the show's producers and writers, I apologize that the questions and categories do not reflect the radiant culture regularly enjoyed by you and your wives in Salt Lake City.

I guess I just don't understand what motivated you to level such a fusillade at a game show that was nothing but fun and profitable for you. Though I commend you on your achievement, let's not forget that Jeopardy provided you with an opportunity to acquire a bunch of money without having to do a whole lot of work, apart from emptying your head of a lifetime's worth of accumulated trivia. It's not as if you founded a Fortune 500 company, invented jet packs or cured cancer. You merely stood behind a podium and pressed a button before anyone else did, which makes you little more than an insufferable, quick-drawing know-it-all. So fuck you, Ken Jennings. Alex Trebek has more character and likeability in 1/100 of his mustache follicles than you do in your entire body.

--The Robo-Pirate

Yeah, I said it.

Fuck you, Tom. Myspace blows.

I'm just saying is all.

--The Robo-Pirate

Spider-Vac

LOOK AT THIS THING!

Pretty sweet way to get rid of bugs, though I have a few suggestions for improvement. It needs a longer tube, say, maybe ten feet longer, and possibly someone else to operate it for you. Also, the little chamber in which the bug gets trapped is missing a couple whirling blades. It also needs a reverse-suction function to blow the chopped-up bug pieces out the patio slider. Basically, what I really want is a combination vacuum, food processor and blow dryer. Someone needs to get on that.

--The Robo-Pirate

In Place of Dying, or How I Came to Loathe Phrasecore

From a local band's MySpace page:

"In Silence And Shadows was formed in the extinguished flames of die in plain sight.*"

Honestly, In Silence And Shadows, don't you think a better and more literally descriptive name might be Born in Ashes?** It would make a lot of sense, and In Silence And Shadows has two S-sounds in it, which don't sound really great when made into a microphone. Plus, if your name has some kind of personal significance to it, it will make all the nights spent practicing hammer-ons and screaming in the garage seem all the more awesome.

Here's what I would like to see. I'd like to see a high school metalcore band whose name is comprised of a maxium of three words, none of which form a prepositional phrase. If this naming convention doesn't peter out soon, we are going to have to subdivide the metalcore subgenre even further, classifying bands of that particular stripe as Prepositional Phrase Metal or more simply as Phrasecore.*** And as an aside, is it a rule that because you play some variant of metal, you have to have a name that indicates what type of band you are? For instance, I would be much more likely to check out a band called LaserPeen (who wouldn't!) than a band called Whispers in the Grave or some other similarly ridiculous prepositional seriousness. And then, when I discovered that LaserPeen played metal, I'd be that much more pleasantly surprised.

I'm just saying is all.

--The Robo-Pirate

*I don't know who is responsible for extinguishing the flames of gravely humorless teenage metal bands, but I need their mailing address so I can send my charitable donation.

**Patent Pending. That's my metasitional phrase so don't you touch it.

***I'm claiming coinage.

The Punisher Cure Journal

Dear Every Cure Fan,

Back in 1993, I had this girlfriend named Denise who really, really liked the Cure. She wasn't like the rest of you, what with the eyeliner and romantic misery and all, on account of being sunny and bubbly, but she really, really, really liked the Cure, the way a burning man really, really really likes to get doused by a bucket of water. It took a while for me to come around, in part because I spent much of that year surreptiously listening to Master of Puppets (mostly while mowing the lawn), but I did eventually, but not without forming certain, um, opinions about the sort of person who would rigorously defend the dubious merits of Mixed Up.

Anyway, the point is that you guys created a certain stereotype for me, and part of that stereotype includes softly playing Disintegration while leafing through Sandman comics on rainy Sunday afternoons. Well guess what? Judging by this picture, your beloved lipstick-wearing crybaby likes the same comic as all those brainless athletic chumps who drove you in a frantic sprint from the end of sixth period to the synth-pop sanctuary of your bedroom.

Now, I like Fat Bob well enough, but if he really is a Punisher fan, I like him a whole lot more.

--The Robo-Pirate

Yesterday's News

On Sunday, Darth Vato won Best Live Band in the FW Weekly's annual music awards, showing that all of our drunken idiocy (which includes, but is not limited to, nut-punching, rib-kicking, pants-losing, mic-farting, beer-spitting and tired-joke-telling) has not gone to waste.

--The Robo-Pirate

Hamstrung, Hobbled, Hidebound, Hindered

The internet is slow. For my job, having to do work with a lethargic server is analogous to hauling logs cross-country in an 18-wheeler with ten flats.

I want to go home.

--The Robo-Pirate

An Apology

Dear Friends in my Office Who Sit in the Same Room as I Do,

I want to apologize to you guys right now for getting Fartaburger for lunch. I know, I know--it's not like I don't know what will happen, but every time I contemplate getting into the drive-thru queue, I think, "Maybe this time will be different. Maybe this time I can enjoy a delicious hamburger with bacon, cheese and grilled onions and not experience massive seismic activity in my lower intestine." Of course, those maybes pour the foundation of wholly unrealistic hopes. I hear alcoholics use this reasoning as part of their denial, that maybe they can have a scotch or two and not drink their way into having blacked-out sex with someone's pill-billied grandmother, and that realizing the fallacy of this logic is a step towards sobriety.

Well, I'm not addicted to Whataburger; in fact, I don't even like it that much, but sometimes it just sounds irresistable. I just want you guys to know that I'm sorry. I know better, and I'll be sure to remember this letter the next time I cruise by that soaring orange W. Hopefully, I will keep cruising. Also know that as I spend the rest of the afternoon blasting away, I will do my utmost to spare you all the noxious fallout and drill them into my chair.

Your Friend,

--The Robo-Pirate

Oblivion Update #2 (No new girls, just new spells)

Actually, that's a lie. Morricone doesn't have any new spells. He did, however, recently acquire the Battle Axe of Embers and the Longsword of Shocking, and they both contributed to his recent successes in the Imperial City Arena in a really big way. He's now the champion and is on his way to buying a little shack of his own down at the waterfront. As for me, I am still a huge nerd.

--The Robo-Pirate

Describe My Day with a Song #3

I switched the format. Guess I'll make this a regular feature. Anyway,

"I Can't Stop Farting" by The Queers

--The Robo-Pirate

Moment to moment

I had to get something out of the Grampus today, and as I walked back to the office, for no particular reason I threw my keys straight up in the air, and for that second during which they were aloft, I felt intense joy, the kind you feel when you're twelve and it's summer and the whole day, if not every day that will follow, is entirely yours. The sun grinned down at me from cloudless blue, catching on the rings and a couple untarnished spots on my keys, and when they clinked into my palm, I was a little sad, but not without hope, for life will turn out okay if I treasue moments like this one.

--The Robo-Pirate

Oblivion Update #1 (from the pages of Nerdular Nerdence)

In my continuing effort to make myself as unappealing to women as I possibly can, I would like to inform everyone that Morricone, my alter-ego on The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, is now a Level 4 Agent and is doing just fine, having recently acquired the Battle Axe of Souls.

--The Robo-Pirate

"Urethane." "I'm a what?"

Today, the MSN home page had a link to Roller Derby, which has been going strong in places like Austin and probably Detroit for like five years now. Since the Texas Rollergirls were on TV last year and now that the internet has decided to write an article about them, I imagine that Roller Derby is probably about to be totally played out.

Regardless of that, I think Roller Derby is pretty cool, mostly because I'm a casual fan of people pushing other people over, especially if all the pushing is on the part of quasi-attractive girls. Of course, in the case of Roller Derby, quasi kind of gives them a mulligan; predictably, Roller Derby is performed by rockabilly/punk rock/Austin lesbian bartender-type girls who are mostly cute and a little scary. This is irrelevant to me, however, because I judge a Derby girl's merit solely on the coolness of her name. For instance, I tried unsuccessfully to get my ex-girlfriend involved in Roller Derby, largely because she said she would skate under the fake name Jackie Onasty.* I never even knew if she could rollerskate or not; I just thought it would be cool to be the boyfriend of famed Roller Derby queen Jackie Onasty.

Anyway, from Assassination City Derby League in Dallas, the best name I found was Mary Lou Threaten, who is a member of La Revolucion. A lot of the other girls' names are pretty jejune, but Mary Lou Threaten totally wins big.

--The Robo-Pirate

*Unfortunately, this name already belongs to a chick on an Austin team.

Whoa Nelly!

Nelly Furtado is back with a new album! To celebrate, I've rewritten part of the chorus-outro to the "Like a Bird." Why? because I want her to read it and think I'm hilarious and marry me. Unless she's crazy. I don't want to marry her if she's crazy.

I'm like a bird,
Except I can't fly,
and I don't have feathers,
and I don't eat worms,

(but baby yeah) I'm like a bird,
but-with-a human-sized brain,
I don't bathe in a gutter,
I don't hatch from an egg

(butstillbabyyeah) I'm like a bird,
but don't live in a tree,
guess it's a bad simile,
doesn't really describe me

Ad nauseum.

--The Robo-Pirate

Succumbing to the Urge

I probably have more interesting things to discuss in light of the past ten days or so (oh who am I kidding--I had a birthday and a show and both evenings ended with me barfing in parking lots), but the most important news is that I finally caved and bought an Xbox 360, as well as The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, which is probably the nerdiest game you can possibly play, unless you count accounting. Anyway, on Monday, I got a birthday check in the mail, which I wasted no time in cashing along with some checks for writing crappy album reviews and raced as fast as the Grampus would carry me to Gamestop, in order to further prolong my adolescence and inhibit my social interractions with others.

--The Robo-Pirate

What would we do without him?

What's that MySpace? Internet Freedom is under attack by big telecoms like AT&T, but Moby is going to show me how to fight back? Whew. I hope he starts by taking on News Corporation.

--The Robo-Pirate

Describe the Day with a Social Distortion Song #1

"Ball and Chain"

--The Robo-Pirate

This was from yesterday. Posted today because I had to board the plane.

I'm at the Sacramento Metro Airport right now, having gone to Lodi for my brother's high school graduation. The immediate inspiration for writing is the fact that there is just now an employee simultaneously dragging two wheelchairs bearing old people through the terminal. He looks like a cross between Eazy E and the trainer from Mike Tyson's Punch-out. Despite the fact that his way is relatively free of people, he persists in shouting "WHEELCHAIRS, COMING THROUGH! ERRNT ERRNT ERRNT!!! WHEELCHAIRS, COMING THROUGH! ERRNT ERRNT ERRNT!!!"

I guess this is a funny thing to do, though I couldn't tell what the old people thought about it. Reading their facial expressions is nearly impossible on account of all that drooping skin.

--The Robo-Pirate

Late Night, with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad!

Now seriously, would a guy like this enrich uranium for the wrong reasons? I mean, you know?

You never catch Kim Jong Il cracking up like that.

I'm just saying is all.

--The Robo-Pirate

Describe the Day with a Sublime Song #1

"Burritos."

--The Robo-Pirate

...And Justice For All, or at least for Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling

Well, Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling were convicted today, thank Christ. Of course, they have no remorse. Of his conviction, Skilling said, "Obviously I'm disappointed. But that's the way the system works."

You're disappointed, Jeffrey Skilling? I'll bet you aren't as disappointed as the people you bilked out of their pensions, nor any Californian who was inconvenienced when his or her power went out because of you two, nor as disappointed as you will be when get to experience life in federal prison. Enjoy your butt-rapes, you fucking assholes. You deserve every humiliating second of them.

--The Robo-Pirate

Sheesh

Log on to Sallie Mae dot com to manage your loans!

(It's not recognizing me)

Your expected wait time for this call is 3 minutes. Mondays are our busiest days.

(it's Wednesday)

...

Look, do you guys still want my money or not?

I'm just saying is all.

--The Robo-Pirate

Fighting the Urge

I've been working part time at my friend's bar in order to have some savings while the bulk of my primary job's paycheck goes to bills. What this means is that I can make about a hundred extra bucks a week or so, which also means that I have disposable cash, and disposable cash means that I very nearly bought an Xbox 360 on Sunday.

As far as compulsions go, I could do a lot worse. At least it's not heroin or shoes.

--The Robo-Pirate

The Robo-Pirate Engages Archie Bunker Mode

Comic books are gay. Now I don't really mean that, but when I was a kid, I used to ride my bike across town to the Comic Grapevine, which was the only dedicated comic book store in Lodi (I know, I know, as if a community of 55,000 people needs more than one). And this made my mom nervous, in part because I had to cross a busy street called Kettleman Lane, but also because she swore up and down that the Comic Grapevine was full of pedophiles, who would love nothing more than to grab a couple eleven-year olds when they went to pick up the latest issue of Aquaman.* As far as I was concerned, I was perfectly safe as long as I didn't go past the manga racks and into the back of the shop, because that was where twenty-something men with glasses and patchy goatees sat reeking of Mountain Dew and armpits while playing Dungeons and Dragons. And as everyone knows, these people are not to be bothered or engaged lest you wish to be pulled into a windowless van and later cut up into bite-sized pieces.

My mom might have been hysterically imaginative about the patrons of the Comic Grapevine, but I do concede that comic books unfortunately get this homoerotic rap, because of a number of inherent conventions. Primarily, it's because of the overwhelming dude factor. When a medium is largely comprised of dudes reading illustrated stories about dudes, it's hard not to think certain things. This was a big deal in the mid-1950s, when some concerned citizens got their noses out of joint over homoerotic overtones (homovertones?) in comics because of a book called The Seduction of the Innocent, that alleged, among other things, that superhero comics made kids gay. And really, if you have ever looked at an old Batman comic, you can kind of see where they were coming from.

Anyway, on Sunday, I went to the Borders down the street to pick up the May issues of Uncanny X-Men and Astonishing X-Men. Like a lot of bookstores, the Borders' comics selection is in a revolving rack near the periodicals. After I had found the two books I was looking for, my browsing shifted to the adjacent magazine shelves. I absently gazed at these magazine for almost a whole minute before realizing that I stood in front of titles such as Out, Shout, Pink, Curves, DIVA and probably the official publication of the Bravo! network. In other words, Borders puts their gay and lesbian lifestyle magazines right next to their comic books.

Oddly, Men's Health was way on the other side next to FHM and Maxim.

I don't know what the point of putting magazines geared for topman and bottom next to the comics is, but I made a beeline for the Playboys nevertheless, just in case anyone had been looking. It's bad enough to be 27 and caught with two X-Men comics; I can't accurately describe the embarrassment of being caught holding said comics in front a magazine with Augusten Burroughs or Rosie O'Donnell on the cover.

--The Robo-Pirate

*Over the past couple years, I've noticed that Aquaman seems to be the most maligned superhero in the entire pantheon. I don't know why this is, but apparently Aquaman hs a reputation for (so sorry for the pun) fishy behavior. This is why I'm glad I stuck to Marvel titles. Cyclops and Wolverine fought over Jean Grey, not Gene Grey.

Yet another reason why Danzig should have stuck with the Misfits

I've been looking for this video for about two years. It's of Glen Danzig getting punched in the face. I assume I don't need to tell you twice to click the link.

--The Robo-Pirate

Quiznos = Bad

Last night sucked. I had a lot of crap to do, not a lot of time to do it, and this stress was compounded by the fact that I ate Quiznos, which caused me to vomit twice. I guess I should be grateful that it didn't totally incapacitate me today. Apparently, minor food poisoning is God's way of saying make your own damn food.

--The Robo-Pirate

I Heart NOFX

The Warped Tour comes to Dallas on July 1. Before you ask if I'm a little old to be going to the Warped Tour, I should remind you that any question you ask of me that begins with "aren't you a little old to be __________" is definitely rhetorical and probably irrelevant, because the answer to the question will almost always be yes.

I don't go every year. In fact, I've only gone to five: '97, '99, '00, '03 and '04. It gets to be a bigger ordeal every year, and unless there is a headlining band that I really, really like, I don't care to watch eight million bands I'll never see again. Occasionally, I'll become a fan of a band I've never heard of after seeing them on the Warped Tour (Tha Alkaholics in '97, Flogging Molly in '00), but mostly, I wait around to see bands I listened to as a kid, which sort of makes me feel like my mom, who recently went to see Bob Dylan. I missed out on a lot of concerts in high school, so while my friends have vivid memories of Rancid at the Warfield or Pennywise at the Crest Theater, I don't. I have to see these bands a decade after I should have, but better late than never, right?

This year NOFX is headlining, and I can't wait. I've never seen them live; the closest I've come was at the 2000 Warped Tour, when I needed only to direct my attention to the other stage when Long Beach Dub Allstars finished their set. Instead, I got a call from my girlfriend at the time, more or less demanding to know when I was coming to pick her up. A week later, that girlfriend would bang her roommate's visiting friend and totally lie about it, so needless to say, I should never have even bothered to answer the phone. If that story wasn't so uninteresting or long, I'd probably tell it to Fat Mike and offer him my sincerest apologies, if I ever get to meet him.

Anyway, I quit listening to NOFX because of two albums: Heavy Petting Zoo and OK Computer. Heavy Petting Zoo was a huge disappointment. It has exactly three listenable songs: "Filthy Phil Philanthropist," "Hot Dog in a Hallway" and "Bleeding Heart Disease"; the rest of it pretty much blows. It didn't make sense to me that a band that got better with every subsequent release could churn out such a turd. Of course, I was a rabid Led Zeppelin fan between 1992 and 1994, and when you consider that the last three Zeppelin records get progressively worse, my displeasure with NOFX is a little illogical and kind of unfair. Regardless of that, though, I lost interest in them, especially after I bought OK Computer.

Now, I don't like Radiohead very much any more, but I used to like them a lot. I love The Bends and I love OK Computer, and I have a lot of really fond memories of both, but after the audio equivalent of "The Emperor's New Clothes," I dropped them like an angry cat. By now I may have painted myself as a fickle fan, but I'm really not; Kid A and Amnesiac are good records, but not as good as OK Computer, and certainly not as goddamn good as every music critic (except Nick Hornby, bless him) insisted they were. Plus, I got tired of Thom Yorke's neverending anti-american pontificating. Doesn't he have his own country to shake his finger at? I'm just saying is all.

OK Computer is the only concept album I have ever paid attention too. Other than humoring people who insist that "The Dark Side of Oz" is something other than deterministic pot-talk, I've never bothered with concept albums, with the possible exception of The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust, since it's on my need-to-get-and-give-a-good-going-over list. I'm not even sure that OK Computer qualifies as a concept album, since there doesn't seem to be a central character or whatever. It is obviously unified in theme (THOM YORKE IS AFRAID OF TECHNOLOGY! SO MUCH THAT HE MADE TWO TECHNO ALBUMS), and my sophomore-year roommate insisted it was a concept album ("a paranoid song-cycle about the soulless mechanization of modern life" Really, Andy? And you say you didn't read that in Rolling Stone?), so for my intents and purposes, that's what it is. The main point of all of this is that after I had digested it, I pretty much decided that I had outgrown the Fat phase of my life.

Then one night in 2003, I went into this bar on 7th street that had one of those mp3 jukeboxes. I went in and loaded it up with Sublime and Bad Religion and Dropkick Murphys, and the bartender and I got to talking about mid '90s punk, and he wanted to know what I thought about the new NOFX album (which, at the time, was The War on Errorism. I of course, had not bothered to listen to it, so he lent it to me, and I was immediately hooked. And since acquiring an iPod, I've been playing catch up with all the releases I've missed. A brief recap:

• So Long and Thanks for All the Shoes is decent. Darth Vato might start covering "Eat the Meek," though Eric does not know it yet.
• Pump Up the Valium wins big.
• 45 or 46 Songs has about 25 songs worth hearing
• I totally missed out on the 7" of the Month Club
• Never Trust a Hippy is also great, though it's more or less a continuation of War on Errorism.
• I haven't gotten Wolves in Wolves Clothing yet, but I'm reviewing it for the Weekly. I hate the album art, though.
• The live album is still my favorite.

They made a video for "Seeing Double at the Triple Rock," and it's not awesome, but it's got me amped about seeing them live. Go see it here.

--The Robo-Pirate

The Ultimate Reason Why CHiPs is Totally Fake

As I drove around downtown today in a tiresome, if ultimately successful quest to get the Grampus registered, I noticed about six or seven motorcycle cops, and they got me thinking about Ponch and Jon, of the ever-awesome TV show CHiPs. Until the A-Team came around, CHiPs was probably the greatest and most awesome show in the history of great and awesome shows. When I was four or five, CHiPs was so inspirational to me that I combined these khaki-colored Pac-Man pajamas with my dad's socks to make what I thought was the closest thing to a CHP uniform you could have without actually having to be stuck in Barstow pulling over semis.

Anyway, if you recall, Ponch and Jon were CHP officers, and they did all sorts of things that CHP officers never do, such as solve crimes and crack jokes. As near as I can tell, the only thing motorcycle cops ever do in real life is ruin a person's day. Ponch and Jon seemed downright helpful, good-natured and glad to be doing what they were doing, which I have always felt is an inaccurate portrayal of motocycle cops, since they don't seem to like doing much of anything but riding around while scowling. Of course, all of Ponch and Jon's phony industriousness and good cheer might as well be gritty realism when compared to the show's most obvious deviation from real life: Ponch and John didn't weigh three-hundred pounds.

What is the deal with that? Why are most bike cops so fucking fat? When I see a pair riding parallel down the freeway, I am immediately reminded of the world's fattest twins riding those minibikes.* I have a couple friends who were turned down from the Houston and Dallas Police Academies, and near as I can tell, the only reasonable explanation for their rejections is that they are both in too good of shape to be cops.

Stupid fake TV. This is why I only watch cartoons.

--The Robo-Pirate.

*And why in the world are there no pictures of them on the internet?! I bought the The Guinness Book of World Records about seventy different times from the book fairs that came to my school for the very purpose of seeing the world's longest fingernails, the world's fattest woman and the world's fattest fucking twins. There was even a joke on The Family Guy about them, for goodness sake! So where the hell are they?

On the other hand....

Darth Vato heads to Galveston tomorrow in our new van, which I have christened the Grampus. There is a lengthy explanation of why I chose this particular name, but the short of it is that the HMS Grampus was a 14-gun sloop that was experimentally provisioned with only water and beer for several months during the Seven Years' War. It's also a genus of dolphin, as well as the former common name of killer whales.

Anyway, we're piling in the Grampus and heading down to the Gulf to play with a band called Shark Attack at a place called the Balinese Room, where we played last month. According to its website, it used to be some kind of hip, speakeasy type jazz club. It looks cool anyway, and we had fun last time. So I guess it's worth being slammed at work. And just in case Jesus reads this blog, I still could stand to win a lottery jackpot. Even one that's only a million dollars. I don't even need the really big one.

I'm just saying is all.

--The Robo-Pirate

Air, please.

I want to disappear right now. That pretty much sums it up. I'm getting swallowed up by everything anyway; it would be great to disappear and start over somewhere else. Wish in one hand, shit in the other, right?

--The Robo-Pirate

What the World Needs Now

This site is awesome. The girls in my office don't think it's funny, which means, of course, that they are totally wrong. Why women don't think farts are funny is an unsolveable (insoluble? No, that's Quik) mystery.

--The Robo-Pirate

To wit:

There may not be anyone cooler than you, but there is surely someone who is smarter.

--The Robo-Pirate

Meet my son, Thunderfist Guava

According to this Kiss FM DJ's celebrity gossip website, Gwynneth Paltrow is about to fire out another baby. She intends to name it after her godfather, who is none other than Stephen Spielberg. Except that to her ears, Stephen apparently sounds like MOR-TI-MER, because that's what she plans on naming the baby. Now I've always understood that Mortimer is a name you give Jewish kids who grow up to be pharmacists or cartoon mice, but on the other hand, when you are willing to name your firstborn after a piece of fruit, I suppose all bets are off.

Seriously, if you think you might want to saddle your unborn children with stupid names why not get a bunch of poodles and get all that foolishness out of your system? Poodles don't give two shits about what you call them. In fact, the only sound you can make that they respond to nearly always has to do with food. Also, unlike children, if poodles don't like their names, you can just eat them if they start complaining about it.

--The Robo-Pirate

How to Make a Band ca. 2003-2006

Dump your sister's jeans, a shirt from your favorite metalcore band, backwards hair, doublekick pedals and tuneless vocals into Protools. Wrap resulting mess in lengthy name made from a subordinate clause or prepositional phrase. Simmer on Myspace for ten minutes. Serve immediately. Feeds ten.

--The Robo-Pirate

Oscar Wieners

Well anyway, I don't normally watch the Oscars, and of course, this year was no exception. My lack of attention is usually due to the fact that I never get around to watching all the Best Picture nominees. This is best explained by the fact that I went and saw Ultraviolet this weekend. Apart from the fact that Milla Jovovich is in it, I can't really recommend any other virtue. My girlfriend said it was better than Aeon Flux. One review of Ultraviolet remarked that it looked like a shampoo commercial. The main difference between Ultraviolet and a L'Oreal ad is that the narrative in a shampoo commercial is relatively easy to follow. Plus, I care about the characters a lot more.

Anyway, everyone in my office was bemoaning the fact that Crash won best picture. I didn't see it, but what I find amusing is that The Three 6 Mafia won the award for best original song. I had a roommate during and after college who listened to them, and honestly, I haven't thought about them in about eight years, but from now on, I will now refer to them as "Oscar-Winning Rap Artists Three 6 Mafia." I don't know if that is a cool thing for a rap group to be or not, but it's probably good that the Oscar statue is gold.

--The Robo-Pirate

Prurient Interest

OOPS!

p.s.
This is probably hot in the parallel universe in which Lindsey Lohan did not become emaciated via Colombian diet powder. It's the one where she lives next door to me and also works at McDonald's.

Avengers Assemble!

Let's face it. No matter how cool I think I am, I will never be able to erase the episodes of riding my bike to the Comic Grapevine to play Street Fighter II and flip through the 918 different X-titles during the springs and summers of '91 and '92. And honestly, why would I ever want to? Those were some of the happiest times of my life. Fortunately, I have discovered a way to celebrate that era of my life (apart from riding my bike to Lonestar Comics and flipping through 917 different X-titles) by tuning into Fanboy Radio, on 88.7 KTCU (click here to hear it on the web). If you have buried an adolescent nerd deep within a shell of grownup problems and adult facades, it's a great way to indulge your secret identity.

--The Robo-Pirate

Vandal SEO Poser

I'm about to officially become a freelance writer (I am making this sound like a much bigger deal than it is), and as such, I wonder about the future of print publishing in the age of the blog. See, I know about the agonizing process of submitting material to various journals, magazines and publishers, and I know how it's an uphill climb, the hill in question usually rising at an 80 degree incline (unless of course, you're a vapid ex-junkie professional celebrity, in which case you don't have to do anything but be related to someone). However, when everyone in the universe has a blog, will that mean that the door to print-publication (and I'm not talking about self-published stuff, or low-rent, quickie-mart porno mags) becomes even tinier and more elitist? Talk amongst yourselves.

Anyway, adding to the growing list of bloggers is my good buddy and bandmate, Kerry. Kerry works at the same place I do, and he works on natural search engine optimization. Or, what the rest of us refer to as MAGIC. Kerry writes about his SEO journeys here. He recently caught MSN cheating at SEO. So go to his site. It's pretty funny.

--The Robo-Pirate

I liked Geena Davis better when she had a job (and Joe Kelly is an idiot).

A few days ago, I biliously frothed about GLAAD's upbraiding of American Idol, because of Simon Cowell's insensitive treatment of a cross dresser. A couple of minutes ago, I read an article in a similar vein. This time the gripes came from Geena Davis, who, when she isn't empowering women to drive convertibles off cliffs, is busy founding gender-advocacy programs. As you might imagine, she is not advocating on behalf of little boys.

Her program, called See Jane, falls under the greater auspices of Dads & Daughters, and they both seek to increase balanced gender represenation in children's entertainment. This aim, in an of itself, is not a bad thing at all, though if you need a reason why there is a greater proportion of male characters to female characters in kids shows, simply compare the entire run of My Little Pony to any one episode of G.I. JOE; you will find that cartoons geared exclusively for girls are pretty lame.

Anyway, this group did a study on the top-grossing G-rated movies from 1990 to 2004, and it discovered that the male-female ratio in this films is a distressing 3:1. Clearly this a notable statistic, but I question the validity of its claim, largely because I don't think these people consider minor details such as narrative context. Joe Kelly, who co-founded Dads & Daughters, remarked that the findings of the study exposed a flaw in Toy Story, and made him realize that the only female character was Bo Peep. Well, Joe, if you can take a momentary break from your hand-wringing, you might notice that the setting of Toy Story takes place in the bedroom of an eight year BOY. I don't know if you are aware of this, Joe, but most boys don't play with girls' toys. On account of most boys being boys.

--The Robo-Pirate

Assorted Things That are Rad and Win Big #1

tremolo
reverb
telecasters
compressed bass
Herb Alpert
Helmet
Motorhead
Metric
mustard greens
taco truck tacos
5:00 PM
Maker's Mark
watching innocent bystanders get kicked in the nuts

--The Robo-Pirate

I Can't Brag Enough

Here's an article about my brother, the All-American Water Polo player. He kicks ass.

--The Robo-Pirate

Soon to be in print!

One thing that I have been intending to do for like the past four years or so is write record reviews for the Fort Worth Weekly, which is Cowtown's oft-maligned alt-rag. It required that I submit a writing sample, and after long last, I finally sent one in. Look for links to my reviews in the next few weeks. Until then, here's what I sent in. It's a review of the Sublime Tribute Album that came out in, um, August. Anyway, since it probably won't get printed, I've posted it down below.

Tribute albums are born of a superfan’s reverence for his favorite band, compromised by some other people who want to cash in on a defunct artist’s legacy. Their success hinges upon the artists selected to cover the songs and whether or not their versions make them any more interesting, which usually dooms them to glaring inconsistency. Thus, a tribute album is almost always a hit-or-miss affair; running all over the map is part of its record DNA. Yet, for a band like Sublime, you’d think that this hodgepodge-selector approach would work in its favor. It doesn’t. On Look at All the Love We’ve Found: A Tribute to Sublime, nurture beats nature, and what should have sounded organic often comes out clunky and contrived.

The songs on Look at All the Love are an even sampling from Sublime’s three studio albums, performed by bands that shared the same L.A./O.C. ska-punk scene, sandwiched between Myspace neighbors like G. Love. In other words, if you don’t get what Fishbone is doing with “Date Rape,” you can always put Jack Johnson’s breezy medley of Badfish/Boss DJ on repeat.

Where the album really shines is in the songs most likely to be skipped by the people looking for “Wrong Way” retreads. Camper Van Beethoven’s version of “Garden Grove” is dub made for a Jim Henson film about barrio life. Mike Watt and Petra Hayden take the stoned lo-fi of “Work that We Do” and boil it into a feverish absinthe hallucination, and Awol One and Abstract Rude turn “Ruca” into a greasy electro trip back to 1981.

Unfortunately, a big chunk of this album doesn’t do Sublime any favors. “Doin’ Time” gets deflated into busy acid jazz by The Greyboy All-stars, blanching what was a smoky summer anthem into jam-band elevator music, and while the countrified dub of Bargain Music is earnest and heartfelt on “Get Out,” it comes across a little too hammy and a lot too Kid Rockish.

As a band, Sublime were frequently uneven. From their sometimes electrifying, sometimes disastrous live shows to Bradley Nowell’s failed attempts to kick heroin, they were off as often as they were on. When they were on, they effortlessly replicated a 24/7 punk rock party on wax, wrapping SoCal’s sunny seediness in bouncy hooks and inescapable grooves; when they were off, they really sucked. In that regard, it’s almost fitting that a Sublime tribute would get cut from the same pattern.

--The Robo-Pirate

Rest in Peace, Grandpa Munster.

http://www.thesuperficial.com/archives/2006/02/06/al_lewis_dies.html

--The Robo-Pirate

"...I'm not too in to reggae."

Kerry (and in case you don't know who he is, go here: www.darthvato.com and look for the fat guy holding a guitar) discovered this afternoon that if you are considering a purchase of Darth Vato's first recording from Wal-Mart, Wal-mart would also like for you to consider a purchase of the Baha Men. Who let the dogs out, indeed.

http://customcd.walmart.com/onehour/servlet/AlbumServlet;jsessionid=Dgnvn3LhZVkdhkYaMnyLxvpfNXolNj2MsRw2jY01TrhQJ7JrIB5y!1985808616?id=106684

The moral of this story: reggae music is totally lame.

--The Robo-Pirate

I'll Shoot Yer Eye Out

That parrot's really going to get it.

--The Robo-Pirate

Is American Idol Homophobic?

Well, Clay Aiken won, didn't he, hahaha. Anyway, according to this Yahoo story last week (I know, I know I'm really up on current events) the Gay Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation got their um, panties in a wad because Simon and Randy made some comments about a dude wearing a dress. According to a GLAAD spokesman, "The real offense here was in the producer's decision to add insult to injury by turning a contestant's gender expression into the butt of a joke."

Sheesh.

Honestly, ladies, gender expressions (such as cross-dressing) made on a nationally televised talent contest geared for eighth-grade girls and their mothers is pretty foolish. And if you think that transgender pop stars are taken seriously anymore, well just ask Boy George. You can catch him on the graveyard shift at Denny's. He usually takes a smoke break around 2:45. Basically, if you decide to appear before a notorious prick like Simon Cowell, don't provide him with an obvious reason to publically ridicule you. A dude wearing a dress is just asking for trouble.

But then there is the PC side of this, which says that a dude wearing a dress on TV is not, in fact, asking for trouble. And in truth, making fun of people for being gay is a little bit like making fun of people for being Chinese. Or for having vaginas, but nobody disagrees with his or her friend who loved Blade: Trinity by saying, "Dude, that movie was totally Mexican." They disagree by saying that the movie was totally gay. And this isn't really fair, but unfortunately, the jury is still out about whether or not one has a choice about being gay, and old habits die hard. Which, I'll admit, is a pretty flimsy defense for what is apparently insensitive bigotry. But you know what? I don't believe for an instant that this RuPaul wannabe was making a political statement. I think he was just being a tacky asshole (and what a great mental picture that makes!). It has been my opinion for a long time that the average American would accept all homosexuals a lot more readily if the fringe-dwelling weirdo ones weren't constantly trying to freak out or piss off Connie Conservative. I'm sorry, but that's the unfortunate reality in a country where pluralism is pre-empted for the safety of the lowest common denominator.

I'm just saying is all.

--The Robo-Pirate

p.s.
I have a couple of gay friends, and we talk about this stuff often enough, and they basically agree with me. And my friends who are homosexuals are also on the same page as I am. They maintain that there are few things as inexcusable as a gay man with terrible taste. And as for my friends who have vaginas, they are named Kerry and Eric. Oh snap!

Polly wanna mouthful of alka seltzer?

My apartment came with a smoke alarm, and I discovered this morning that it is possessed by the spirit of someone's panicky mom. It totally freaked out because I made toast. Not smoke, mind you, but regular, old toast. And when I tried to shut it off, it wouldn't stop, so I took the battery out. It still wouldn't stop. I yanked it off the wall, revealing a tangled warren of wires, and it subsided to a single beep every thirty seconds. I think what it is doing now is akin to sulking, but if it's still beeping after all that, I'm calling a priest.

The other thing my apartment came with that makes a lot of noise is a parrot. It lives on the balcony directly above me, and of course, it's not only a parrot, but a talking parrot. After I had angered the nagging goddess of smoke detection, I heard these creepy muppet sounds coming from outside. I hopped over the patio railing and to investigate, and sure enough, there was a wire cage cresting the top of the upstair's neighbor's patio. So there's that. I couldn't figure out exactly what it was trying to say, but I have a feeling it will soon learn to repeat "shut the fuck up" loudly and clearly.

--The Robo-Pirate

I should really do this more often.

Anyway, I was fortunate enough to receive an iPod for Christmas from my family. Suffice to say, I have most of my music collection on this thing, and I haven't even used up one sixth of its capacity. What I've realized is that I like NOFX waaaaaay more than I thought I did, as setting the iPod on shuffle causes it to play a NOFX track every fourth song or so. Stash said that he thinks people end up sticking with the music they liked when they were seventeen, which is probably why I've been listening to Fat Mike's snotty whine for three weeks straight. It's also probably why Darth Vato plays ska songs.

Another big development is that I moved into a new apartment in a better part of town, so theoretically, I shouldn't have to worry about my sneakers getting lifted from my patio. The new pad is almost double the size of my old one . I'm sans dog now, as my lovely girlfriend took him back to Albuquerque with her. I've learned to make the best of a long distance relationship, and in many ways it's been a really good thing for us, but I'm really missing her dog. He was the best roommate I've ever had, although to Eric's credit, he never ate my sunglasses or shat in my bed. As far as I know anyway. Eric, you'd tell me if you shat in my bed, right? RIGHT?

As for the New Year, I made a number of resolutions. I haven't maintained them in the strictest sense, but I've done okay. I haven't jogged in over a week, because I got a big tattoo (of a ship) on my back. It's almost done healing (right now it's itchy, like I've rolled in fiberglass insulation), so I should be able to compliment my rice and beans diet with some exercise again, at least until I start Phase II, in which I'll get the background put in. And in case you are wondering about how I have managed to doctor a tattoo in a place I can't reach, I had my girlfriend do it. And prior to her arrival, I used a spatula.

--The Robo-Pirate

One more thing:

My brother got into University of the Pacific. So we're all really excited about that. It means he might get to play H20 polo in college, and it also means that he has an option outside of Fresno State, which, if you don't know anything about the city of Fresno, would be like attending a good school inside of someone's armpit.

--The Robo-Pirate.

Holiday ROOO-OOOOO-OO-OO-O-O-OOOAD!!!

So I'm a total boner, and here is one reason why. I missed a flight. It happened Thursday. I was supposed to be on the America West 7:30 to Vegas out of DFW and then on to Sacto, but I didn't allow myself enough time. Oh, technically I did, if conditions were ideal, but obviously, conditions were merely normal. See, in order to get from Fart Worth to DFW International Airport, you have to drive through the Mid-Cities. If you've read Stephen King's Dark Tower Series, think of The Wastelands, especially the part where they get held up walking through the ruined city full of creepy inbred people. The Mid-Cities are basically three large growths metastasized around the main artery between Fort Worth and the airport. They throb with chain restaurants, sports bars and about eight thousand on-ramps, and as such, the real speed limit is about 25 miles per hour. Of course, I forgot all this at 5:15 in the morning, what with getting dressed and taking the dog out and all. But even with the hindrance of a crawl through the Mid-Cities, I could have conceivably been in the nick of time for my flight if not for the airport's silence on where America West keeps its planes.

See, when I got to the airport, the terminal directory signs said nothing about America West, as if the whole America West terminal simply vanished into oblivion. Thinking that I was a moron (for reasons other than my habitual lack of planning), I circled the airport until I saw the terminal directories again, and sure enough, there was no indication that America West has ever flown out of DFW International. So I guessed, and of course I guessed wrong, but I at least got a shuttle to the right one. It is now 7:05, and the fact that I am even attempting to make this flight is a testament to the combined powers of hope and wishful thinking. Oh, did I mention that it's Christmas? Well it's Christmas, in case you forgot what that tree and pile of presents in your den was for. Christmas, of course, is the hammer that regularly seals the coffins of all improbabilities, despite what Hollywood has led you to believe about magic. Christmas travel leaves no room for foolishness, tardiness or sloppy planning, and this fact was made obvious to me when I arrived at the check-in queue. I might as well have been planning to ride Splash Mountain in July; the fucking line was two miles long and full of people who no-speaka-english. I tried to do the automated self-check in, and all that did was confirm what my heart of hearts already knew: THERE ARE NO SEATS AVAILABLE ON THIS FLIGHT.

Thus, I got back in line, which by now extended out of the terminal and back onto Highway 121. And in an effort to deal with the circumstances (made in part, by myself) which I could not change, I took a deep breath and adopted one of those "go-with-the-flow" attitudes prevalent in places like Venice Beach and Berkeley. And really, it made things a lot more enjoyable, because once you've accepted your fate, watching others struggle against their own is hilarious. Though you are still on the disgruntled traveler side of things, you begin to empathize with the customer service side. Accepting present circumstances gives you the power to say, "whoa, whoa, whoa man...." And it also gives you license to marvel at how fantastically ridiculous people can be.

For example, ahead of me in line was a family of four: fat dad, mousy mom, awkward middle school band-nerd daughter, spindly younger brother clad head to toe in Dallas Cowboys clothes. And this family, who I'll call the Fowlers, had SOME ISSUE. I don't know what it was, but they were arguing with the lady behind the counter, and they weren't winning. From the what I could gather, someone (Mrs. Fowler, I think) had made them late for a flight that they had booked at the last minute. And while Mr. Fowler was unsuccessfully trying to get his brood on the 8:27 flight to Phoenix (or Phunix! as I prefer), Mrs. Fowler began repeating, in public, at an airline check-in desk, mind you, "Are you mad at me? Are you mad at me? Just tell me, are you mad at me?" It has been my experience that you shouldn't ask questions in public if you aren't going to like the answer. And predictably, Mr. Fowler (Dan Fowler, I think), said, "Well, honestly, a little bit, yes."

Over the next four and a half hours, I would periodically see Dan Fowler skulking to and from the check in desk at gate B24, sans family. I suspect that he sent them home and traveled to Phoenix by himself.

Then, there was the Wealthy Line-Jumping Couple. The Wealthy Line-Jumping Couple, whose surname likely ended in "worth," (as in Dalworth, Barnsworth, or Worthworth) were a married couple, she in her late 30s and he in his mid to late 40s, who had been tricked into buying expensive clothes that look absolutely ridiculous. To wit, the wife, blonde, thin and attractive, was wearing a blanket. Oh sure, it had some kind of non-blanket type pattern on it, and it was gathered here and tossed there to give the illusion of being a garment, but if you remove all that and whatever name Neiman's gave it while it lived on the shelf, it was and shall ever be, a blanket. Combined with her Iditarod boots, she would have been at home in the Mos Eisley cantina or with the Last of the Mohicans.

Her husband was gold. That is the best way to describe him. In fact, the only thing golder than this man was is an Oscar Statue. His shirt: gold and red plaid. His shoes: gold. His pants: khakis covered with gold dust. His skin was gold, and his sport coat was a kind of a gold houndstooth pattern. And when he cut in line and went straight to the counter, I immediately imagined a scenario in which he looked at me and asked "What are you looking at?" to which I would have replied, "You can wait in line with the rest of us, and if you don't like it, you can take your Freddie Couples wins the Masters jacket and dry my sweaty balls with it." Then it occurred to me that PGA jackets are green (I think), and I was glad that I hadn't written that line into a TV show or movie. But anyway, he was hopping mad when the lady told him he had to wait with everyone else, and really made me laugh.

Ahead of me, there was one of those families in which only one member speaks something that approximates English. I felt bad for this family, because the grandmother looked terrified about getting on a plane, and also because the father was having a hard time conveying everything they needed. As near as I could tell, the only things they needed were seats on outbound flight. Then there was another couple who were either moving to Calcutta circa 1900 or visiting the Howells on Gilligan's Island, as every piece of their luggage (and there were many, many pieces) was the size of a steamer trunk.

Anyway, I eventually got to fly standby. Sometimes, like maybe in June or April, standby means that you might get on a flight. But during Christmas, standby means you will wait at a gate while airline employees bribe people to give up their seats on overbooked flights. Or more, precisely, it means that you will not get to fly that day. You can't really get mad, especially if you didn't get up early enough to make your flight (though Dan Fowler seemed to think this isn't the case). So I didn't get mad. I waited with a college girl who turned into tears every time she went up to the desk (her dad was sick and she needed to get to Denver pronto), and a lesbian cowboy, who came complete with a coloful Garth Brooks-type striped shirt and tin of Skoal in her back pocket, as well as the most well-behaved dachshund ever put in a ventilated duffle bag. They were both very nice, though I think the teary college girl suspected my good humor was colored by ulterior motives, which was why I prefered the lesbian cowboy. After I didn't get on three flights, I asked the counter lady (named Cheryle) if I could get a guaranteed seat the next day. And she said yes, so I said thank you and good bye.

Needless to say, I got up earlier the next day, and that is why I am eating leftovers in Lodi with my family.

--The Robo-Pirate

p.s.
awwwwwww! Whose teeth hurt from that bit of sweetness? Mine sure do!

p.p.s.
The title of this post is an attempt to spell that song played over and over again in the first Vacation movie. The Robo-Pirate regrets any anguish or bewilderment caused by this lackluster title and begs your forgiveness.

p.p.p.s.
The Robo-Pirate also congratulates you if you made it all the way down here and will do his best to keep things shorter in the future.

p.p.p.p.s.
But he can't promise anything.

Fort Worth vs. the Frost Giants

If anyone outside of Texas has been watching the Weather Channel, you will have noticed that the weather-guessers have directed their ebullience toward describing the below-freezing temps currently wreaking havoc on the driving preferences of DFW residents. For those of you who live here, you're already tired of those people (who drive around muttering about having to keep an actual car-length or two between them and the car in front). A while back, I griped, in a sort of back-handed way, about the fact that it was November and still 80 degrees outside, implying that I wished Texas experienced actual seasons rather than summer, spring, summer and hell. Well, I take it all back.

Call me a wimp, those of you who have to deal with snow and ice for four months of the year. I tip my hat my hat to you and ask that if you have time, perhaps you'd like to give me a lift to work. I hate this shit. I don't drive well in it, but at least I admit it, which is more than I can say for the other million people in the DFW Wretchroplex. On top of bald tires, a light vehicle and a relative lack of experience with icy roads, my trips around town have been further complicated by Fort Worth morons who are largely ignorant of the physical properties of ice and wholly ignorant of what happens when you accelerate while driving upon it. Their logic runs as follows, "Well, my truck weighs more than a ton and I have two extra wheels on my rear axle, which means I can drive as wrecklessly as I do when the streets are dry." Or, that axiom's corrolary, "I drive a Mercedes, and because my Mercedes costs sixty grand, the laws of physics obviously do not apply." And if they aren't operating their vehicle according to those rules, they follow this one: "Fucking speed up! Get out of my way! Why the fuck are you going so slow?!"

So God, if you've got a sec, would you mind putting the thermostat at say, forty-five? I don't mind it being winter, but there are several reasons why I don't live in Boston, chief among them I HATE DRIVING ON ICE!!!!!!

--The Robo-Pirate

This is probably a dumb post when I have other things to write about buuuut....

....I think, in terms of iconic symbolism, musical representation and overall coolness, Black Flag is the best band name ever.

Also, I really, really hate the word schnockered. Can't we just say drunk? Hammered, shithoused, shitcanned, plowed, plastered, wasted, geez--even bombed, but please, stop saying schnockered. It's the sort of word that is said with sneering self-righteousness by those guys who stayed in the dorm playing penuchle on Saturday nights when the rest of the floor was out sucking down trashcan punch and keystones and getting turned down by girls.

In hindsight, I probably should've spent more time with the penuchle-playing guys. I'd probably be an billionaire astronaut by now.

--The Robo-Pirate

p.s.

I just glanced at some Amazon reviews of The Truth about Diamonds from people who have actually read it. One of them begins, "I don't like to read..." I think that sums Nicole Ritchie the author up pretty nicely.

Angry and Nauseas

I am busy right now, but I am so enervated that I could probably cut my arm open and molten fire would spray out instead of blood.

It was this phrase, found on a Yahoo news post, that did it:

"Television personality and author Nicole Ritchie"

Author? Really? What did she write? Oh, this book? This "novel" about the daughter of an entertainer who gets on a reality show and becomes famous? You mean the one with the picture of herself wearing a tiara on the front cover? It looks a lot more like a thinly veiled, heavily-promoted vanity project, if you ask me. You know whose fault this is? It's yours, America, for continuing to pay attention to these vapid, inflated celebrities, who if not for being fired out of some rich woman's vagina, wouldn't get to "write" books and get them published.

Nicole, honestly, what have you had to do thus far? Grow up being friends with crappy human beings like Paris Hilton, get everything you want (which, apparently included at some point being an author), go score heroin on Sunset, never go to jail for scoring heroin, be on TV, etc. etc. etc. Hmmm... I didn't see consistent disappointment from rejection form-letters on that list. Well, fuck you, Nicole. This book is the last straw. When I think of every writer who gets his or her stories, articles and manuscripts rejected over and over again, who works a nine-to-five in order to be a writer because writers don't usually make livings off their passion, who may get to experience a divorce or a drinking problem or some other misery because of his or her drive to do what he or she loves, well I hope, just a little bit, Nicole Ritchie, that your personal hell involves having to eat every copy of that novel, after the rest of us have wiped our asses with them.

--The Robo-Pirate

Nuclear with Pride

My little brother is a senior in high school, and he recently played his final high school water polo game. He's pretty good; so good in fact, that at the end of the season, he was named an All-American, as well as being named to the All-Section First Team as well and the Northern California First Team, which means he's in like the top fifteen of Northern California.

It's very possible that my family will have a Division-1 Collegiate athlete in it. I am so stoked and have never been prouder of him.

--The Robo-Pirate

Do they bother to go listen to themselves later? Or do they just not care how stupid they sound?

Regarding the Senate's handy defeat of the Democrats' effort to call for a Iraq withdrawal timetable, Senate Majority leader Bill Frist said this:

"They want an exit strategy, a cut-and-run exit strategy. What we are for is a successful strategy."

Right, because we've been so successful at everything else in this war, like supressing insurgents and getting the lights turned on and the toilets unplugged. I don't really trust your party to do anything successful beyond successfully lying and cheating.

--The Robo-Pirate

It's time for the indie kids to break out their scarves and v-neck sweaters.

North Texas is apparently getting a cold front this week, which means that the THIRD WEEK IN NOVEMBER will feature temps in the upper 60s and low 70s. For those of you in other parts of the country, I think you call your cold fronts "fall" and "winter."

--The Robo-Pirate

I'm actually not sure who the jerk here is, oh well. I hate indie kids.

Real fast, as I have to get back to work, but my band, Darth Vato, just received its first two pieces of hate mail, which I pasted below, followed by my response.

Dylan S., probably from Saddle Creek, NE writes:

you dudes totally look like a bunch of losers who listen to sugar ray, and
sublime. perhaps your name which abounds in originality was thought up listening to one of the afformentioned bands whilst smoking some form of illicit drug. i am sorry for not speaking
monosyllabically for you guys to understand, but i just thought i would say you suck...

and then:

i just downloaded one of your many songs, and realized you guys sound like 311, which is worse that i previously imagined. that skeleton with the sword is like a harbinger of death to you guys, seeing as how im going to steal the cutlass he is holding and cut off all of your fingers, so as to save the world from the hell that is darth vato. you guys would probably have been better in naming yourselves "going nowhere cause we are frathouse wankers". oh sorry for being a bit "rude", but bands like you give the world of music a bad name. just thought i would give you guys a word of encouragement by saying "quit now". by the way 311 sucks, but not as much as you guys. oh yeah you guys should return that year prescription of rohypnol you got from your buddy at the pharmacy, because dosing chicks at your venues is sooooo last year.

Oh! Well allow me to retort!

Dear Dylan,

Wow. You are the first person in three years to directly express antipathy for Darth Vato. We assume that people make fun of us behind our backs, but no one has ever made his or her loathing as explicit as you have. For your honest opinion, we thank you.

I do take issue with a few items in your emails, however. Though I applaud you for checking your spelling, grammar and punctuation (are you a journalism major, perhaps? Are you using your reporting class as a podium by which to disparage your town's music scene?), I am puzzled as to why, in your second email, you chose to enclose the word rude in quotation marks. Did you mean something other than the definition of rude that is commonly agreed upon by nearly everyone who competently understands the English language? Because otherwise, I can only assume that you were trying to emphasize your point that we are frathouse morons. I suppose you drove that point home sufficiently; in the event that you were trying to be funny, I am sorry to say you failed.

Furthermore, in the first email you accuse us of emulating Sublime and Sugar Ray and in the second, 311. I would like to clear up any misconceptions you might have about our musical tastes. Kerry (the bearded guy who plays guitar) and I (the sometimes-bearded guy who plays bass) both love Sublime. Though we both like many other types music (Kerry is really into jazz; I am all over the place), Sublime was common to both of us when we met in college, and our band largely sprang from jamming on Sublime songs (oops--sorry, jamming is a gerund probably too fratty and stupid to use with you). I will also begrudgingly cop to liking a couple Sugar Ray songs. For good or for ill, Mark McGrath (or whoever writes them) crafts sickeningly good hooks. That's partly why he doesn't have to have a day job beyond appearing on television and singing at state fairs. He is likely a millionaire, and if you are accusing me of aspiring to be one of those, I can only plead guilty. As for 311, our drummer likes 311, and we ridicule him mercilously and ceaselessly. We hate 311, despite what it says on our Myspace page. Bad Brains are awesome, however.

Finally, my last issue with your emails involves your contention that we give music a bad name. We have no pretensions about being a type of band different than the one we are, but I think you are thinking of The Bravery. The bass player should have stuck it out in whatever ska band he was in.

As for you as a person, we sincerely appreciate your honest feedback. It would have been better if you had articulated your enmity without using verbiage such as "abounds," because in total, your emails lead me to believe that you are, in fact, an eigth grader who has recently discovered what pressing the shift and F7 keys does on your keyboard (which opens Microsoft Word's thesaurus, in case you have no idea what I'm talking about). But really, I know you even less than you know me. I might, for example, guess that you are some burgeoning indie snob, who after purchasing Good News for People Who Love Bad News became a Modest Mouse authority, especially after you found out they made albums prior to getting Top 40 spins. If I were to make these types of assumptions, (which I'm not, of course), I might suggest that you take your devastatingly original, ironically-worn, size-too-small "Virginia is for lovers" t-shirt and use it for wadding when you cram that unopened Yo La Tengo album you bought two months ago up your ass. Or, I could assume that your email address pays homage to that underground hip-hop guy, which means you are light years beyond us in terms of indie cool and therefore intelligence and overall human merit. Either that, or you are a Dragonball fan, which confirms my suspicions about your being in eighth grade.

Anyway, thanks for the feedback. See you at the Warped Tour!

Steve

p.s.

I'm not sure how to get rohypnol, but if I do, the first girl who is going to get it is your grandma, so I can take the ten dollars out of her purse she intends to put in your birthday card.

What I Learned from Saturday Night Commercials

According to television, touching a brand new Nissan Maxima creates some weird, crack-like, contact high that is instantly and perilously addictive, so addictive in fact, that if the Maxima you have touched boards a ferry and the ferry steams away from a pier, you are liable to continue to chase it to the point of madly running off the end, presumably drowning in the water below. Either that or you swim after the ferry and end up in Vancouver. Or Alcatraz. I'm pretty sure those are the only places that use ferries.

Needless to say, I don't ever want to touch a Maxima. Or swim to Vancouver.

--The Robo-Pirate

Hey! Mine is fulla thumbtacks!!!!

So one aspect of my job involves writing titles and descriptions for internet search terms. I typically get a list of keywords for whatever company's campaign I'm working on and write the stuff that pops up as a sponsored link when you type it in Yahoo, Google or MSN. These lists always include terms that make me scratch my head in bewilderment because of their specificity, unwieldiness or general idiocy. Today, as I was cruising through a list that had to do with frozen gourmet seafood, I encountered this gem:

Seafood stuffed crab shells.

Aren't crab shells already stuffed with seafood? On account of being full of crab? As if you might crack open a crab shell and discover a bunch of lettuce or loose change.

I'm just saying is all.

--The Robo-Pirate

p.s.

p.s.

Unless you plan on using one to suck Dick Cheney out of his bedroom window. We could probably stomach one more, then.

A Child's Letter to God

Dear Jesus,

Please stop with the fucking hurricanes.

Your friend,

Steve

What to do when your Saturday goes belly up

To Natalie and Andrea, thanks for sitting on the curb with me last night. It meant more than you know.

--The Robo-Pirate

NEXT BLOG!!!

You know when you go eat Mexican food and you have two quarters left over so you go over to the put-quarters-in-and-turn-the-knob prize dispensers and there is a Homie prize dispenser, and the top part has really awesome Homies like the guy in the wheelchair or the big cholo-looking one who's restraining a pitbull and then you put quarters in and turn the knob and you don't get either of those but instead get the chick with a pink coat on, who looks pretty much like the other chicks with the pink coats (I went to high school with those chicks, by the way) who you got the last two times you purchased a Homie out of a Homie-dispenser? Well, that's how I feel when I hit the NEXT BLOG >> button on this thing. I want a funny or interesting blog, but what I get is one about how research shows that lizards cure cancer or how research shows that smoking makes your eyeballs fall out or some other such sponsored nonsense. So when one of those pops up, I push NEXT BLOG >>, and then this next one is in Spanish, and I don't read Spanish very well, and so I push NEXT BLOG >> and this one appears to be in Arabic, and I don't read Arabic at all. So of course, why not check out the NEXT BLOG >>? Because the NEXT BLOG >> looks like the layout desk in Juggs' editorial department, because it is haphazardly covered with pictures of amateur topless women with preposterously large breasts.

I gave it one more shot, and the NEXT BLOG >> did not make me laugh as much as it made me consider how I probably should get around to learning Norwegian, so I can learn how Alexander feels about David Cronenberg's Videodrome. I will admit that I am interested in learning Norwegian now, because of the proliferation of decorative diacritic marks on Norwegian letters. While the English alphabet is basically limited to the occasional breve and umlaut, the letters in the Norwegian alphabet look like you could hang them on a Christmas tree.

So anyway, when you click on that button, chances are you aren't going to get what you're after. Certainly not a cholo with a pitbull.

--The Robo-Pirate

The Skin-Thinning Properties of Bad-Day Projection

I found out this past week that my mom had a blog. Long story short, by taking a sentence out of context and framing it within the context of the bummer weekend I had and the crummy day I was having, I handily found hidden implications from which I took umbrage. The two emails I sent her in response were not directly unkind, but they were unwarranted and unecessarily indignant. The consequence of all this was that I hurt her feelings to the point that she took down her entire blog.

If you are interested in making yourself feel like a really awful person, make your mom sad. It works nearly every time.

So of course, I feel like a big jerk, and here is why: my mom is not particularly adept at using computers, and the fact that she was able to navigate Blogger (or Blooger, as I nearly typed a second ago, which I think is a hilarious word, incidentally), follow the instructions and successfully create a blog is wonderful and astounding. I say that with absolutely no sarcasm. Furthermore, I can imagine her sheer joy at having an outlet to write and relate sometimes hilarious, often frustrating stories about my dad, my brother and myself. The fact that I effectively squashed that joy by being a titty-baby makes me feel about an inch tall. I know I wasn't the one who deleted her blog, but shit. Seriously, this is me telling me, grow up, dude. It's not like it's the first time my mom has made light of something I've done. I did, after all go to high school in the early-to-mid '90s, so you can imagine the number of terrible haircuts and goofy clothes I had, most of which practically begged for informed mockery by sensible adults.

Anyway, I'm not trying to feel sorry for myself, but I am sorry for being a jerk. So mom, will you please put up another blog? Pretty please? I know people will read it (especially Wink), and they're fun, and therapeutic, and so are you gonna put it up now? Please?

--The Robo-Pirate

Now I feel cool!!!

Driving to work this morning, zoning out, appreciating the fact that it is not yet a thousand degrees in Fort Worth..... And some dude who I did not know was blaring my band's most recent CD out of his pickup. If everything falls apart today (don't know why it would), at least I have that moment of giddy joy. Sounds kind of gay, but it's a really cool feeling to know that a stranger is enjoying one's creative output.

--The Robo-Pirate

How to Make Sense of History When You've Watched a Lot of Television

Based upon this PBS show I watched last night that had to do with what a big deal 1968 and 1969 (and how they made the things that happened in '70-'74 happen) were, I arrived at two conclusions:

1. Vince Neil is the rock and roll equivalent of Ted Kennedy. Both are fat, bloated and the wrong person to ride in a car with.

2. Arlo Guthrie looks and sounds like he is being portrayed by Darrel Hammond in an SNL skit about a guy tailgating before a Jimmy Buffet concert.

--The Robo-Pirate

p.p.p.p.s.

So is Prince.

Y? Because I have two more minutes on my lunch.

A short list of famous musicians whose first names begin with the letter Y:

Yngwie Malmsteen
Ytzahk Perlman
Yesod from Pepper
Yellowman
Yuri from MxPx

oh Christ--I almost forgot.... YANNI

--The Robo-Pirate

p.s.
Can you believe I almost forgot Yanni? It would have been like leaving Skeletor off of a list of scary purple things.

p.p.s
Grimace is definitely on that list.

p.p.p.s.
So is the anthropomorphic onion on the new Eclipse gum commercial.

Hi. My name is America, and I'm a oilcoholic.

I recall a Calvin and Hobbes strip in which Calvin is bitching about the future not being very futuristic. "Where are the flying cars?" he gripes. "I mean, we still have weather?"

Yes, Calvin, we most certainly still have weather, and right now, our still-extant weather is further proving that America (and the rest of the world, if we are going to be honest with ourselves) will be forever hidebound by our addiction to oil, an addiction which mires us in costly mid-east wars, poisoned air, and stymied innovation.

Want to keep living in the twentieth century? Then let's keep the oil pumping. Throw more money at finding more oil, rather than spending money on retrofitting our infrastructure to accomodate hydrogen or other renewables.

I know I'm oversimplifying this, but seriously, how many more natural, energy-crippling disasters do we need to recover from to realize that pursuing an alternative is better for everyone and everything in the long run. How many more theocratic despots must we tolerate before we hit (bed)rock-bottom?

When will we have a clean-burning flying car?

--The Robo-Pirate

OHHH YEAHHHH!!! MY WAAAAR!!!!

The more I think about Henry Rollins, the more I get the impression that he would be partial to grape Kool Aid. And that he would also be likely to come smashing through a wall screaming "OHHH YEAHHH!!!!, resplendent in his little black shorts and with his huge carotid arteries bulging and pumping with furious, sugary purple punch, because he likes grape Kool Aid so much that he has completely supplanted his blood with it. And if you like grape Kool Aid that much, you know who to bite in the neck.

--The Robo-Pirate

p.s.
I thought this up with Kerry. He likes Kool Aid too, probably.

(a + b) 121/c = TRIANGLE?????

Really, launchcast radio? Shania Twain? You honestly thought, given all your algorhythms and research and ratings that I might like to listen to a Shania Twain song? I fail to see which variable, selection or rating might have even remotely suggested that I wanted to hear Shania Twain. Because I don't. Not even a little bit. Remember when you thought that I might want to hear some Aerosmith, maybe from the Big Ones album? And remember how you were wrong? Well this is like that time, only worse. Is it because I picked Jack Johnson, and you know that some people who like Jack Johnson like Shania Twain and that if you were to present a Ven diagram illustrating that overlap, my tastes might overlap there in the middle? Well, they don't. You're not listening to me, because I also have told you that in addition to Jack Johnson, I like Black Flag and Minor Threat, and I think it's a safe assumption that the average fan of either of those bands does not like Shania Twain. Moreover, I know for a fact that Henry Rollins and Ian MacKaye definitely don't like Shania Twain, because when the three of us (along with Greg Graffin) got together to play Dungeons and Dragons last Saturday, I was about to make the scenario when Rollins goes, "You know who I'm sick of? That stupid Shania Twain!" And then Ian is like, "Yeah, bro, I totally know what you mean." So then I changed the campaign and made up this really easy-to-kill troll who was loaded in gold and called him Sh'naya T'weyne, and it was really funny, and we laughed and laughed and laughed some more, especially when Greg Graffin spilled Dr. Pepper on his pants.

--The Robo-Pirate

Dammit (I guess this is growi--BLAM BLAM BLAM!!!!!

So last night, I went downtown to the Flying Saucer to meet Jackie and her friends for a beer (which really turned into three or four given that they had Sierra Nevada IPA on tap). As I crossed Sundance square, I saw three people held hostage on a park bench by a busker badly performing "Just Like Heaven." Then, as I stepped into the crosswalk at Fourth and Main, some asshole in a Mercedes jerked out of his parking spot and through the red light. If not for the techno pumping out of his car, I probably would have been nailed. Of course he wouldn't have noticed, unless the impact had made him drop his cigarette or phone, which he was operating simultaneously. He was obviously commanding the car by the power of sheer concentration, so it's understandable that he didn't notice athe red light, let alone a human being stepping into the sanctioned walking area.

The other thing that happened was that when I got to the bar, I saw this girl I graduated with. I don't think I have ever spoken to her, but with characteristic creepiness, I know that she was a Chi-O, an Ad/PR major, and from Overland Park, KS. Anyway, she was sitting at this table with this dude, and the dude looked like he was in his early-to-mid 30s, and when I saw him, I thought, "Whoa, that dude she's with is old. He must be like, 32 or 33!" and then I realized that 32 or 33 isn't really that much older than someone who is 27 or 28. I never thought I'd feel old until I had kids. The fact that going to the Flying Saucer and buying expensive craft beers was something I did when I was 21 and 22 didn't help anything either.

This is why I shouldn't go out on Sundays.

--The Robo-Pirate

p.s.
I had a beer called Old Scrimshaw, brewed in Fort Bragg, CA. It tasted like your grocers freezer, like licking a Lean Cuisine package.

Fun Fact #1

According to the Internet Movie Database, Robert "Freddy Kreuger" Englund's father designed the U-2 spy plane.

Bonus fun fact: He auditioned for the part of Luke Skywalker. My guess is that he couldn't get the whole petulant space-teenager thing down.

--The Robo-Pirate

Angry Lesbian Breasts Part II

Oh man, that sounds like a new John Waters movie, if he eschewed the subtlety of his other films. Anyway, I forgot to mention that I read an article about Antigone Rising in Spin or EW or Here's Some Label Money to Promote Some New, Terrible Band a day or two after posting about them. It turns out they are a female JAM BAND, which means that not only is their sound the musical equivalent of a menstrual cramp, it is a cramp that lasts the entire month.

--The Robo-Pirate

p.s.
I should probably mention that Angry Lesbian Breasts is a referrence to a line Stephen King used to describe inappropriate modifiers (and bad slam poetry) in his On Writing book. If you like to write and haven't read this book, you need to pick it up.

p.p.s.
Also, I gathered from Antigone Rising's interview comments that my eye-rolling and criticism is not original at all and that they hear that sort of thing all the time; in that case, let me say that I have never been ashamed of pointing out the obvious. If you have shit on your shoe and everyone can smell it, expect to hear about it until you scrape it off.