As it turns out, unfulfilled childhood fantasies may still be possible.

There was this game show for kids in the 80s, (I regrettably cant remember the name, it may have been a local thing) in which at the end of the show the winner got to answer as many trivia questions as they could in 60 seconds. These correct answers were transformed into the number of seconds they were allowed to push a shopping cart around Toys R Us to fill up with whatever they wanted, and that was what they took home as prizes for winning. It was a SuperMarket Sweep for children. My sister and I would LOSE OUR FUCKING MINDS when some 7 year old girl would win and fill up her cart with random plush animals worth fractions of the video games, sports equipment and action figures within eyeshot. But for the most part, kids went BONKERS for x seconds and would literally hold their hands out in front of their cart and run down the board game aisle, and bricks of Operation, Sorry! and Battleship piled up in their hoppers. Most kids played it right, and walked out of there with the fixings for a fully stocked, brand new game room and the celebrity and incoming offers of friendship from your entire elementary school.

I wanted to be that kid.  I wanted to have a ridiculous shopping spree.  It was part of my little kid dreams, day and night.  I did end up having 3 chances at a toy store shopping spree in my life.  When I was one month shy of my 8th birthday, my family moved 200 miles away.  In this Upstate, NY town there was a store called “Toys for Joy” that gave you an opportunity to choose a key that could open the shopping spree treasure chest on your birthday.  They’d announce your name over the store intercom and play some retarded song and invite everyone to come to watch me attempt to open this chest, which allowed for a one minute spree.  The chest never opened and the store would give me a $10 gift certificate that my parents would use to buy me a toy because they were awesome people.  But, it wasnt the spree that I was waiting all year for the chance to get.  A month before my 12th birthday “Toys for Joy” closed and my childhood closed with it when I came to grips with the fact that life is not a storybook, and I would never have my chance at a plastic recreational bonanza.

Recently, it occurred to me that I could possibly gain a similar experience.  I could still have a chance to be that kid. It hasn’t happened yet, I expect it to someday, and I don’t think I’m anticipating it enough. That kid is me at my first visit to a marijuana dispensary. I’ll be hopping up and down, shaking my arms in front of my mouth like I’m speed eating an invisible corn on the cob, cheshire cat smile causing head shaking from employees. “I’ll take that one, and that one, and I, I want some brownies, and, and some cookies and one of those, and OH MY GOD WHAT IS THAT CAN I SMOKE THAT I’LL TAKE SEVEN” I will try it all by the dime load, and Augustus Gloop will be giving me disapproving looks from his chocolate coffin. It will be worth it. I will make thunderheads in my hotel room. You will mistake my living room for San Francisco dawn. My game room will be fully stocked with bricks of things called Jumanji, Hungry Hungry Hippos & Candy Land. And I will know what those kids felt like when they were filling their hearts, as they filled their carts.

As it turns out, the African email con-artist industry leaves a lot on the table.

I received an email from an acquaintance, telling me all about how they were robbed at gunpoint and needed some money for a hotel room and replacement passport.  It was obviously a scam and it got me to thinking how many people it hooked.  I wagered 1 returned the email honestly, if any did at all.  Then, I doubted that one person followed through with the bank account or wire transfer.  Of course, if they did, they totally deserve whatever they spend on the lesson.  A fool and his money are soon parted.  Whether it’s a Nigerian Prince, door to door driveway sealing, bad investments, or stories from your family.  Anyway, after realizing how ridiculous the scam attempt was, I started improving the racket in my brain.

Do a little research.  You have access to the marks history of sent e-mails.  Why not check out a little precedence and compose your e-mail to form.  Why is this elitist redneck who was fired from Target before going to work for her Dad in a laundromat telling me about her hard scrabble times in Spain on a “culture tour with a little business mixed in”?  Why is the girl who sends tweets with abbreviations, numbers for letters and raNDoM CaMElcAsE using words like “inadvertently” and “irrevocable” in a well crafted email?  Did her last Facebook status update of “GoIn 2 C MaH bOYeEs n CrUNk a BuNCh” really mean “I’m headed to Europe to expand my scope of understanding”?    A little understanding can expand the mark pool, is what I’m saying.

Time for a new game.  Everyone’s onto your ruse.  Flip a script.  Why not take advantage of seasonal religious guilt and cook up a phony donation email.  You know, “Hey everyone, My sister/work friend is trying to raise money for a poor family she knows with a son in Afghanistan and a daughter in a wheelchair. Click this link to help!”  The particularly awesome thing about this sham, is that it’s likely legal in whatever country is housing your servers, provided you pay the disingenuous warlord in charge of them his $40 in gold teeth and two women per month to keep the Serengeti rebelistas from mortaring your meal ticket.  People can donate their money to whatever they want.  As long as you call it a donation, it’s just a gift, an offering with no need of compensation.  Of course, if there is even law where you live to begin with.

Look, I’m just saying people expect a little more out of their grifters these days.  It’s been a continuing trend of the past millennium or so to raid your continent of anything remotely resembling a resource, INCLUDING PEOPLE.  Here’s your opportunity to gaffle back from the Evil Empire, lets give it some hustle here.  I’m talking to you. Liberians with a Tandy and a Juno account, clean that shit up.

As it turns out, “Cyber Bullies” are heroes.

The story of Josie Ratley may have come across your TV at some point, recently, and for that I can only apologize. She’s a 13 year old girl who texted hateful messages to 15 year old Wayne Treacy about his brothers suicide. Wayne did not take kindly to the gesture, promptly took a three mile bike ride and put Josie in a coma with his boots. Feel free to google names for news article. I like to do my own research, and leave you to do your own as you see fit.

Before I go any further, I’d like to make clear that I do not condone the behavior of Wayne Treacy. Dude deserves a cell. No question. I am, however, going to take issue with the fact that Josie is being portrayed as some sort of hero on my TV. The part that really got me is when white trash staple turned activist Mom Ratley and her new boyfriend Turdy McLawyerson have the balls to ask for money on early morning national TV. Furthermore, they continue the hypocritical crusade by staging some “Bowling Against Bullying” event. Um, HELLO?!?!? This bitch was trolling. Or, as the news media loves to call it “Cyber bullying”. The piece could, and SHOULD, have been portrayed as a continuation on the argument of cyber bullying instead of completely ignoring it. It should have been used at the situation meritted. “Look what happens when you cyber bully someone. You might end up drinking peanut butter and jelly sandwiches through your arm for a few years. Do they make prom dresses for automatic wheelchairs? Your whole life was ahead of you, now McDonalds will have to find a new cashier.” Instead, The news is canonizing this girl. Sometimes hours after running stories about how cyber bullying is a terrible thing and drives people to suicide.

“Woah, hey, MetaCog” you may find yourself thinking, “The girl is harvested vegetables living in a wheelbarrow, is there really any need for the insults?” Hells yes, and let me tell you why. I am perpetuating the negativity she started because she doesn’t deserve to be the hero here and I’m upset with the hypocrisy of the news. People get put in comas or die every day for getting hit by drunk drivers, being born to the wrong father, or wearing the wrong colored shoes in LA. These are the innocent people that deserve to have some monetary assistance for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. These are the stories I should be hearing about. This drooling, bediapered, shit mop was not at the wrong place at the wrong time. She invented her own destiny by bringing negativity to the wrong person at the wrong time. People are put in comas every day for being an actual innocent victim. This girl was nothing close. She brought negativity to someone stemming from a superiority she thought she had because his brother committed suicide.

Again, the repercussions were not justified. Wayne should go to jail. There’s already like ten wrongs in this story, and few, if any rights. I wager the world is cured of Josie’s personal text trolling issue, though be it from her losing the cognitive function to recognize a cell phone. In any event, the entire horrible situation possibly leads to avoiding you or someone you love any unnecessary negativity, should you have had the future misfortune of ever having met this straw-breather, who looked the same in all her before pictures as she did after a ten minute boot stomping. Or, it may have saved your life had you made the mistake of getting on the wrong side of Wayne Treacy, someday. The only things that will never change for the better, is Ann Curry asking a question to a person sitting in front of her that is not in the script even though millions of people are asking their TVs, and my continuing failure to consider morning news shows journalism.

As it turns out, Appreciation without Gratitude is verbal devestation.

Rarely, in day to day life,  will you find yourself in the situation that someone has placed the blame for a mistake that they have made on you.  Some jobs have this as a daily occurrence, so this is more useful to them, but everyone can benefit.

If this situation were to arise to you, I highly recommend a firm “You’re welcome” right before the conversation ends. Not a sarcastic, drawn-out “You’re welcome” like a teenager, that’s too obvious.  Pleasantly and politely, “You’re welcome” like you misheard a thank you. Its like a spiral ham dinner on a cold winter day, high morale and internal satisfaction abound.   If you are on the phone, hang up immediately.  But be sure to continue listening, as you might even get the rare and other-worldly satisfying “But I didn’t even say thank y-*click*”.  If getting to say “You’re welcome” to someone without a “Thank you”  is akin to seeing Bigfoot, then hanging up on them mid-recognition of this is like seeing Bigfoot eat a Whopper on a treadmill.  Only it’s all there for you and your own enjoyment to soak in.

It’s really the most pleasant way of saying “Up Yours” to a stranger I can think of.  A hearty Willy Wonka “Good Day” is over-used and is easily over-acted.  “Child, please” isn’t as mainstream yet, and will always go over old peoples heads.  “You’re Welcome” gives the illusion that you understood them to be saying the two little words (“Thank you”) their pride wouldn’t allow them to.  The two words they have said hundreds of thousands of times in their lives, but won’t say now because they are far too right.  The two words they have carefully omitted from the conversation to try and save what face there is to be saved from being important and incorrect.

If you found this article to be insightful and pointed, then you are welcome.  If you did not, “You’re welcome“.

As it turns out, elaborately performed disrespect is hilarious.

One Christmas break my friend and I snuck to the woods outside a families house that we hated. When the coast was clear, we stole the baby Jesus out of his families manger set and put Joseph doggystyling Mary in the manger, and either a donkey or a camel had his head in there, helping out somehow. I believe Myrrh and Gold were finger-cuffing Frankincense in the stable, also.

As we were running away shouting Taliban slogans and laughing our asses off into the pitch black night, I sprinted, nipples first, into one of those high tension wires stuck into the ground to hold up telephone poles. Instantly, I literally made a C shape with my body in mid air, legs parallel to the ground as all the air escaped from me. I remember seeing my baseball cap frisbee off my head, like it was still going running speed. It whizzed 10-15 feet ahead of me. I didn’t feel any pain, I now believe my body was more interested in wtf had just happened than to register pain. As I sat there, my friend notices I’ve stopped and retreats to collect me. He thought I saw something, so he kneels down next to me and I told him what happened. He blamed it on the ghost of Jesus. I told him I thought we would have had a three day head start.

Anyway, we sent a ransom letter to the family, with a Polaroid of baby Jesus blindfolded and guns pointed at his head. Letters cut out of magazines and everything. During my buddy’s family vacation, he sent them a postcard from Martha Vineyard with two hot babes on the front. He taped a picture of baby Jesus with sunglasses and a Mai Thai between the babes and told the family he escaped his captors by turning 97% of their bodies into wine. He said he was going to travel a bit and he’d be back in time for the Holidays. Sure enough, we returned him the following year with stickers from across the globe on him.

As it turns out, the “Leap Second” ruins New Years.

For those of you who don’t know, scientists have added an additional second to the end of this year to keep up with the fact that the Earth is spinning a little bit slower every day.  I have no issue with that.  That seems legitimate.  A little excessive reaction maybe, but it makes sense.

Do we really have to add one second to the ONLY TIME DURING THE YEAR PEOPLE ARE COUNTING DOWN?!?!?!  Ridiculous placement.  I have to think that only scientists who spent as much time being socially inept as the ones who are calculating the slowing speed of the Earth and ways to combat it, would consider this timing to be a good idea.

Here we go!  Five…  Four… Three… Two… One… One…  HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Assholes.  For people who claim to control time, you have a terrible sense of timing.

As it turns out, gay people aren’t so happy.

Proposition 8 passed in California, which essentially is the legalized discrimination of a group of peoples. I can marry a woman, but a woman can not. Full disclosure, I don’t really care all that much. I don’t care about gays, or black people, or religious people, because I am none of those. There are two groups of people in the world; those who say “Do whatever you choose, as long as it doesn’t hurt me, I have no issue”. And the rest have the “What you are doing is wrong, and I’m going to stop you.” mentality. Thats what I care about. I care about stopping people who take themselves too seriously, that somehow they matter enough to be able to force their beliefs into my home.

So, to Homosexuals, I offer this solution. Get married. “I/They can’t,” you say, “that’s the whole problem.” Hear me out. I think Homosexuals people should protest with gay couples finding lesbian couples, pairing up men/women and having a double wedding. In a church.  After the ceremony, you go off with your original partner and live happy lives.  Maybe you call the lesbians twice a year; once to celebrate your anniversary, another dinner party to fill out your taxes. Maybe exchange Christmas gifts for laughs. But, the whole point, is that homosexuals are getting married. Just to each other. Confused? Good, thats the point. Confusing the issue makes the opposing argument lose weight. How could a conservative Christian be angry with a man and a woman marrying each other? Because they are gay? They can’t be gay, they just got married! See the fun that can be had?

The end game; Homosexuals get the same rights as married couples because they are married. And Christians are pissed off because gay people are getting married in their churches and making a circus of the institution that already has a 50% failure rate, and a joke of their beliefs.

Gay men, help your cause, marry a lesbian.

As it turns out, my vengeance is excessive.

At least, it was, when I was a child. There was this bully, he ruined everyones life for a number of years. He spit in my face, and others, countless times. He would knock textbooks out of girls hands, and when they bent over to collect them, he would grab the back of their head and mash his crotch in their face. You would be walking down the hallway, and you would get punched in the back of the head hard as hell. He poked people with pins, mostly girls in the ass. He scattered thumb tacks around the locker room. He was very violent, put a kid in the hospital for some insignificant drama.

Anyway, he got his own car for his sixteenth birthday. It was nice, Pontiac something. He used to park it waaaay in the back of the lot by the woods in three spaces so no one would scratch it. it only took two weeks of seeing this happen every day that I decided to make his new car, my target of retribution.

I thought it would be best to pull my stunt just after the second period bell, everyone who was late would be in, and it’s too early for anyone to leave, they just would have taken the day off. I skipped first period and hid in the woods. Two minutes after the second bell, I;

– Was ready to break his window with a rock to get into the car, but the dumb bastard left it unlocked.

– Tore his leather seats with a pocket knife. Shredded them.

– Left a hot steaming food canoe in his ashtray. (I squatted in the back seat and let piss flow throughout his back leather seats. Before I did this I emptied the contents of his glove compartment into the back, so his documentation was soaked in urine.)

– Emptied a five pound bag of salt into his gas tank.

– Stole every fuse in the box and put them in his gas tank also.

– Kicked a screwdriver through the faceplate of his stereo system.

– Ripped his visors/sunscreens from their holdings, folded them neatly and left them in his glove compartment.

– Left a note that said “If you weren’t such a **** to soooo many people, you’d know who’s ass to kick, ****tard.”

Think it’s excessive? I do now, also.

But, at the time, this was for a reason. If I just slashed his seats, he replaces his seats, and goes on with life.
When you do so many different things, he never quite knows if he fixed all the problems you caused, so it adds to the psychological warfare of it all. Additionally, I was sure not to mess with the outside of his car, so he wouldn’t consider it a loss and wreck it.

I wanted to see him driving around in it for the next 3 years just knowing that it still contained traces of my fecal matter, and more importantly, that he knew it did.

Made three years of laughs possible at any corner. The mall, my girlfriends house (he lived near her), the school, at a stoplight. I saw him in his car and I laughed.

As it turns out, everyday activities can be new experiences.

I was in the middle of a week of vacation and this girl was increasingly into me. We make plans to go to the beach at night to watch fireworks and I can tell minutes in she wants to sit on my boystick that night. The more it becomes apparent she wants to do the no pants dance, the more I realize I have to grow tail.

So, after the fireworks, she invites me to her place which sounds great, but I need to lay cable. And Im not rocking her tiny motel room toilet with corndogs and chinese food right before poking her. So I told her that I wanted to go swimming first. I didnt expect her to follow me. I should have seen it coming. She thought it was romantic.

And, thats what happened. I shat standing up in the Carribbean Ocean while flirting and hugging a naked hot girl. The funny thing about pooping in the ocean is that crap floats. I could feel the turds tugging up when they were still attached, and every time I cut free a candy bar it floated to the surface. I would lean forward in the hopes I wouldn’t feel a fecal torpedo scrape up my back. This is when I would push her or tackle her out to sea. I was herding her against the current of my fleet of food canoes.

I used the salt as an excuse to shower, to which she joined me. From that point on the vacation was a haze of room service, candlelight, me putting things in fantastic places.

Special thanks to Dave of http://www.poopreport.com for the shitty link.  (Yuk Yuk Yuk)

As it Turns Out, I have a Tagalong Problem

Seriously.  I have eaten two boxes this season, have an open one on my desk, own two more in the freezer, and have at least 4 more boxes coming from different sets of girl scouts.  Tiny green bitches and their chocolate crack.  God help me if those Samoas solicitors are hanging around the front of any building I have to go into.  I can’t walk by without buying two boxes.  Remember that old Tootsie Roll song, “Whatever it is I think I see, becomes a Tootsie Roll to me”.  Thats me, only with orange boxes.  Those tiny little delicious disks, they’re well worth a quarter a piece.  Which, coincidentally, is about the cost of each cigarette.   Just as addicting, but if I was still smoking, Id be losing weight.  Keep your eyes on the news in June.  Ill be the one arrested for shaking the shit out of a little girl wearing a green dress, begging her for my fix.  Will I care shes not even a girl scout?  Probably after I spend a few hours in the detox tank.