Was Rodney King right?

My friend Matt is an aficionado of the Trinity Broadcasting Network. Matt and his friends can often be found getting stoned and tuning in to the TBN and getting a good hearty laugh at the expense of many god-fearing citizens. One thing that Matt has observed through his years of watching Benny Hinn and Jim Bakker and company, is that these fundamentalist Christians live comfortably in a world that is approximately twenty years in the past. If you were to tune in to TBN at this exact instant, you would see side pony-tails, fluorescent parachute pants, and slap-wraps. Women would have on oversized sweaters and have a perm, while men are sporting pastel sweaters and neatly parted hair. Matt's stoned thesis doesn't need much research to prove(just the resolve), but my point is that I came across a brilliant piece of evidence to support is theory. On my way home, I passed a church advertising Sunday's sermon as: "Was Rodney King right?" I swear that is not a joke. Seriously- "Was Rodney King right?" It's one thing to get high and laugh at someone's shitty TV graphics and silly outdated fashion and hairstyles, but these people are living THIRTEEN YEARS in the past! FOR REAL. Has the Catholic Church been debating Rodney King's infamous "Can't we all just get along" for thirteen years? Did I miss some recent revelation in the Rodney King trial last week? Did God grant them a time-machine after all that praying? I can only imagine what the future holds for this congregation. Some highlights are bound to include: 1993- David Koresh's Waco, Texas Branch-Davidians compound is raided by the federal government; next year, in 2006, Christians will applaud the federal government's treatment of this "filthy liberal godless cult" and help raise funds for (ironically) President Bush's re-election. Chrisitans will also suddenly realize what the jokes about Janet reno on Saturday Night Live reruns are all about. 1995- Oklahoma City Bombing; in 2008 there will be many candlelight vigils in honor of the victims of this horrifying domestic terrorist action. 1997- Scientists clone sheep; in 2010, while the rest of us send our cloned doppelgangers to war with aliens, the fundamentalist christians will be appalled that science would disgrace the will of god and the desecration of the human soul. 1999- Columbine School attack; In April of 2012, Christians will be witness to a horrifying act of youth terrorism and raise hundreds of dollars for the victim's families and surviving alumni of Columbine high school. The recipients of these funds will be momentairly confused by this gracious donation to an old incident, but then shrug it off and buy another flying car. As you can see, there are going to be future repercussions(if you'll pardon the pun), for the Trinity Broadcast Network and other fundamentalist christian organizations. Their lack of timely coverage on current events will help them gather awkward stares and whispered sarcasm for decades, until they fall so far behind the rest of the world's nature they have to move into the BioDome. Luckily for them, no one has cared about the BioDome since 1993, so they will be right at home.

Eight Minutes, Fourteen Days

My girlfriend called me at 8 AM today, as I was on my way to work. It was a nice surprise as I normally don't here from her until after lunch. Even though she was just calling to say hi, it was a nice way to break up the monotony of the morning commute in rush hour traffic. After hanging up my cell phone, I thought it would be a good idea to check my cell phone minutes seeing as I had two more weeks before my billing cycle reset. The plan I "pay" for is 400 minutes a month. Free nights and weekends. Free Verizon to Verizon calling. It's a good deal and I share it with my mom for a good price. Since she really only has the phone for emergencies, we split the minutes 350 for myself and 50 for her. If we go over, I think it's something like 45cents a minute, which can add up quick. I've gone over my minutes a couple times, with no ill effects, because my mom didn't go over hers. Last month, which was pretty busy at work, I knew that I was going to go over mine and it turned out that it wasn't as bad as a I thought it was going to be. But when I checked my minutes this morning, I saw that I had 8 minutes left for this billing cycle. Which ends on August 15th. I rarely use my phone during "nights(after 9 PM)," though I like to abuse the free weekend minutes. So now I have eight minutes to spread out over 14 days. Three hundred and thirty six hours! Twenty thousand one hundred and sixty minutes! I have to chose which of those 8 minutes I deem most important over the next two weeks. Furthermore, I have to determine whether those minutes should be Calls or Answers. If I'm out on an errand for work and they call, are they wondering what I want for lunch? Or should I not drive out to Santa Monica to pick up tapes? Or do they need urgent blackjack advice? If my girlfriend is calling me, can I call her back from a land line? What about that restricted number? What about that unknown number? My sister? The Long Beach Police Department? My old job? Steve Agee? A young man can't be given such important choices at such young an age! It's unfair and is causing me stress and my hair is going to fall out and I'll be impotent and bipolar. A million different things will happen to me because I can't decide which 8 minutes out of the next 20160 are the most important in the next three hundred and thirty six hours of my life. You can't put a cellular gun to my head like this and expect me to pull the trigger. The next 14 days will reveal which 8 minutes are the most important. In my heart I will know for sure what is important at what time. The Bard once said, "To thine own self, be true!" Confuscious said, "Only man without time, truly understands how valuable it is." and the Buddha said, "Just Do It." Such wise, almost supernatural men genuinely understand the nature of mankind- a species without understanding. And that, Mom, is why I went over my cell phone minutes.

Open Letter to the A-Hole Who Stole My Pen Last Night

Dear A-Hole Who Stole My Pen Last Night, Congratulations on acquiring your new, used, white, black-ink, Bic "round stic" pen. I hope you are as excited by stealing it as I am about hunting you down and kicking the tar out of you. Regardless of the fact that it is just like any other, plain, Bic pen; besides the fact it costs a tenth of a cent; even though you asked "to borrow" it, you still walked away holding my pen with me sitting there, watching you. You couldn't have stolen from someone who takes pens MORE seriously than I do. I am very protective of my pens, mostly because EVERYONE steals them from me. (I don't want this to sound TOO selfish, and I want to acknowledge that everyone steals pens from everyone and that I clearly wasn't singled out for pen theft.) It boils down to me always having a plain white, black-ink, Bic "round stic" with me at ALL times, so that I always am able to write things down. You have removed this joy from my life, because you have taken my pen without my permission. To be honest with you, jackass, if I lose a pen (on my own accord) it RUINS my day, and now that you have walked away from me, holding my pen, you have become the target of my scorn for YEARS to come. You have become the face of my mortal enemy. You have ignited my jihad and become my Osama Bin Laden. After the events that occured last night, I will hunt you for years, following you through underground bunkers and hide-outs; across Iranian borders and through volatile minefields; into enemy territory, the West Bank, or the Korean de-militarized zone. Yet I know that I will never find you, that I have decided to fight a tragic, losing battle, against you, with your emo-sweep haircut, tight-fitting band t-shirt and wallet with a chain. You are the face to my faceless enemy. I will never again make the same mistake of letting my guard down and loaning my pen to you. I will remember. Regards, Jeffrey Alan Crocker

ur - the future of language

When I was 17, my girlfriend at the time had me get a pager. I was keen to the idea because it was better than a cell phone. You can stay "in touch" while not being obligated to talk to somebody. When I signed up for the service, she gave me a piece of notebook paper of pager speak, a "numeric alphabet" where numbers represented letters in both cases as well as certain phrases. This was the precursor to text messaging, because you could digitally message someone without cell phones or anything. Around this time, the bronze age of digital communication, people started to truncate most of their writing (and stop capitalizing) via e-mail as well. For example: Original message: wassup bro? i just want u 2 know that im always here 4 u. y don't we go 2 the movies l8r? KIT. Translation: Dear Brett, As your brother, I would like you to understand that I am happy to be your shoulder to cry on. Our friendship means more than words to me and I want to make sure that you are happy. Perhaps you are preoccupied with your current relationship? I suggest we go to the cinema tonight. Keep in touch, my friend. A few years l8r, with the inception of DSL and Cable modems, online gaming became a large hobby for men and boys alike. You could blast your friends into chunky, meaty, globules and you never had to get out of your pajamas! I think that this is where 1337 or "LEET-speak" comes in(someone correct me if I'm wrong, please) I seriously know nothing about 1337, except that it is next to impossible to decipher. It's fucking computer chinese. I may be wrong but I think []D[][]V[][]D = PIMP. The most perplexing thing about 1337 is that it's the opposite of text messaging speak (replacing you with U, etc.). Instead of shortening the time it takes to write a message, in fact, it takes longer and involves more complicated key strokes. Shakespeare it's not. But the very interesting pop culture aspect of 1337 is that of "pwn3d." As near as I can tell, "pwn3d" was an accident that caught on like wildfire, like herpes. The combination of the slang term, OWNED, leet speak, and a typo, most regular internet nerds know exactly how to pronounce "pwn3d." The point of me explaining all of this is because it is clear to me, that while I don't understand, use, or care for the use of U for YOU and 4 for FOR, this is clearly the future of our language. It is progress. As our world transfers tons of paper to terrabytes, and books to CD-ROMs, our written communication is bound to change with it. I'm not trying to say that writing will change, because I don't think it will. Grammar and spelling will certainly take a significant hit, as everyone has spellcheck now, yet grammar and spelling will undoubtedly become MORE important as this digital communication revolution takes place. Yes! This will be a REVOLUTION! It will represent progress into a bright new future of new ways to communicate. Everyone will have their own website soon, their own personal font created by a certified font-smith, their own personal newsfeed giving them only the headlines, box office takes, and sports information they desire, we will go to school online, we will work online, we will order food online etc etc and so on. Think about it! We buy our music online, we rent movies online, and we link to our friends information through websites and personal e-mail accounts. It is obvious 2 me, that things R changing. R U going 2 change 2?

Shattered

I have never really been one to make New Years Resolutions, yet for some reason, 2005 is the year I set a few resolutions and wanted to do my best to keep them. This last week, I totally and completely SHATTERED my Alpha New Years resolution, which was- "I will not buy any more books until I have finished the ones I haven't read yet." Let me illustrate how easy it was for me to fall off the wagon, by stating how long I was on it(6 months) and expressing how amazing it is that I was able to keep it up for that long. I go into bookstores with empty hands and I leave with an empty wallet. I am totally addicted to buying books. It's obscene. Most of the time I'm not buying books for myself, either. Presents, favors, urges, and a desire for everyone to enjoy the books that I have enjoyed, are usually the reasons I buy books for people. What I used to do was buy books based on recommendations knowing that I wasn't going to get to them right away, but would be reading them soon. And yes, this pile grew larger and larger and larger with neglect, but I was still buying books knowing that I would be reading them someday. While I still believe that I will read all the books I have purchased one of these days, at the end of last year I decided enough was enough. My bank account had suffered sufficiently and I wasn't getting to these books fast enough. No more book-buying until I did some book-reading. The days got shorter and my life got busier. To this end I still hadn't gotten to any of the books in the large, literate, landfill on my desk. And then one day last week, I opened the LA Times and saw a review for a book titled "Chuck Dugan is AWOL." It was written by Eric Anderson(the brother of Wes Anderson) and was a narrative fictional tale, but with tons of pictures and diagrams, the author having been a cartographer as a previous career. The review was glowing with praise and I thought, "Well, I'll get this book because it got a great review and I think buying one book is hardly going to hurt me." It's hard to think of a time when I have been more wrong that this. So I go to the bookstore later that afternoon and search for "Chuck Dugan is AWOL." Along the way, before I even find the book I'm looking for, I stop at the true crime section to see if they have "In Cold Blood" which is the last book I read. It was loaned to me and I like having copies of books that I read in case I need to reference them later. Sadly, they don't have "In Cold Blood," and I walk away from the section with "To Catch a Jewel Thief" and "The Scam Handbook." I head downstairs to the fiction section where I've determined Chuck Dugan is, but on my way, I pass the trashy paperback kiosk and like any good reading junky I love trashy paperback thrillers. So I pick up a copy of "Prey" by Michael Crichton. At this point, with 20/20 hindsight, having picked up three other books other than the one I was looking for, I should have realized just how far immersed into my addiction I was. I finally reached the new fiction release shelf and grabbed the book I was looking for and ran up the escalator to check out. I think it cost something like $50. That's a lot of good smack that I didn't buy. That's a nice steak dinner for my girlfriend. That's a videogame. It's new pants and new socks; four DVDs; my cell phone and utility bills; Forty cups of coffee; or Fifty soccer-themed plates from the 99cent store. But I blew it all on fucking BOOKS. Epilogue: Since that day in the bookstore, it has been an uphill battle that I have been tragically losing. These are the books that I have bought since then: Cadillac Desert Trawler Everything Bad is Good for You The Best American Non-Required Reading 2004 Anthology of Pirate Short Stories The Da Vinci Code Raid on the Sun A Series of Unfortunate Events: Book ..1 Pulp Ask the Dust

I just got some Roscoe's Chicken and Waffles

No blog. Just bragging.

No one is safe from me.

I don't watch too much TV, but I try not to miss an episode of the Amazing Race. If you aren't watching this show, you have no idea what you're missing out on.

For those that just watched the finale to Season 7, you know as I do how awesome this show can be. Finger-biting, hair-ripping, edge-of-your-seat frustration. Some of the choices people make are just baffling.

I've always thought about what would happen if I was to go on The Amazing Race. First of all, I would have to have a team member. Would I want to take my girlfriend? My mom or dad? My sister? My best friend? You never know if traveling with that person is going to help or hurt a pre-existing relationship. There is usually at least one relationship that crumbles during the course of the race. Most of them are "strengthened," supposedly, but I have my doubts about that. Personally, I would want to bring the strongest mother-fucker that I know, because the odds that you are going to be doing something physically demanding are greater than something more brainy.

And what about the language barrier? I would need to brush up on my Turkish probably, and Chinese, and maybe Japanese. They also inevitably give you a task that involves eating gross or spicy food, so i would need to eat a lot of feces in preparation. I validate eating poop because, obviously, if you can eat poop, you can eat anything else. right? RIGHT?!

Then there is going to be the inevitable task where you ride a horse/camel/llama, drive a column-shift transmission, or a double-decker bus. I'll need to brush up on my motor vehicle knowledge and local traffic laws in every country.

In fact, maybe I'll just hire a ridiculously strong butler to carry me everywhere on the race. And he will only wear a tuxedo the entire length of the race. And he will never talk because I cut out his tongue when I rescued him from cannibals. He owes his life to me and he  will never forget because I have seared my brand into his skin.

If anyone tries to beat us during the race, I will have my faithful servant break their legs, or pluck out their eyes, or cut off their hands. If that kiwi Phil Koegan tries to tell us we are not allowed to do that, he will find that his kids are being held hostage by my specially trianed SWAT team back in the states. NO ONE IS SAFE.

They will have no choice but to immediately award me the one million dollar prize, or I will tear the world apart one city at a time! You cannot defeat me! I tower above you all! Bow to me you peons and grunts! You are not worthy of my god-like presence!

NYAH HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!