Thursday

One Man Flash Mob

Predator Press

The guard completed a complex-seeming series of transactions with a set of keys, and the heavy doors slid back open; the armored elevator seemed to have moved at all, but the dungeon-like quality of the new floor was immediate and palpable.

Flandsa Ha’asasanba -familiar somewhat with the cellblock for his own reasons- proceeded to cellblock 'I' -ironically the location of LOBO's 'POD'- without an expected direction request.

In the center of a checkerboarded lancing of light, LOBO, in an orange jumpsuit, sat on a cot facing the opposite wall. He was not the pensive animal Flandsa was expecting. He seemed, well, serene.

“Flandsa Ha’asasanba,” said LOBO in a cool voice that unnerved Flandsa. Rubbing his wooly, unkempt facial growth in thought, LOBO didn’t turn to address him, but as Flandsa grew closer, he could see LOBO’s face -it was covered in a macabre splash of dripping red.

Flandsa stopped at the sliding cell door and steeled himself for anything. “I don’t know why I would be surprised to see you in here,” he joked.

“Yes,” LOBO replied coolly. He rose, slightly wobbly from the crutch, and made his way to his visitor. “I’m a con now. A hardened, dangerous man. Did you know I converted to Islam? I‘m also a Crip and a Blood.”

“You’ve only been in here two hours.”

“Two hours is plenty of time to get yourself killed when you’re on this side of the law,” whispered LOBO with authority. "Respect is everything in here. And do you know the best way to get the respect you need to survive when doing Hard Time?"

Flandsa shrugged patiently. LOBO was moving poorly, and only now arriving to lean on the cellbars.

“You have to make a name for yourself," said LOBO, squinting painfully. Fully in the sharp wedge of light, his eyes dilated wildly. "You have to pick out the biggest, meanest, toughest, ugliest guy in your POD and rape him.”

“You mean fight him,” Flandsa corrected helpfully.

“Fight him? Shit. Have you seen the biggest, meanest, toughest, ugliest guy in my POD? He’d kill me.”

“Well then how would you-?”

“I was thinking roofies or something. I don’t know. It’s complicated,” LOBO admitted. “Not to mention I don’t think I’ve ever even been drunk enough to rape a guy. I mean I guess I just close my eyes and pretend it’s only Sarah Palin.”

Brief shuffles of movement. From various directions just out of the stale, flickering overhead lights over Flandsa. The loneliness of this conversation is wholly illusion.

“What happened to your face?” Flandsa asked, changing the subject.

“It’s these fucking ketchup packets. They’re complicated enough as it is, but the lighting in here is terrible.”

“Why didn't you bail out?” Flandsa inquired. “It’s only six dollars.”

-Nervous, illusive titters spring like lightning bolts. LOBO, noticing, starts seeking them out. Speaking unnecessarily loudly, he asks, “So my boy, did you bring me the Viagra and rolls of duct tape I asked for?”

Silence.

“Yeah well, it’s been long enough. Post Cereal has agreed to drop all charges if you promise to-”

"Only now, too late, does Big Cereal realize it has wakened a sleeping giant," LOBO snarled. “I don’t negotiate with Big Cereal. Especially now that the juggernaut has rumbled to life. Their oppresive rule is coming to an end.”

The pause that ensued was punctuated dramatically by a fart from someone sleeping to Flandsa's left.

“But you have a broken ankle and boken wrist," Flandsa implored. "Don’t you want some medical attention? Some painkillers?”

“The pain merely helps burn in the memory,” LOBO scoffed proudly. “The memory of the beginning of the overthrow of Big Cereal. And we won‘t need painkillers in a post-Post world. With real food, our bones will be nigh indestructible.”

“You think Post Cereal is poisoning you?”

“Ever had Grape Nuts?

“Well-” Flandsa stammered. “Yeah."

“I have no idea what that crap is either,” LOBO explained. “But I can tell you you would be hard pressed to find a grape or a nut in it. And it tastes like the spackle for holes in Noah’s Ark.”

“I think you’re supposed to add sugar and stuff-”

“Add stuff? Isn’t it pretty much a box of added stuff already?” LOBO is incredulous. “What is this, the Middle Ages? Well the Middle Ages are over buddy. I‘m ending this Middle Age just like Paul Revere ended the last one.”

“LOBO, the Sheriff has asked me to ask you to leave. They can’t keep you without some kind of reason.”

“Participate in a cover up? And end the Revolution? Never!” But after a thoughtful surveillance of his cell, LOBO relented.

“Only if they let me redo my mug shot.”

Sunday

Predator Press Movie-Middle Reviews: Braveheart

Predator Press

[LOBO]

Braveheart, starring Mel Gibson, is apparently the story of a bunch of people that liked to fight a lot more than they liked to bathe.

The afore-mentioned hygiene problem suggests to me that the story takes place way, way in the past. Probably the late 80’s … the whole grunge look is “in,” there's a sprinkling of goth, and you still have a generous helping of mullets.

Mel Gibson is like really, really pissed about something I probably missed when I was in the bathroom, and is just killing people left and right. Did someone steal his pants? Mel Gibson is totally out of control. Jesus, where are the cops when you need them? Some of the places Mel killed people at should be isolated as crime scenes and dusted for fingerprints! I mean holy crap, he’s not even wearing pants; he’s probably leaving DNA everywhere he sits!

Damn. Telephone.

Anyway, blah blah nah nah. Mel Gibson’s arch-enemy -Merlin, I think- has a great big-assed beard. Holy crap that’s a big-assed beard; Merlin better be careful around open flames. Under enormous pressure to get some pants on the freeballin’ serial killer Mel Gibson, Merlin is often mad at people too -probably because he doesn’t have an X-Box and is forced to push little war toys around on a big war map. I’m not clear on if the map surrendered because then stuff started blowing up.

Conveniently, all Mel Gibson's freinds don’t wear pants either, and have gathered together on this big island -probably Hawaii- so’s Merlin's British guys can kill them with maximum efficiency. In historical context, this inadvertently causes America to declare war on Britain and drags us into World War II. Was Merlin elected by the Japanese when he bombed Pearl Harbor? Or did Merlin create the Godless Yellow Hoard with the explicit intent of pulling the Aloha Spirit out of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s keyster? Hm? Hell I don’t know man … shit that was a long time ago. We may never know for sure. The fact that the first half of this movie is total 'Chick Flick' didn't help, and I found myself fast-forwarding a lot.

I don’t even know how the movie ends; a commercial for Sham Wow came on, and after some brief channel-surfing I found Family Feud. Where is the fat guy with the weird teeth? The #1 answer was toothpaste. Holy crap that dumbass lost the whole game for his family, and made them look like assholes on national television. I wouldn‘t want to be at that house for Thanksgiving dinner!

By the time I got through the Hee Haw marathon, I had all but lost interest in how Braveheart ended ... but I sure hope they caught Mel Gibson! My guess is that the movie would go on to show Merlin bombing Pearl Harbor until John Wayne and Jesus killed him and kicked all the Japanese out of America. To this day, the Japanese remain banished to the other, crappier side of the world ... which is fine with me really; Hee Haw translated into Japanese is just plain weird.

As far as the Predator Press Movie-Middle Review, we give Braveheart, like, sixty-six thumbs up. The exploding stuff, fight scenes, gratuitous violence, and historical accuracy had it on the cusp of a beefy two hundred and sixteen thumbs up, but the middle of Braveheart suffered from the glaring absence of nudity, robots, and football. It was also dinged grammatically for the improper contraction of the words "Brave" and "Heart." Further, it wasn't in 3-D, Sigourney Weaver wasn't in it, and it wasn't Avatar -an automatic eleven-thumb penalty.

Still, a solid sixty-six thumbs up is nothing to scoff at.

-I, for one, can't wait for the middle of the sequel.

On Mom's Fridge (Magnetized for Your Protection)

Predator Press

[LOBO]

Monday

Feminist CDC Scientist Identifies Himpes Venereal Disease

Predator Press

[LOBO]

"The implications are clear," warns Doctor Kimberly Eisner, a Senior Researcher at the Center of Disease Control.  "What we have here is clearly a pandemic in the making."

She is among the first scientists to discover that in blind experiments, when control groups of men walked around with catfish and certain strains of small mouth Bass in their underpants, painful cuts, lesions and rashes often appear on the male penis.

Most scientists attribute this to attacks by hungry and feral neighborhood cats, and question her motives and methods.  Nonetheless, the Obama Administration recently granted her a twelve million dollar research grant to investigate the issue further.

"Men who walk around with catfish and certain strains of small mouth Bass in their underpants deserve a cure just like anybody else," Eisner insists.  "The debilitating effects are horrifying to see, perhaps rivaled only by those who like to wear live hand grenades in their underpants."

Sunday

Ox Nuts and the Escape from Zanzibar

Predator Press

[LOBO]

x Nuts and Gwendolyn, on a beautiful white stallion Ox Nuts named Beautiful White Stallion, rode day and night at full gallop. But just as they arrived at the Zanzibar border, they got pulled over by the ZPD.

"Excuse me sir, I am going to need to see your license and registration," demanded one of the cops. "Do you have any idea how fast you were going? This is a school zone."

"Hey, O'Malley," said the second cop. "This guy looks familiar. Isn't this the guy that escaped the Vile Prince of Zanzibar yesterday?"

"Indeed," Ox Nuts replied menacingly. "It is I, the Mighty Ox Nuts!"

"We don't want any trouble mister.  Word on the street is somebody put a hit on the geometry class. If that's you, we don't want any part of that."

"Yeah," O'Malley agreed.  "That sounds kinda dangerous, and frankly unprofitable.  We just want to give you some traffic tickets and send you on your way."

So Ox Nuts was cited for going 30mph in a 20, a busted taillight, and a parking ticket for pulling over in a red zone.

"How can a horse have a busted taillight?" Ox Nuts complained.

"Forget it," said Gwendolyn. "Let's just go find someplace we can have sex."

"Ox Nuts cannot have sex with you," he brooded. "Not while Gwendolyn is married to the Vile Prince of Zanzibar!"

"Okay whatever. Just drop me off at that night club over there. I'll see you in a few hours." As she dismounted, she paused thoughtfully, peering into Ox Nut's clearly wounded eyes.  And as she watched, a single tear ran down his Mighty cheek.

"Well, see you later," she waved.  "Do you have any condoms?  I hate when I get all itchy down there."


Guy Lombardo and the Vile Prince of Zanzibar

Predator Press

[LOBO]

My wife is having an affair with the Prince of Zanzibar.

I know this, because I am the Prince-of-Zanzibar101@aol.com.

I don’t blame her. She thinks I am a wealthy guy with long flowin’ Fabio hair ridin in his 3,000 foot yacht.

And how can I blame her? I never would have thought AOL would let me have the official logon “Prince-of-Zanzibar101@aol.com" unless I presented proper credentials verifying my royal lineage: through what was doubtlessly an oversight, perhaps a 'comedy of cascading errors' on AOL’s part, the name slipped through their corporate security –and that’s how I seduced my wife.

-Well, that’s how I got her to add me to her ‘Buddy’ list. But that’s where it all starts, right?

If you doubt any this tragic story, Guy-Lombardo101@aol.com can verify it.

I know this, because I am also Guy-Lombardo101@aol.com. And “Guy” will be the first person to tell you that the vile Prince of Zanzibar is up to no good. The vile Prince of Zanzibar will woo her with all his money and good looks, and then just toss her aside like a prom dress made of wicker!

Still, it would be cool to ride in a 3,000 foot yacht.


"Ox Nuts" Reviews

Predator Press

[Mr I]

"Dude," he says into the phone. "That was amazing. I mean, 'Ox Nuts' is going to be a major bestseller. Maybe even a movie. It's genius! I don't think I've 'punched the clown' while crying this much since, like, September ... who knew you could write like that?"

"But I post on the blog two or three times a year," says Mr. I.

"Yeah, but who reads that tripe? 'Ox Nuts' is big! Can you put in some explosions and helicopter chases? I don't want to infringe on your art, but a scene where Ox fights a giant bug or something might help get some of your boring soppy romance edited out."

"It's supposed to be a love story, you moron."

"Well how about some buxom Nordic chicks in Viking helmets, wielding electric battle axes that go 'bla-WANGGGGGG--'?"

[long pause]

"Maybe."

Ox Nuts: The Pilot Episode

Predator Press

[Mr Insanity]

"Oh Ox Nuts, my love," cries Gwendolyn. "The ocean is so vast, and yet here it is, for us and us only. Our love is captured forever in this meaningless, private moment on a magnificent beach." She unties her flowing, golden hair. "Even the stars have turned away from us tonight. Take me now, you savage lustful beast! Before you are captured." Her flimsy clothing slips over her pointed nipples, her curves, finally falling around her bejewelled ankles. "I want to have experienced your mighty passion, so I can remember it fondly while you are tortured and executed by my abusive boyfriend, the vile Prince of Zanzibar. Oh Ox Nuts, ride me like a wild stallion ..."


Ox Nuts and the Vile Prince of Zanzibar

Predator Press

[LOBO]

he Vile Prince of Zanzibar, a mirror in each hand, peered from every angle he could imagine.

"It makes me look small, doesn't it?"

"Did you want us to make you a small throne so you look larger?"

The Prince's eyes flashed. "Mind your tongue, or you may not keep it," he warned. "But this throne definitely makes me look tiny. I want everyone in Zanzibar familiar with the concept of geometry executed."

"Yeah. Sure," shrugged the advisor. "I'll get right on that. Meanwhile I do have some good news."

"I love good news!" cried the prince. "Is it a pony?"

"We have captured the scourge Ox Nuts!"

Just then the doors flew open, and horrible screeching sound filled the throne room. Ox Nuts twisted his impossibly wide shoulders to enter. Each wrist was chained to a separate ship anchor that dragged noisily as he walked.

"Jesus Christ!" exclaimed the prince.

"Indeed," the advisor nodded. "What shall we do with him?"

"Execute him. In fact, new rule: 'No more non-executed prisoners in the throne room.'"


***


Mortal men usually die within few hours, but Ox Nuts was tortured for forty days and forty nights. This caused many Union infractions, and was finally growing on the prince's last nerve.

"Why do we have to execute him in the throne room?" the prince demanded. "If I hear 'kootchy-kootchy-koo' one more time ..."

"I have an idea," said the advisor. The cloaked man in black seemed to flow eerily to the executioner's ear, and from his pocket he produced something the mere sight of which made the gasping Ox Nuts groan.

A feather.

"I am loosing my patience. Perhaps we have been too hospitable to out guest," soothed the advisor in a reptilian laced quip, waving the quill gracefully. "Remove his shoes."

-But Ox Nuts was ready. Once he was barefoot, he grabbed the executioner's neck in one foot, and ripped off the top of his skull with the other. Then he scooped out the executioner's brains in one mighty toenail, and jammed them into the advisor's eyes, blinding him.

"Eeyew!" cried the blinded advisor.

Surging with new-found strength, Ox Nuts rose to his bloody, brain-splattered feet. And dragging the anchors chained to his wrists, he took another step to the throne.

"Where's the girl?" he growled, his sepulchral voice could be felt in the marble floor.

"Do you think I a fool?" the Vile Prince laughed. "If you harm me, you will never find her!"

Another screeching step.

Ox Nuts' muscles bulged, and he lunged one anchor significantly further.  The marble cracked all the way to the prince's flip flops.

"I'll bet she is in your iPhone" Ox Nuts glowered.

"Okay okay fine," said the Vile Prince, flipping through his contacts. "I was just kidding.  Here.  I will put her on speakerphone."

The phone rang.

"What now Larry?"

"Honey. It's the Vile Prince of Zanzibar. Remember what I said about when we were on speakerphone?"

"Whatever Larry."

"Honey, uh, there's someone in the throne room that wants to see you."

"Well I just painted my toenails. Plus I am shopping on QVC. I just bought a limited collection of porcelain dolphins that will look splendid in our QVC storage unit. And did you know Kim Kardahian had her baby? The sink is still dripping and all the murderholes are clogged with leaves. What ever happened to that television show 'The Facts of Life?' I really like Tutti ..."

"Gwendolyn," said Ox Nuts, straining another step. "It is I, Ox Nuts. I am here to rescue you from the Vile Prince of Zanzibar."

"Well I won't have time to shave my legs. But I can pluck my eyebrows right? I mean I will save time since I don't need to put panties on. Should I go with an elegant flowing princess gown with a tiara and maybe some tasteful bracelets? Or something like a hot tomboy tough girl, ready for adventure? I just BeDazzled a skull onto this really cute denim vest. But I don't know what kind of shoes to wear with it. I should just go with boots probably ... "

Another step.

Ox Nuts glowered. "If you touched her, I will make your suffering legendary."

"Ox Nuts I'm fine. He's my husband. He can't touch me. Larry made up the whole prince thing because he was trying to trap me in an affair."

"I will make your suffering legendary," the Vile Prince repeated, mockingly. "Meh. Where do you get your dialog? Rent-a-Center? You are about to kill your nemesis and rescue the girl. This is the best you can do? I mean there are dozens of people here to witness this history."

"Yes. Make in impression" Gwendolyn advised.  "Say something authoritative and menacing like, 'My vagina hurts.  The rest of you guys are going to have to settle for blow jobs.'"

If You're Mad At Paula Deen, Meet My Dad

Predator Press

[LOBO]

The only time I can recall dropping an "N-Bomb" was in the heat of a fistfight -one that I lost- when I was about fourteen years old.  For reasons never explained a guy sucker-punched me on a bus, and I pounced him.  Shocked, adrenaline-feuled, and furious beyond rationale, pow, out it came.  All the oxygen seemed to be suddenly sucked out of the vehicle.  Time stopped, and that word just hung there, palpable and malignant in the ether.  I was so mortified at hearing myself say it I kinda threw the fight, feeling like I deserved to get my ass kicked.  And boy did I ever.  (Note to self: pick more prudent times to be stricken with guilt.)

Even at the time, it wasn't in my lexicon.  My dad and stepmom were (are? more on this later) vehement racists -my dad in particular- so I most certainly was exposed to it.  But dad lost custody to my "birth" mother when I was six or so.  Mom, in weird contrast, was the first of her migrant family to be actually born in the United States, and as a consequence she was definitely not down with the whole racism thing.  In retrospect I don't know how those two crazy kids got together in the first place.  A quasi "foreigner" herself, not only did she suffer her own racial discrimination issues, but she was among the first women trying to break into the workforce vis-à-vis "Mad Men."  Working for a sexual harassment factory posing as a law firm, she returned us to the cultural squish of Chicago where I was born and raised. There, I made friends with every race and nationality imaginable -hence underlining the horror and deep regret of my action.

The last time I saw my dad's side of the family was maybe ten years ago, and I regret to inform you some of them were just as racist as ever.  Dad was a perplexing and textured cat: a former Chicago cop that passionately hates cops, and a white supremacist that had black friends who were aware he was a white supremacist.  As a decorated Chicago cop, he fought the Mob until a crime lord threatened his family, i.e. my mom (his first wife) and the toddling bundle of joy aka yours truly.  Legend has it he set his badge on the Mob guy's desk and walked away from the force, never looking back.  He would also go on to sell his house and go into bankruptcy in the bitter custody battle over me which he would subsequently lose.

I speak of him in a past tense now as I'm not sure he's even alive; he got so fed up with the country he bought a large piece of property on an Arkansas mountain, and a whole chunk of that family side sort of just receded into it.  To imagine him in a rocking chair, shotgun cradled in his arm, waiting for a hapless "revenuer" to wander up to his doorstep is not far-fetched; that single visit was anachronistic to the point that it was cartoony.  And that I don't share his views shamed him I think.  I have on numerous occasions amused myself with the idea of getting a black woman in a police uniform to go there with me and introduce her as my wife.  Hellooo, life insurance!

So let's not kid ourselves.  That culture, as back-assward as it seems today, is still out there. And Paula Deen's situation, on the face, might not seem that different than mine other than she didn't make the conscious effort to take herself out of it that I did.  She is also much (much!) older, so one could argue I had an easier time than she might have.

But the idea of hosting cotillion-like events replicating that whole ugly era is utterly bizarre.  I suppose it may have some historic value and tradition, but it borderlines being insensitive if not outright distasteful, thusly magnifying anything she can claim would have been a simple "youthful indiscretion."  Why people don't just emulate something more neutral puzzles me.  If you're not racist, why look, act, and dress like one for fun?  Even if bigotry is sincerely the furthest thing from her mind, wouldn't anyone with a double-digit I.Q. recognize she is asking for trouble?  Go get really jazzed up about something else like the Monroe Doctrine instead.  "Hooray for the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act!" has a nice ring to it.

Unfortunately, that won't work either.  America was arguably founded in 1776 and the Civil Rights movement wasn't until 200 years later.  That only leaves 20% of American history to draw from -and if you count a certain compound on a remote Arkansas mountainside, you have 0.

So Paula, please enjoy your "Smurfs 2"-themed wedding.  Don't tell any midget Avatar jokes.  And sprinkle in frequent  "I'm sorrys" to all who participate and attend.

Like I do for my do for my dad.

Saturday

All Ball

-or "The Miracle of the Toaster"

Predator Press  

There was a point that I loved college. But I started getting involved in the more political aspects, the economics, the teacher unions -cumulatively this proved very disillusioning. The closer I got to the underbelly, the beloved altruism of academia gave way to the petty motives of the once-respected peers. In search of Superman, I accidentally discovered Clark Kent.

This had far-reaching ripple effects, mostly bad, on the rest of my life. I would no longer go to concerts or seek personal information on my favorite artists in fear of finding something negative that might change my opinion. Deep cynicism and mistrust seeped and eroded into a sort of boredom and malaise of humanity. For decades, I have so badly wanted that that exuberance and optimism back, and yet it escaped me;  I ached to find something truly new and marvelous.  But through the lenses I perceive the world there is little but self interest, and this blog is sort of an expression, a parody, maybe a metaphor of that; "LOBO" is written as a five year old child, devoid of a sense of consequence to action. Neither good nor evil, LOBO acts on the razor-edge Existential plane of exactly "here and now."

But that's just too depressing a conclusion.

-There must be something redeemable about existence beyond the general experience of it.

Right?

As a menial industrial minion of a book warehouse, I am allowed to listen to an iPod while doing my mind-numbingly dull job. And I find myself listening to highly-randomized lectures supplied by iTunesU. Recently, I rolled my eyes as Marshall Brain released one on how a toaster works.

But it turned out to be pretty interesting.

In fact it got me thinking. Maybe turning on ESPN Sports Center or going down the rabbit hole of news and fiction of my choice is the problem.

-Perhaps our "comfort zones" are just too comfortable for our own good.