99.99% Crap

Predator Press

[LOBO]

So much for taking a break.

This morning, I cheated on Predator Press.

I cut and pasted three stories from this blog (“A Fairy Tale”, “Silent Night Holy Crap”, and “Love is a Funny Thing”) at www.writing.com.

I feel like such a filthy whore.

But I got four and a half stars out of a possible five in my first review. So screw it.

Now, I know you’re thinking ”Oh jeez, now his ego is gonna be unbearable.”

Hell yeah you’re freakin right it is! Woo-HOO! Egomaniacs are looking at me and going “Jesus Christ, I wish I had his ego right now!”

Hey, this writing stuff takes a lot of time, and it’s virtually thankless. So I’m having a self high-five today.

Okay, I'm done.

Still, those are older pieces; my favorite stories are the newer ones with people that are flamboyantly flawed and infinitely more interesting. Which is sad in a way ... should I go back to the older stuff?

For instance, “A Slicing Device” --my adaptation of “A Christmas Carol” (God, that’s funny now that I think about it)-- is a much better piece in my opinion. But it doesn’t make much sense without the backstory of the cast: you can't submit stuff like that to anybody at all.

I think this means I’m writing an exponential amount of unappreciable, non-profit crap.

Well, the world needs crap too.

What else would we do with all those toilets?

Chutes and Chutes

Predator Press

[LOBO]

Spitefully, the sun does rise.

Ethan hangs up the phone, removes his glasses and rubs the bridge of his nose. “We've lost another staff member.”

“Was it Cobe?”

“No,” Ethan sighs. “Seth is gone.”

“Who?”

“Mister Insanity.”

“No shit. That guy?”

“They found his body in a cheap motel in St. Paul, Minnesota.” He shakes his head. “The ‘official’,” Ethan makes quote marks in the air with his fingers, “cause of death was a heart attack. But the investigation is suggesting suicide.” Setting his glasses on his desk, he wonders aloud. “Who knew you could actually drink yourself to death on Fuzzy Navels? They said the room was just covered in orange peels.”

“Well if there were such a thing as 'death by cheerleaders', working those hotlines would certainly be a lot more fun.” I turn the page of the newspaper I’m pretending to read. “Hey, he only made it eight months,” I reflect. “How did he get a week of vacation already?”

“When someone asks to take a week off to go spend it in St. Paul, Minnesota, I don’t ask too many questions. They’re pretty fucked up.” Ethan swivels in his chair to look out the window. “Still, eight months is somewhat of an improvement,” Ethan admits.

“Aren't you getting these people pre-hire physicals?”

Ethan sighs. "Don't you ever get sick of this?"

"This what?"

"This," he says, gesturing around him. "Predator Press."

"Every day," I says. "What are you saying?"

"I think it's time for a breather."

"You mean quit posting for a while? Maybe going out and getting a life? Getting the sun on me? Maybe getting laid?"

"Yeah."

"Who needs that crap?"

"Fuck, lately I'm within inches of just deleting the whole goddamned thing."

"Ethan, I'm almost certain I've repeatedly pointed out how lazy I am. The real world is no place for the likes of me." I put down the newspaper. "I went to the grocery store one time and let me tell you, it was a fucking nightmare. People kept waking me up bumping shopping carts into me --that place was full of jerks.

"I think it's over. At least for a while."

"Well," I sigh. "At least we left on a high note."

Dead Ahead

Predator Press

[Mr Insanity]

As a kid, I once witnessed a barfight.

I remember seeing blood on the pool table soaking into the green velvet --and it was the "blackest" black you could imagine.

Maybe it was the lighting.

Today, I'm a living testament that there is nothing that can't be outdone.

It’s noon on New Years Day, and I’ve already screwed up all five of my “Resolutions”. And as soon as this artsy Bohemian chick wakes up, I’m breaking number four a few more times. Hopefully she will simply leave without incident afterward, not arrogantly hoping to toy with my little black heart like an amateur surgeon binging on whiskey and PCP.

I’ve had my fill of that, thanks. Don’t let the door hit you in the ass.

Admittedly, this is not the product of “social” drinking; this is the result of balls-out wanton and savage revenge drinking. I remember watching "Leaving Las Vegas" on Christmas Eve –a great feelgood romance comedy that’s fun for the whole family, I might add-- trying to muster strength from a vacuum to continue wrestling these demons. "The Fisher King" carried me for a little while. But not a violent man, I have no recourse but to turn unmanaged rage inward. So why deny it? I have catching up to do.

Well, there’s always today. Death by inches, while cowardly, can be very worthwhile with some creative effort. With a little hard work, luck, perseverance, and a lot of accelerants, it won’t take much time at all to be completely destroyed altogether. This coupled with some advance planning and an optimistic ‘can-do’ attitude can even make being slowly murdered fun; just lather, rinse, repeat. The details will take care of themselves.

Bungled and botched, I’ve woken up on the wrong side of the Millennium.

And I've learned to accept it.

Violated

Predator Press

[LOBO]

I’m dreaming.

Rush Limbaugh is playing golf, and I’m hiding behind a nearby tree --surrounded by water balloons.

I must be careful which balloon I select; this is the opportunity of a lifetime. It must be full enough to make a good splash at this distance, but not so firm as it would burst during the hurl …

“Mr. Curr!” exclaims Nurse Garrison.

Waking slowly, I realize I am holding her breasts.

Mortified, I smacked her.

Frostbyte

Predator Press

[Mr Insanity]

“If it wasn’t Ethan’s request,” Captain Reinhardt yelled over the deafening semi-steady throb of the helicopter, “I would never fly in these circumstances”.

Diminutive, Cobe sat bundled up in his huge arctic gear looking more like a kid on the school bus. He said nothing due mostly to nausea; at this point, even exhaling might bring an uncontrollable fit of vomiting all over the cockpit.

He tried closing his eyes for a bit, but that didn’t help. "Motion sickness," LOBO once explained while Cobe barfed over the side of Ethan’s yacht, "has something to do with losing track of the horizon. The magnets in your head get all scrambled up or something."

Cobe forced his eyes open, and stared into a plain white sky. It was snowing so hard, you couldn’t see the edge of the rotors.

“So what,” laughed Reinhardt, trying to lighten the mood. “You tell Ethan you wanted to get away for a while or something?” The pitch of the engine changed as he fought the buffeting winds with the stick. “I just hope this little gizmo doesn’t start freezing up like it did last time.”

Something dark loomed into Cobe’s vision.

Cobe pointed.

Reinhardt looked up from the stick, and saw it too.

A mountain.

“Whoa!” laughed Reinhardt, throwing the tiny chopper into a gut-wrenching starboard dive. “That could’ve gone badly.” Arching within meters around the cliff face, he exhales in relief. “It’s right here somewhere,” he says. He presses a button on his helmet, and Cobe can hear him over the radio. ”Chuck, this is Jerry, do you copy?”

Static.

“See anything?”

White.

Wait.

Cobe points to two faint glowing rods, swinging like pendulums in the distance.

“There he is,” says Reinhardt, shrugging. “Communications must be out again.”

Paper Machete

Predator Press

[Mr Insanity]

I didn’t want to watch Saddam Hussein die.

Which is not to say I don’t think he deserved to die; I just didn’t really want to see it replayed over and over on my television.

If this makes me a hypocrite and a coward, I’m okay with that. I plead guilty.

Hell, Bush slept through it.

This blog doesn’t really deal with topical matters, history, cultural issues, personal problems, et cetera. It’s a comic strip of sorts; a cartoon generally wrapped around tragically flawed people behaving badly, superimposed upon events in normal everyday life. And rather than endorse such behavior, I would like to think it handles the Karmic payback in a rather elegant --and occasionally funny-- manner.

The overall dynamics aren’t really that different than your garden-variety sitcom: Ethan, the fatherly figure. Cobe --the guy that everyone vehemently hates despite the fact that he makes everything “tick”-- is a mom of sorts. LOBO represents the 5-year old “id” that lies in every man, and I guess that leaves me, the cruel older stepsister that is always trying to make the pest stick a fork in the light socket.

Everything is fairly formulaic as such. Aside from this poorly-lit, flimsy paper mache diorama –and horse fucking, or advice on how to safely apply Rain-X to your webcam-- there isn’t anything really unique about it at all; people have been writing like this for thousands of years. All the relationships run in triangles. Character “a” has a relationship with character “b”, but character “c”….

Despite this deceptive simplicity, on occasion you get the easy part; sometimes I hit the “Publish” button to send out a post about a twisted galactic odyssey of hedonistic horseshit so someone can maybe get a laugh or two, only to face a real world which is infinitely more complex, non-sensical, and sadistically ruthless.

Maybe, in some weird way, it does have a certain dignity.

It’s safer in here.

We have a sense of humor.

Win, Place, Blow

Predator Press

[Cobe]

It turns out the story of the “real” Mister Insanity reads like a Shakespearian tragedy.

Born to a small rural community in Kentucky, Mister Insanity –or “Knickers” as he was known then—had a rather unspectacular childhood. He wasn’t particularly good in school, probably due to the long hours on the farm.

But could he ever run.

It didn’t take long for friends and colleagues to take notice of his blossoming talent; despite mediocre grades and poor attendance, Knickers was granted a scholarship to Notre Dame.

It was there that Knickers would earn his now-famous moniker “Mister Insanity”, due mostly to his adolescent fondness for campus streaking, avocado dip, and Fuzzy Navels. But now a star on the rise, the inertia of his career was superceding even the lightest of disciplines; endorsement deals soon followed, clouding his adolescent judgment ... among the most notably controversial of which, the 2.2 million dollar “Crazy Glue” commercials.

After graduating with honors, Mister Insanity married track star Gertrude Stewart, his high school sweetheart. Gertrude was an athletic, pretty, and reclusive girl from Louisville that was anxious to start a family. Friends would often comment that these were the happiest days of her life, and she was rarely seen without an effusive, sloppy grin on her face.

But despite the outward appearances, all was not well for our beloved Knickers; the road and stardom were taking their toll. Soon he was going to parties with the likes of Paris Hilton and Winona Ryder, and snorting heroic amounts of cocaine both on and off the field. At the recommendation of his coach, Knickers was ushered secretly away to the Betty Ford clinic, where the long and arduous recovery process had begun. There, Knickers spent months shuffling around in pajamas, shooting pool and playing pinball between therapy sessions.

Hard work paying off, all appeared to finally working out for Knickers, and a year later he was back in the gymnasium preparing for a comeback. It was then that misfortune struck yet once again: during the course of a routine physical, it was discovered that so much damage was done to his knees over the course of his young career he would never run professionally again. Only deepening his situation, multiple knee surgeries in the vain hope of restoring his damaged tissue left him virtually hobbled; vulnerable to medical con-artists and quack science, he soon invested his image and entire life savings on a product called Knee-Grow Medical Ointment that was ill-received by the public in general.

Always the fighter, he made efforts to reinvent himself … but he was wholly unprepared emotionally for the disappointment of flunking out of astronaut training school; Knickers entered another downward spiral. His hygiene suffered, and his diet consisted solely of fistfuls of sugar cubes for weeks on end. This triggered diabetic seizures, and simultaneous rampant gonorrhea. Two days later, an alert cop, suspicious of the Fuzzy Navel smell on the car interior, gave Knickers his first DUI.

While never directly implicated in the Sweet'N Low shootings, Knickers had dropped from the public eye completely; little is known up until his recent indictment for Tax Fraud and Money Laundering. Always a fan of art, he now sits in Federal Prison, riddled with hepatitis and syphilis, tattooing his fellow inmates while awaiting his inevitable execution.

Gertrude since left him for a successful and svelte young greyhound racer, and they now live in Twenty-Nine Palms, California.

Understandably, she doesn’t have that big, sloppy grin anymore.

But she’s comfortable.