McFucked

"Oh, folks but lately I have been spotted with a Big Mac on my breath. Stumbling into a Colonel Sanders with a face as white as death. I'm afraid someday they'll find me just stretched out on my bed with a handful of Pringles potato chips and a Ding Dong by my head" Larry Groce from "Junk Food Junkie"

The nurse was late with my dose of happy fun time pills and the worry must have been all over my reality facing mug when she entered. She smirked, taking a bite of her breakfast burrito, the cause of her tardiness. Of course she is allowed to feed, I just always assumed that she did so like all the other Nosferatu, draining the hemoglobin strait from her preys carotid artery with her fangs. But seeing her chomp on a tortilla surrounding eggs, bacon, and enough sausage to make a porn star nervous, I realized that even though the sun light would turn her to dust, the nurse liked to eat fast food like the rest of us. Though, I'd venture to guess that she mostly haunts the 24 hour variety, as they would be open in the pre-dawn hours.

We all know that eating fast food is the equivalent of pouring fat directly into our veins, consequences be damned. We do it because it's convenient, the single thing that makes America American. Waiting isn't our strong suit, hell it's not even that suit that we keep in the very back of the closet, you know, the baby blue job with the lapels wider than Tennessee. Speed is not only our drug of choice, but our lifestyle of choice. Think about it. Have you ever been sitting in line at the drive thru of your local McSatan's and cursed the minimum wage earning, grease covered, teenagers and convicted felons that jockey the headset and fryer? Ever time how long it takes for that obscenity laced diatribe to start? I bet it's about 3 minutes. 5 tops. If the Big Mac Attack isn't squelched in a time frame that should make us question how long that cholesterol burger has been sitting under the heat lamp, we freak out.

So, with our need for speed taking precedence over our need to be healthy, why aren't there any fast food establishments that offer healthy grub on the go? Wouldn't you eat at a place that could service you with a good for you menu if it could be delivered at the speed of Burger Hut? No, probably not. Because it doesn't taste as good as a cardboard box of canola oil soaked potatoes. But if the option existed and the food didn't taste like dirt or tofu, you'd probably try to hit it once, maybe twice a week. Wouldn't you?

That's my challenge to America. Stop with the news stories and documentaries about what a bunch of fatties we all are. Start offering us an option. Face the fact that we live in our cars, we eat on the run, and time is the most precious resource we have, except for cheap gas. Show us that you care enough about your citizens to offer these establishments tax breaks. Offer grants to open these types of businesses. Prove that you don't want us to die choking on our own weak will. And you restaurateurs out there, make the chow edible, make it tasty, that's how you get us hooked. Crack is awesome at retaining customers, why shouldn't your new wholesome drive thru?

Would you eat at a health food drive thru? Is this the greatest idea since sliced tofu? Isn't tofu disgusting?

Dixie Cup of Love: The Slender Being inside All of Us.

75 Cents From A Dollar

"Go 'way from my window, leave at your own chosen speed. I'm not the one you want, babe, I'm not the one you need. You say you're lookin' for someone never weak but always strong, to protect you an' defend you whether you are right or wrong." Bob Dylan from "It Ain't Me Babe"


The psychiatrist at the Asylum had the nurse and I in for a little couples therapy session. I tried to explain to the mentalist that she was just a made up fantasy and that having her in on my therapy would, in fact, probably do more harm than good. But Dr. Quack saw it a little differently. He thought that maybe I wasn't being honest enough, wasn't looking deep enough, wasn't letting go enough, and the nurse was my restricter plate. Having her in on the appointment might allow me to see things for what they really are. He held a mirror up in front of the nurse and asked me what I saw. And in her reflection, I saw the nurse as I never had before, and she saw me as something more than just an inmate. This realization got me thinking.


How do you see me?


Interesting question. Hard to answer in an honest way if you have negatives to say, hard because you don't want to hurt the feelings of the recipient. Even harder to answer when the person you are talking about is yourself.


I've been more honest in these blogs than I imagined I would be. The words flow from my fingertips like bullets of truth, piercing my armor, letting my emotional blood pour across the cyber world. Why? At first I thought it was a great way to allow people to see my talent, to garner fan support and adulation, but as the first quarter of the year closes, that's right one fourth of this project is now in the rear view mirror, I realize that I am addicted to you all. A comment junkie who needs his fix and writes in order to procure just that. And it turns out the more I reveal of my inner workings, the more you respond.


Along the way I have lost some people, those whose blogs I no longer have the time to comment on, and I can't blame them for stepping away. When I was pre-HellJob I had time to sit in front of the monitor and read blogs all day, as a matter of fact, it got me through that time with what little sanity I had still intact. But lately I have been slack in my efforts to read the writings of my fellow bloggers. I apologize to those that I have offended with my busy schedule. It's not intentional, if I had the time, I would like nothing better than to pour through your magnificent words all day. Sadly, I can't.


For those of you that have stayed with me for the first season, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. Your insights are sometimes just the thing I need to see whatever issue I've decided to ramble about from a different angle. Some of you I have gotten to know a little bit, some I only know by your comments, but you're all important to me and I miss you when you're not around. Some of you have mystified me, some have inspired me, some have shown me things that I would never have seen, and some have occasionally pissed me off. That's proved to be the point that I didn't know existed. When I was tired, and thought of giving up, a few of you stood strong in your opinion that I continue to try and see this thing through to conclusion. Thanks. Without that, I would have quit, but as out of material as I am, I'm gonna find a way to fight on.


We're gonna have a prom on Mar 20th of 2009. I don't know where yet, I don't know how, but I think it's gotta happen. The greatest gift that has come from the Asylum is how you all support each other. I don't feel like the center of the universe, but I brought a lot of you together and I think that's amazing. And I have to meet you all. So, start saving your pennies.

So, after 92 blogs, how do you see the Asylum?

Dixie Cup of Love: Spring 2008.

Named After Waldo the Bus Driver

"Alabama, you got the weight on your shoulders, that's breaking your back. Your Cadillac has got a wheel in the ditch and a wheel on the track." Neil Young from "Alabama"

I was movie night in the Asylum and the nurse begged as if my pockets were lined with snausages for a romantic movie. If there is one thing that a strapped down inmate hates more than shock treatment, it's the silly notion that romantic comedies give the ladies. But alas, I wanted to make the nurse happy in order to ensure one helluva Dixie cup, so I suggested we watch a truly romantic film. One that features wonderful characters in the throws of a romance much bigger than themselves, and who better to pen such an opus than Quentin Tarantino. Scribe of two of the greatest love stories ever told. No, not Titanic or When Harry Met Sally, I'm speaking of Natural Born Killers and more to the point, True Romance.

If you have never peeked this high octane love story you are missing out on one of the most underrated films in the last 15 years. To make my point I will start with the cast. Christian Slater who I have always had a good time with since I viewed Heathers for the time time. Patricia Arquette with a body so smoking hot you'll never believe it's the chick from Medium. Dennis Hopper and Christopher Walken share the screen for one of the single greatest scenes in cinema, better I think than DeNiro and Pacino in Heat. Val Kilmer as Elvis Presley, no more need be said. Gary Oldman was the blackest white dude since Al Jolson. Brad Pitt as a complete pot head stone named Floyd. And a couple of lovable lugs named Tom Sizemore, Chris Penn, and a brief appearance by Samuel L. Jackson. That, ladies and germs, is one of, if not thee, greatest casts ever assembled. I will give credit for what Emilio Estevez did with Bobby, but when your old man is Martin Sheen, things must be a little easier to pull off.

The tale of Clarence and Alabama covers everything from Kung Fu movies and comic books to man on woman violence between Arquette and an anorexic looking James Gandolfini, oh yeah, Tony Soprano is in this behemoth too. The dialogue is at times razor sharp, cutting at you with words so shocking you think you're watching a very racist film, never more so than in the afore mentioned Hooper/Walken scene. The hooks get in you early and you really do care about Clarence and Alabama, as twisted as their love may seem, it feels impassionately real.

But what truly sets this romance apart form other love stories is the connection our two lover birds share and how they win over nearly everyone in their path. A journey that takes them to Los Angeles from Detroit all in an effort to sell Dr. Zhivago. along the way the innocence and purity of Alabama captures your heart. Clarence has this cool demeanor that almost feels too empowering for a guy who works in a comic book shop, but his love for Alabama changes him, motivates him, because to her he is three simple words: "You're So Cool".

I don't know why I have been thinking so much about this film lately, but watching it inspired me to share it with those of you who haven't seen it and to remind those of you that have what a fantastic piece of cinema this is. You need to watch it again or for the first time, really, you do.

See it? Thoughts? Based on my review do you want to see it?

Dixie Cup of Love: Quentin and Tony Scott.

Bad Johnny

I gave the nurse today off, because this pissed me off so much that I had no way to tie her into it. So...

HellJob has moments when I can't believe the people that we service. The rent to own business is essentially a business in which you only deal with the poorest dead beats in society. If you, a normal consumer, want a 50" plasma television you save your change or you go into credit coma like a civilized American. In my line, if they are on Government assistance, have a couple of convictions for spousal abuse, or are just degenerates in general, we will get them that big screen in a matter of hours. And a week later, when they miss their first payment, we will repossess said idiot box and rent it to their cracked out neighbor. You get used to the lowest common denominator. However...

As I took a moment between trips from one bad neighborhood to the next, a gentleman, a term that will soon fail to fit this scumbag, walks in with his rented Dell computer tower under arm. My boss knows that I'm okay with computers, I mean, I pirate, and I pirate well. So, when a computer comes in with a complaint of slow workings, I generally have a grasp of how to speed the machine back up.

Well, Johnny Asshole's computer is on the verge of serious viral shutdown. I mean, this computer had AIDS. It was on meds and dying. So, my boss hands Johnny a suitable replacement model and off he goes. I start working on the hard drive, seeing if I can be the first to cure the incurable.

My first step is to isolate the virus. I know from the icons on the desktop, LimeWire, Azureus, Morpheus that this guy has probably been downloading a Library of Congress sized amount of porn. I check out his Incomplete folder first, just a bit of advice kids, empty the Incomplete Download folder from time to time, it's a trail and it's full of usable memory. Anyway, the flag goes off when I see the first file name in the folder. "Daddy Teaches Daughter a Lesson in Fisting". At this point I am really hoping that the poor girl that is getting this highly painful lesson is of legal voting age. The second file assures me that she isn't. "10 year Old Rape". You have to be kidding me?

Johnny Asshole brings in a dead computer full like a coffee cup to the rim with child, incest, and bestiality porn. I couldn't believe my peepers. I've mentioned that I, like most red blooded American men, have some porn. Not ashamed of it, don't hide it in a drawer, it's all above the board, some fetish stuff but that's for my own "special time". And nothing that is so scandalous that you would be mouth agape if you saw it. But this sick shit, I mean, I saw some things on that hard drive that I can't unsee, you know? My boss laughed and thought it was a funny, that was until I called the cops. Yeah, that's right. I ain't the kind of guy that let's some sick-o pervert get his rock off at the expense of girls that don't know that what Daddy is doing is so God damned wrong.

The cops show up and take one look at the sheer volume of crap that this waste of life has on 'our' machine that they can barely look at it. One says, "Are you sure he downloaded it?". And I'm thinking, no, asshole, we pre-load the computer full of elementary school seduction videos. I show him the time signature on the properties, it tells you when the file was downloaded, definitely during Johnny's rental agreement. That seemed like all they needed. They took his name, address, and the computer and said they would contact the feds as this type of disgusting fetish falls to the Government to control.

I hope they lock that vile son of a bitch up for a long time in a prison where he is looked at like he ogled those young girls on his computer. If I find out what prison he gets sent to, I will visit every inmate in there so that word gets around that Johnny likes to watch kids. Bastard.

Tomorrow the song lyrics and Dixie Cups return.

Gabba Gabba Hey

"I sit and stare into the grin of Skinny the Foo. I just wanna have something to do! Life goes on, I'm still an angry punker with a view, but an icon is now gone, and he's left me here with you." Anderson Silva from "Joey Ramone is Dead"

The nurse has taste like Nancy Reagan, a strict "Just Say No" policy to anything that isn't Grade-A certified smash by the collective masses. she may be all falke boobs and tattoos but if you spin through her Ipod you'll find enough Mariah Carey and Pink to choke the world to death on bubble gum. She would never had appreciated my musical voyage, hell she wouldn't understand the beauty, the brilliance, the ballistics that were The Ramones.

I quote Joe Strummer, founder of one of the greatest bands in the history of music, The Clash. He said "If that Ramones record hadn't of existed, I don't know that we could have built a scene here because it fulfilled a vital gap between the death of the old pub rocking scene and the advent of Punk." That's a statement. Saying that a little band of misfits and uncool kids from Queens helped establish Englands punk rock scene.

For me, punk rock, and I'm talking real not for commercial distrubution, punk rock was an essential part of my high school experience. Wes, thank Jeebus for Wes, opened my ears to the likes of D.I., the Dils, Rhino 39, Sham 69, The Adolescents, the Sex Pistols, and of course the Ramones. We would sit in his room, drum set nearby, and listen to records, yes records in the 80's, as we made mix tapes that I would play until they stretched so bad that Joey Ramone started to sound like Pat Boone. If it wasn't for Wes and those sessions I never would have been able to appreciate all the different types of music that I now do, but the Ramones were special.

I remember driving with Don to the Rock Shop on Hollywood Blvd for the express purpose of buying The Ramones. The debut album. Now granted this was like 1986 and punk rock had long been gagging on the vomit it had spawned, but there were few albums I absolutely remember buying. It may have been after the game was over but we found something amazing. We popped the cassette into the deck of the Mazda trucks tape deck and listened to it twice on the way back to Don's house. It brought us together. It was angry and raw. Our Reagan-era upbringing was in need of a swift kick to the BMW. Finding punk help[ed us to stand against the yuppie epidemic that was all around us.

I think there are maybe 5 albums that changed the musical landscape. Elvis Preseley's Sun Sessions, the Beach Boys Pet Sounds, the Beatles Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band, Nevermind from Nirvana, and the Ramones. The only other two albums I would even think about including are Thriller and, this will make someone out there very happy, Guns N' Roses "Appettite for Destruction". None of which could or would exist without the others, except Thriller, because it's not a rock-n-roll record. Important in the history of music, sure, but not in the same genre and leauge as the others mentioned. Each of those records has been a part of my life, none of them played as important a role as The Ramones. It is still worthy of my love and devotion, even if I look like an aging hipster driving my huge SUV while listening to "I Wanna Sniff Some Glue". When I see a 14 year old kid walking down the street in a Ramones T-shirt, I feel bad for the kid. He thinks he knows, but he doesn't really know, you know?

The Ramones wrote some great mix tape making love songs to go along with the slam and pogo standards. For me, that's whay makes them fascinating, 30 years later, yeah, I'm feeling old, but my ears are still young. I wouldn't want to have grown up without the countdown in my head. 1,2,3,4. The Ramones made those numbers seem like the start to everything, the beginning of the story, the birth of a genre, the emergence of my adulthood, all with three chords, a leather jacket, and the right attitude.

Did punk rock effect your life? The Ramones?

Dixie Cup of Love: Joey, Johnny, Tommy, and Dee Dee.

Sin At The Street

"Back in school, we used to dream about this everyday. Could it really happen, or do dreams just fade away, Now everybody is singin' now, it's in this town, woo ooh, So we started a group and here we are kickin' it just for you" Boys II Men from "Motown Philly"

My tolerance level to my meds has become a huge topic of discussion here in the Asylum. No inmate has ever shown such a high resistance when it comes to substances that alter the brain waves. Luckily for me that means my Dixie Cup overfloweth. As the concentration of good stuff gets higher, the effect is less wondrous. This lull in my liveliness was a source of glee for the nurse, as it's usually her misery that feeds my giddiness.. With the shoe on the other foot I find myself thinking of another time that my tolerance level started to impact my life.

Before there was a certain married red head to occupy my time I was just turned 21 and employed in a low paying job. I needed wild adult nightlife at bargain basement prices. A high school friend that I was working with at the time had a second job s a DJ at a bar called Basin Street. He informed me that Thur day night was $1 drink night. YATZEE! That's what the future alcoholic in me needed, good drunks for under twenty smackers. I had to check it out.

All I can say about the place was it was dark enough to hide many a flaw and bright enough that you had to use you hands to walk. It was dark, that's all I'm saying. So with the advantage of bad lighting and cocktails cheap enough to make Scrooge happy, I was set to move to the rhythm of the night. The problem with my timing was that the music of 1991 was, well, crap seems like too nice a word for it. This was a hideous time when the clubs were ruled by Gonna Make You Sweat and Things That Make You Go Hmm, from the never to be immortalized in the Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame, shit sandwich that was C&C Music Factory. If that wasn't bad enough you could add a pair of hits for Color Me Badd, the second D was for "depression" One year later Nirvana would change the way we all thought and dressed, but 91 may very well have been the worst year for music in the history of strung instruments. Oh, did I forget to mention Jesus Jones and Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch, feel it, feel it. Thank God for the dollar refreshments. Without them, unbearable.

Bad music aside, Basin Street was full to the rim with girls every Thursday. A happy hunting ground if there ever was one. So I endured the cheese that my pal spun. After just a few weeks I was a regular, with tabs running near 30 bucks a night, that's drinking. Hated the music, but the booze being cheap made up for a lot, and Jamie made up for the rest. Jamie had as ass like an onion, it would bring a tear to your eye. I had never seen a backside that made me lustful before Jamie, and I didn't see another until Corporate Monkey posted that new default picture of hers. Both those cans are world class. Jamie's backyard was a sight to behold and even more lovely when grinding on me on the dance floor. Cause yeah, enough $1 Heinekens and I start thinking I'm Deney Terrio, Dance Fever Madman.

We did end up in a game of naked twister one night after a party at my house, splendid party, but for some reason we never hooked up again. We danced, we smooched in the parking lot, but we just never got around to being a couple, just wasn't in the cards for us. Too bad. But still pretty memorable.

Did you have a bar at 21? Did you hate that music? Did you have a Jamie?

Dixie Cup of Love: Jamie and Corporate Monkey for opening my eyes to something else.

All About Ashley

"She said, she said' you don't know shit, because you've never been there. She turned upon him, took him by the hair. Spun him round about, laughing as he fell about, sat down for a drinkin her father's favourite chair." Ned's Atomic Dustbin from "Kill Your Television"

Every year about this time the Asylum holds a talent competition for the entire staff. In years past the winner, four years running, has been Doris the Cafeteria lady. Her vast array of useless talents has had everyone gunning for her like she was Jessie James. This year the nurse was dead set on being Doris' personal Pat Garrett. A bullet in the back would not have surprised me, but hearing that the nurse intended to do sketch comedy, that was more shocking than the end of The Usual Suspects. I didn't know the nurse had it in her, comedy I mean, you dirty filthy minded adolescents.

I'm a decent enough writer, not too shabby as a director either, though I still have much to learn on that skill set. Acting, however, well I've never been one to think of myself as the next DiCaprio. But for two different seasons of KYTV my skills, such as they are, were on display in a limited way every Friday night.

While doing work with the Insurgo Theater Movement in Orange County I got roped into being the tech guy fro my pal Russ' brain child. A talk show. A live in the theater talk show. It had the familiar markings, a monologue, the bit, a guest or two, then a musical act. It was insanely popular. I'm sure Russ takes most of the credit when he discusses the show, and he rightfully deserves it, but the two people that came out of it with fan clubs were Darcy and I.

We played characters, though our names were our own. Darcy was the stage manager and neighborhood man hole. I don't know how that came about, maybe it just evolved into that, who knows. As for me, well, I was the tech guy portrayed as a constantly stoned and enamored with Ashley Olsen kind of fellow. I even wore a "Fuck Mary Kate" shirt. And there is a song. You can here it right here: It's All About Ashley.

We had more fun than should be allowed in theater. And our fans were rabid and loyal. Every Friday night, no matter what show was on stage during primetime, the KYTV supporters would arrive, sometimes drunk, sometimes stoned, sometimes somewhere in between. No matter what the audiences state of coherency was Russ, John, Darcy and I always tried to entertain them as only we could. We even managed to squeeze in a few reoccurring characters like the Russian UPS guy, Jombi from Pee Wee's Playhouse, and Uncle Beer who would not only teach us to make booze, but offered up samples to the crowd.

The musical guests were often times more entertaining than the show itself. Mike Barnett, Jessica Dobson, and the world famous Hokie Brothers, who later became a little band that I might have mentioned from time to time, Bob Knows Best.

My favorite episodes were The One Twinkie To Rule Them All, a Lord of the Rings spoof and our lost 70's Episode. It was a grand time to be a theater geek.

Ever done any performing?

Dixie Cup of Love: Russ, John and of course Darcy.