Posts Tagged Humor
Four Of A Perfect Kind: An Exercise in Platonic Horror
Posted by Keith Spillett in General Weirdness on January 11, 2012
“Death is not the worst that can happen to men.” -Plato
There aren’t many things that scare me. I’ve been around a time or two and have seen some awful things. Sure, I’m afraid of death, just like everyone else. But, I think I’ve made my peace with it. There are things far worse than death out there. When I wake up in the middle of the night, in a cold sweat, filled with pure panic, it’s not death that’s staring back at me. It is something far more hideous. It is the number four.
You’ve seen a thousand fours in your life. They are everywhere. Four noble truths, four great elements, four horseman of the apocalypse, four letter words, the number four Bobby Orr, the list goes on and on. What they are used for is not important. It is what those fours ARE that is lurking behind every door, just behind the shadows, just out of reach. It is what those fours ARE that is haunting me. No matter how hard I try I cannot escape.
Because, you see, there are plenty of uses for the number four, but there is only truly one four. It is indivisible, it is unstoppable, it is perfect, it is irreducible and it is after me. I try to tell people what’s going on, but they don’t believe me. I explained my predicament friend the other day about my problem and he laughed. He drew the number four on a piece of paper and ripped it up. “Now you’re safe,” he chuckled.
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Fool! He doesn’t understand. It’s not some absurd, half-witted drawing of the number four that strikes fear into my heart. I’m not scared of what can be done with four; I am utterly terrified of what it is. The perfect platonic form of four. Four in all its grotesque fourness. The ideal four. The world is filled with four imitators, trying to fake fournesss, trying to be useful, trying to help us count all of the pointless presences around us. But, I have SEEN four. The real one. The root of all fourness. And, worse, it knows I have seen it.
Oh platonic four, if I could take back that one time my eyes shot open in the middle of the night and I saw you hovering above my bed, I would. Everything was fine before that night. I wandered through this odd fantasy world of illusion that we call life with full belief in the forms that surrounded me. Then, I saw you and was forever changed. I had seen a lifetime of fours, but never any as perfect as this one. In that moment, I understood all other fours to be impostors. They did not have your straightness, they did not have your smoothness, they could not measure up.
What my eyes witnessed forever corrupted my being. At first, I looked for the perfect four everywhere. I needed to see it once more. I needed to know it and be connected with its truth. I wanted to be by its side. I wanted it to show me that there was more to this life than incompleteness and wandering. I longed for one more fleeting glimpse of its timeless perfection.
A horrible thing began to dawn on me. What if I wasn’t meant to see it? What if my accidental encounter had doomed me? What if the perfect four was looking for me with the same fury that I searched for it? All at once, I knew. I began to sense its presence everywhere I went. It was stalking me. Waiting for me to let my guard down. Hunting me.
I was at the supermarket looking at the oranges and suddenly; I saw it out of the corner of my eye. It was hiding behind the walnuts and almonds. Waiting to consume me whole. It sensed my glance and began to move towards me. I dropped my grocery basket and ran out of the store screaming. I didn’t stop until I got to my car. Which was the right key? There it was dashing across the parking lot like a rabid dog. No one saw it but me. It raced towards me. Finally, I pushed the key into the lock, got in the car and sped away.
I have been hiding from it ever since. Held up in a dingy motel room passing my final hours. I have this lingering sense that it knows where I am and is toying with me. Enjoying my suffering. Laughing at me. I went through a day or two thinking I could destroy it. I repeated 3 plus 1 equals 5 for hours on end. I figured if I denied the truth of its inevitability I could make it go away. However, my mind is no match for the perfection of its form. A mere string of thoughts could not slow its terrible, astonishing inertia for even a second.
I prepared for my final showdown with four. I would wait for it. I would catch it by surprise and break it into a million pieces. I would hit it with a hammer. Shoot it with a gun. Cut it up with a chainsaw. Melt it with a blowtorch. Something. Anything.
All resistance is absurd. I know this. Four is indestructible. It has no parts. It is endless and deathless. It wasn’t created and cannot be destroyed. It was here before we were and will be here forever after. If I dropped a million nuclear bombs on the world the number four sustain as much as a dent. It is beyond law, beyond meaning, beyond understanding. Unstoppable.
I feel its presence getting closer now. Through the trees. Into the parking lot. Past the couple putting luggage in their trunk. Up the back stairs. Past the ice machine. Outside the door. Inside the door. Across the room from me. Next to me. Inside of me. Finally….
Free Market Anatomy
Posted by Keith Spillett in General Weirdness on December 6, 2011
The Silent Majority
Right Lung, you work hard everyday to move oxygen into the blood stream. I often find myself thinking that right lungs are the hardest working organs in the body. What you do is a thankless job. You are one of the good, hardworking organs. Many of the other “piker” organs like the liver, the pancreas and the embarrassingly lazy appendix spend their days lollygagging around and benefiting from all the sweat and toil you put in. They reap the same benefits as you for one tenth of the work. Now I ask you, is that fair?
What do you get for all your labor….nothing. Bossed around all day by the Brain. Sure, the Brain sits up there enjoying the good life while you pump oxygen 24 hours a day without a break. Only like 10 percent of the Brain even does anything, Lung. But it feels entitled to tell you what to do? Who gives it the right? The Brain thinks it knows everything, but let it spend ten minutes trying to convert angiotensin I to angiotensin II. Puh-lease!
The Brain wastes all this time consulting with different useless departments like the cerebellum, the parietal lobe and the frontal lobe all the while using the precious oxygen that you generously provide it with. Sipping coffee and making policy decisions while you pump away. Enforcing its sadistic code of anatomical correctness. They redistribute your oxygen to every organ regardless of how hard they work and you get nothing but the short end of the trachea. What is your reward for all of your effort? Nothing but lectures on how you should produce more oxygen just because the body is running or underwater. You go underappreciated while the other organs bask in the rewards of your effort.
Right Lung, I want you to know that there is another way to live. I’m not sure if you are aware of this but the body is essentially a communistic system. All the organs benefit equally, no matter how important their contribution is. What is your incentive to work harder than say, the Left Lung?
As we all know, human nature clearly shows us that we can only be happy if we are pitted against each other in bloodthirsty competition for control of all of the vital resources of the body. Cooperation between the organs has left the lazy viscera sitting pretty while the diligent, enterprising ones do all the work. Instead of allowing this madness to continue, I propose we move towards an “every organ for itself” system.
If one lung produces oxygen really well, I say why punish it for being good at its job? It should be allowed to keep as much of the oxygen as it makes. This way all of the weaker organs will die off and the strong ones will be left to create a better body, without free-riding, parasitic entrails. Let’s face it, you will not be free until the body stops coddling the slothful and the shiftless.
A truly free market anatomy promises each organ will be judged on its merit as an individual and not held back from producing and consuming anything it wants. When the body stops forcing all of the organs to work together in some socialistic form of “harmony” and begins to compensate organs for what they contribute and no more, then, and only then will we be free.
Gods and Ends
Posted by Keith Spillett in General Weirdness, Pointyheaded Highbrow Stuff on September 4, 2011
Greek Mythology has always been a source of great fascination to me. The Ancient Greeks had an uncanny way of explaining the random, capricious nature of life through their deities. The gods were wild and erratic. They could hand you a check for a million dollars one minute and throw you in a pit with a thousand rattlesnakes the next. Imagine the entire Old Testament was The Book of Job and you have a decent sense of how things worked for The Greeks.
The gods seemed to be a great way to explain anything and everything. At times, it can seem as if there were more gods then Greeks. Often, scholars spend their time focusing on the better-known gods like Zeus, Poseidon or Athena. However, there are many fascinating stories of gods that were widely worshiped in their day, but have disappeared into the great dustbin of history. Here are some great examples:
Arteriosclorities-The God of Deep Fried Foods
Beyond contributing democracy and many other key philosophical insights to our world, The Greeks are also the first society to deep-fry their foods. From yak to Snickers bars (a delicacy first created by Aristotle), the Greeks would throw nearly anything into a bubbling cauldron of oil. It is no wonder that the Greeks are believed to be the progenitors of Western medicine. Most Greeks weighed upwards of 300 pounds and were barely able to run. This fact tends to throw their achievements during the Olympic games into a whole different light.
Supposedly, Arteriosclorities was one of Zeus’ many sons from an affair with Eris, the goddess of strife and discord. In order to hide this affair from his wife Hera after the child was born, Zeus placed Arteriosclorities into the stomach of Dionysus while he was sleeping off a wild night of overeating and general debauchery. Dionysus awoke with a terrible feeling of discomfort and collapsed. Zeus, not meaning to have harmed Dionysus, sent Indigestius, the Greek god of stomach acid and ulcers, into his stomach to destroy Arteriosclorities. The two had a great battle, which was won by Indigestius. Dionysus finally awoke with terrible stomach pains that could only be allayed by eating massive amounts of antacids.
McKuenius-The God of Bad Poetry and Greeting Cards
The Greeks are known for creating some of the most poignant and moving poetry in human history. But, for every Homer, there were 1,000 less talented hacks trying to write their own Iliad. Many of these no talent writers ended up working for the Hallmark Corporation, which was founded in 654 B.C., with the mission of sending sappy, dull poetry to people on important days of their lives. Their patron saint is the god McKuenius.
McKuenius was known for writing terribly boring, pointless poetry and asking Hermes to deliver it. Hermes, the busy messenger god, was forced to deliver idiotic compositions like “Roses are Red, Violets are Blue, You are a Goddess and Athena is too” to Aphrodite or “Poseidon likes water, Demeter is his sister, She gave birth to his daughter,” to the god of the sea. After growing tired of having to read this drivel, Hermes begged Zeus to punish McKuenius in order to make him stop writing. First, Zeus sentenced him to one hundred years of writing dirty limericks on bathroom stalls. However, Zeus quickly discovered that he was enjoying his job. Zeus realized he was a lost cause and sent him to pits of Tartarus and made him write a detailed description of Sisyphus rolling a rock up the hill for eternity. He is still there today, happily describing suffering and misery in a pithy, gleeful, and highly moronic way.
Aggasius-The God Of Male Pattern Baldness
The gods seemed to all have some sort of fatal flaw. Be it rage, greed, avarice or just plain old insanity, they all seemed to have something locked into their character that made them both all-powerful and amazingly vulnerable. One of the earliest examples of this is Aggasius, the god of male pattern baldness. Aggusius was one of the original Titan gods who were overthrown by Zeus and The Olympian gods at 4:22 PM on February 12th 3212 B.C. Aggasius was capable of creating tornadoes, causing earthquakes and smiting entire nations with a wave of his staff. However, he was unable to grow hair on the top of his head. The tragic irony of Agassius was that he could grow massive amounts on his back, his ears and even on his shoulders like Sonny Corleone in the first Godfather film. He tried several potions created by Greek pharmaceutical manufacturers, a terribly made hairpiece created from the beard of Hyperion, and even tried to rubbing pomegranate seeds on his head three times a day, nothing seemed to work. In spite of his great power, the other gods laughed at “The Bald One” whenever his back was turned. Eventually, he grew tired of the mockery, quit being a god and moved to a suburb of Stillwater, Oklahoma, where he still lives today working as a successful middle manager at a meat packing company.
American Burlesque or I Just Flew In From Vaudeville and Boy Are My Arms Tired
Posted by Keith Spillett in Articles I Probably Shouldn't Have Bothered Writing, General Weirdness, The Politics Of Catastrophe on July 25, 2011
Last Christmas, my wife bought me one of those human cloning machines that they sell on TV for 129.99. At first, I didn’t have much of a use for it and it stayed in the back of my closet. However, I started getting some wacky ideas in June and began sending away for samples of the DNA of famous Borscht Belt comedians. I got an excellent mixture of Milton Berle, Shecky Greene, Mort Sahl, Buddy Hackett, Henny Youngman (his even came in a small violin case!) and a dash of Rodney Dangerfield. At a local DNA shop in downtown St. Paul, I purchased the DNA of several 1960s radicals like Huey P Newton, Abbie Hoffman and George McGovern.
Two days ago, I took all the DNA, threw it into the machine and, as per instruction, simmered for 12 hours. I just wanted to see what the combination would create. I wanted no trouble. What came out of the machine yesterday morning was beyond my worst nightmares. It was around 7 feet tall, had a cheap looking tuxedo and a blown out afro. It looked like a bizarre cross between Strom Thurmond and Julius Erving. It told me that it must find a club and do stand up comedy. I tried to stop it, but it tossed me aside and ran out the door. Minutes later, this creature burst into the VFW Hall located down the street from our home and began doing its routine for the 15 or so semi-drunken patrons. I was able to get there in time for the second half of the act. The following is a transcription of what took place.
Creature: What’s the difference between an American and a gorilla?
The gorilla won’t tell you it’s proud to be a gorilla.
Thanks, I’ll be here all week. Try the veal.
Woman in the Audience: YOU SUCK!!!!
Creature: Thanks, you’re a dear. I wish I had my hunting license.
Man in the Audience: Get OFF THE STAGE, Idiot!
Creature: All right, all right! What has 600 million legs, over 1 million guns and an IQ under 70?
The American Public
Bartender: Shut UP! Please!!! I’ll call the police if you don’t get off of the stage!!!!!
Creature: How do you get 200 million Americans to vote?
Turn on American Idol
Thanks! Tip your servers!!!
Woman in the Audience: YOU SUCK!!!
Audience: BOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!
Creature: Yeah, George W Bush, George W Bush…..The other day I asked Bush where’s the 20 dollars I loaned him. He said in the other room under the weapons of mass destruction. He went to get it and I never saw him again. But, hey, you re-elected him!!!! I LOVE THIS CROWD!!!!
Audience: BOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!! (bottle smashes behind The Creature’s head)
Creature: What’s the best part of voting in Florida?
Knowing it won’t count
Take My Wife, Please!
Man in the audience: Come back when you’re funny!
Creature: Hey, I forgot you were all Americans. Do you want me to repeat any of these slowly?
Audience: BOO!!!!! (three more bottles smashed against the wall behind The Creature)
Creature: What do you call an American who works 60 hours a week in order to pay off 25,000 dollars in credit card debt?
Free! Ya get it! Free! You guys are the best crowd I’ve had in months!
Man in the Audience: (over a chorus of boos and bottles smashing) SHUT UP! We’ll tear your eyes out!!!!!
Creature: Ahhhhhh….what are you going to do? Invade Iraq again!
A mob of angry patrons began to storm the stage. I ran up and grabbed The Creature by the arm and pulled it out of the bar. A group of three raging men ran after us as we sprinted down the street. After a few blocks, they stopped chasing us. We were both exhausted and safe….for now.
I realized later that night that this creature simply couldn’t exist in our world. It was too jaded, too unwilling to accept compromise, too hateful, too cynical. I had created a monster that did not belong in today’s America. It was just going to cause trouble and incite riots wherever it went. I knew what I had to do. I crept into the room where The Creature was sleeping and pushed a pillow over its face. It struggled and screamed, but after a minute or two, it stopped thrashing around. I went back to my room, turned on the television and fell asleep. The problem had been solved.
Even A Blind Watchmaker Can Find A Nut
Posted by Keith Spillett in Existential Rambings, Pointyheaded Highbrow Stuff on May 24, 2011
Vladimir: So….you take a watch and you put it in a bag….
Estragon: What type of bag?
Vladimir: It doesn’t matter.
Estragon: Well, what type of watch is it?
Vladimir: Again…not important. You put the watch in a bag. Now, you take a hammer and you smash it.
Estragon: Wait…What?
Vladimir: Just see if you can follow me here. You smash the watch into a hundred pieces….
Estragon: Is it a digital watch or a nice one?
Vladimir: It doesn’t matter….You take the watch and you smash it into….
Estragon: Well, why are you smashing the watch?
Vladimir: Okay, that’s really not important! The important thing is…
Estragon: What kind of lunatic would break a perfectly good watch?
Vladimir: It’s a metaphor. Nobody is really breaking a watch with a hammer. The idea is to prove a point.
Estragon: But how can you prove a point using an example that is completely unrealistic.
Vladimir: I don’t know. It’s not important! Just listen.
Estragon: Well, if it is a digital watch with one of those plastic bands it’s not going to break with a hammer
Vladimir: Fine. It’s a Rolex. A really nice gold Rolex.
Estragon: A Rolex is really expensive. Why would you want to break an expensive watch? And I don’t know if a hammer will break a Rolex into a hundred pieces.
Vladimir: Fine. It is an inexpensive magical watch that magically will break into a hundred pieces. Can I get back to my point?
Estragon: Sure.
Vladimir: Okay, so you break the watch. You shake it up in the bag?
Estragon: Uh-huh.
Vladimir: Does it re-form into the same watch?
Estragon: Well, of course not!
Vladimir: SEE!!!!!
Estragon: See what? I’m not sure I follow.
Vladimir: Evolution is impossible.
Estragon: Wait…What?!?!?
Vladimir: Something has to be there to assemble the watch if it’s going to come back together, right?
Estragon: I guess.
Vladimir: And the watch has been reassembled into a perfect whole, right?
Estragon: That is what you said.
Vladimir: Well, then there has to be a watchmaker who has a plan, right?
Estragon: Uhmmm. Okay. So, who is the watchmaker?
Vladimir: GOD!
Estragon: Wait….WHAT?!?!?!
Vladimir: God is the watchmaker! Otherwise the watch would still be in pieces.
Estragon: Wait…so God reassembled the watch?
Vladimir: YES!
Estragon: Why?
Vladimir: What do you mean why? He’s God. He doesn’t need a good reason.
Estragon: So, God just goes around putting broken watches together? We’re not sure why. That’s just what he does.
Vladimir: Exactly. He loves us. Maybe he wants us to have a nice watch. Maybe he wants us to be happy. That’s for Him to know.
Estragon: If he wanted us to be happy, why didn’t he just stop us from breaking the watch in the first place?
Vladimir: Free will!
Estragon: So, wait, he loves us so much he is willing to fix the watch, but he won’t stop us from breaking it?
Vladimir: Exactly!
Estragon: That’s not a very efficient system.
Vladimir: Well, He doesn’t have to be efficient. He’s God. He doesn’t have to explain anything.
Estragon: Well, if he’s going to go around smashing watches, I think he owes somebody an explanation. That’s pretty rude. If he smashed my watch I’d be really angry!
Vladimir: Okay…forget the watch. We’ll use another example. Pick something.
Estragon: A piece of ham
Vladimir: So, you put a piece of ham in a bag…
Estragon: Ham….in a bag?
Vladimir: Yes! And you smash it into a million pieces.
Estragon: Uh-huh
Vladimir: It still tastes like ham and smells like ham and looks like ham. RIGHT?!?!?
Estragon: Yes…I think.
Vladimir: So there has to be some kind of ham designer, right?
Estragon: Yes…well….maybe…I guess….
Vladimir: Evolution couldn’t have designed ham.
Estragon: Wait…why not?
Vladimir: Because it is perfect.
Estragon: What is perfect?
Vladimir: Ham! Ham is perfect!
Estragon: Compared to what?
Vladimir: To a universe without ham.
Estragon: How can you tell?
Vladimir: God wouldn’t have created it if it weren’t perfect. Ham is in our universe. Therefore, ham is perfect.
Estragon: Okay, now I’m really confused. If God is perfect and created a world that is the most perfect possible world for us, why does he create people who smash ham and watches in bags?
Vladimir: To test us.
Estragon: Why?
Vladimir: To see how much we love him.
Estragon: Oh…so we show him we love him by not smashing things in bags?
Vladimir: Yes!
Estragon: I see. So that’s the point of the whole thing!
Vladimir: YES! That’s the point. We have the choice whether to smash ham or watches or even possums in bags. If we choose not to, we do it because we love God. And if we do that we will be rewarded.
Estragon: With a nice watch?
Vladimir: Maybe with a watch. Maybe with eternal happiness. We’re not exactly sure. We just know that the reward is going to be REALLY good.
Estragon: And if we smash things in bags?
Vladimir: Then bad things happen to us. REALLY bad things. Things like sickness or eternal suffering or boils on our face.
Estragon: Boils on our face?!?!?!
Vladimir: It won’t be a problem for you if you just do what you are supposed to.
Estragon: So these are the rules?
Vladimir: Yes.
Estragon: And if I follow them, I’ll be…………happy???
Vladimir: Unless God has another plan for you. But eventually you’ll be happy. At some point.
Estragon: Will I get a watch?
Vladimir: If that is what you desire and that is God’s plan and you follow the rules then, yes, you will get a watch.
(At this exact moment, a giant meteor hits the earth obliterating smashing it into a million pieces. The entire human race, including Estragon and Vladimir, are destroyed in a firey, horrible instant without warning)
Venom Singer Saddened By Royal Snub
Posted by Keith Spillett in General Weirdness on April 28, 2011
Uncle Cronos
There is one Brit who is still waiting for his invitation to tomorrow’s wedding between Prince William and Kate Middleton. Cronos (Conrad Lant), the bass player and singer from the band Venom, has checked his mailbox everyday patiently waiting for a message that may never come. Why would the lead singer of a band that recorded songs like “Sons of Satan” expect an invite to one of the most sacred and important events in Britain this century? Cronos is, in fact, Kate Middleton’s uncle.
As hard as this may be to believe for many metalheads, Cronos is the brother of Kate’s mom Mary Lant. In an exclusive interview with The Tyranny of Tradition, Cronos revealed that he had a close relationship with Kate from the time she was a baby. “We were on tour supporting the Welcome to Hell album when I got the call. Little Katy was about to be born. The band and I cancelled the show and rushed to the hospital. I’ll never forget when I held her for the first time. Abaddon and I broke down in tears. It was beautiful,” recalled Cronos.
Cronos was always a big part of the future princesses life. She grew up going to Venom concerts and was even in the studio when the band recorded their third album “At War With Satan”. “Mantas had this great idea to have her voice mixed into the background of the song “Aaaaaarrghh” but it we were never able to get it to sound right.”
As Kate got older she got more involved with the band. “She started playing drums at age 7 and even sat in with us a few times during concerts. She played Buried Alive with us at a show in Coventry back during the reunion in 1995 and was amazing. She reminded me a lot of Dave Lombardo.”
When the royal couple first started dating Kate promised Cronos that they might play at the wedding if the two ever decided to tie the knot. “She had this whole idea about us playing Countess Bathory during the part of the service where she walked up to the altar. I thought it was crazy, but she kept bringing the idea up. I’d have been honored to play her wedding.”
Cronos was in touch with Kate as recently as seven months ago, but since the wedding announcement she has not returned any of his phone calls. “She used to call me her favorite uncle. She loved singing songs with me when she was a little girl. We used to sing the song “Black Metal” together. She loved doing the growling part at the end. Now she won’t even talk to me.”
There have been few mentions of Cronos’ relationship with Kate in the British press. He believes the royal family has conspired to keep the Kate Middleton/Venom connection out of the media. “There used to be video of her playing with us up on YouTube, but that was mysteriously taken down months ago. I feel like they are embarrassed by my career as one of the founding fathers of Satan influenced thrash metal. I’m not trying to get famous out of this or make money. I just want my Little Katy back.”
The Banality of Evil
Posted by Keith Spillett in The Poetry of Death on April 27, 2011
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The Price of Freedom Is 4 Dollars
Posted by Keith Spillett in The Politics Of Catastrophe on April 23, 2011
“as freedom is a breakfastfood” –ee cummings
The smell of freedom. I hadn’t thought much about this idea until a few hours ago. What, in fact, does freedom smell like? While wandering aimlessly through CVS this morning I happened upon a new Old Spice product referred to as “Fiji”. It is a combination of unpronounceable chemicals that are supposed to save me from hours of social humiliation if I simply roll it onto my armpits. A sticker on the front announced to me and anyone else who passed through aisle 9 that it “smells like Palm Trees, Sunshine and Freedom”. Fantastic! I threw it in my shopping cart immediately. Four bucks for the scent of freedom?!?!? A bargain if you ask me.
This could be the beginning to one of those columns where the writer quotes George Orwell a lot and rails on and on about the dire effects of the degradation of language. I promise you, it isn’t. If you haven’t figured out that language has been cheapened I recommend that you get back in your spaceship and go home immediately. Instead, I’d like to take a few moments to genuinely appreciate how the word “freedom” has become a complete free-for-all of a word that may not mean anything but does so in the most convincing of ways.
The Old Spice deodorant claim is a beautiful example of it. You can stick the word freedom on the end of anything and it sounds like a halfway convincing argument. Old Spice even manages to have the added dimension of irony attached to it. If you are a complete rube and you think that buying a specific brand of fumigant will make you more free, go ahead and buy the product. If you are one of those self-aware ironic types who looks down on those moronic enough to be influenced by this claim, go ahead and buy the product and laugh at those other idiots who bought the product. Freedom for everyone!!!
I must tell you that I happen to be an expert on the subject of freedom. I am an American. Many of my politicians have taken great pains to remind me that Americans are the freest people on earth. We are so free that former President and freedom lover George W Bush announced to the world that the reason 9/11 took place is that “they hate us for our freedom”. You have to be pretty darned free to be hated for your freedom.
Just in case those credentials don’t impress you enough I should tell you that if we could afford to own a house my family and I would most certainly get our loan from American Freedom Mortgage or American Freedom Lending and we would get our homeowners insurance through American Freedom Insurance.
I am so free that I basically sweat freedom out of my pores. If an unfree person happened to get my sweat on them, they would immediately become free. Sweating is kind of a problem for me, which is why we will hire American Freedom Heating and Air to cool off the house that we will be able to afford at some point in the next 50 years.
How will we get our furniture to the new house you ask? By putting it in a 2009 Pace American Freedom Cargo Hauler which we will fill with gasoline at American Freedom Fuel and Package Store. On our journey to our new home (located in Freedom, Wisconsin) we plan on letting freedom ring by visiting the American Freedom Bell in Charlotte, North Carolina.
We are certainly not living the American Dream if we don’t have a dog in our new home, so we plan to purchase a cute little pit-bull over at American Freedom Kennels. Pit-bulls are expensive dogs, but after all, freedom isn’t free.
One of the great things about being an American is that I can freely use the word freedom anytime I want. “Freedom!” Want to see it again? “Freedom!!!!” Not convinced? “Freedom!!!” “Freedom!!!!!!!” “Freedom!!!!!!!!!!” See! Some places don’t let you do that. It is really important that you get to do that, because if you can’t, you are NOT free. That would be bad.
5 Reasons Men Should Go To The Doctor
Posted by Keith Spillett in Health Tips for An Early Death on April 18, 2011
You probably saw the article last week on Yahoo that “Men Often Don’t Go To The Doctor Because They Secretly Long To Die”. The story was based on a survey that 90 percent of men would rather spend their time watching re-runs of “Two And A Half Men”, eating enormous plates of fried foods and harassing female bartenders than going to the doctor. According to a study done by a guy I know from work, most American men have cholesterol rates over 2,300 and nearly 3,000 on weekends. This wouldn’t be such a bad thing, except for the fact that some doctors have recently linked high cholesterol with heart problems.
According to the American Academy of People With Stethoscopes and BMWs, 56 percent of men between the ages of 25 and 34 don’t even know what the word “doctor” means. What gives?
Simple. “Men are pretty freakin’ stupid,” says I.P. Knightly, a contributing editor to Urologist Weekly and writer of best-selling books “Urine Trouble” and “You Gotta Be Kid-ney”. “Men avoid doctors, mostly because they are scardey cats and also because their co-pays are around 80 bucks a visit. Therefore, many men at some point in their life will die, in some cases without warning.”
Here are 5 warning signs that should tell you to go to a doctor immediately:
Profuse bleeding
Many American men see bleeding as a sign of weakness. They think it shows that they are too emotional. They worry that women will not be attracted to them because they are hemorrhaging out of their face, neck and chest. So, they try to pretend they aren’t bleeding.
The first major symptom of bleeding is blood loss. This is often followed by a red substance staining their clothes. Men often ignore these signs until it is too late and they have ruined the nice white carpet in their office.
“Bleeding is a really bad sign,” says Dr. Marvin Obvious, a noted PhD who has spent most of his career studying the history of adhesive tape. “Exercise and diet can help, but major loss of blood can overcome these things and lead to, well, something bad.”
Growth of Additional Limbs
I know, I know, you find that additional arm a big help in your job at the local copy shop. Maybe you’ve gotten some complements on those extra toes that appeared at the end of your chin. But beware, these seemingly innocuous appendages could be a sign of a deeper problem.
9 out of 10 Americans who have grown extra legs may be morphing into giant human spiders said a survey in the Upper Alabama Journal of Medicine and Other Forms of Witchcraft. Sure, they look cool, but at what cost!?
Stoppage of Breathing That Lasts More Than A Week
What do all dead people have in common? If you guessed, “they are not breathing” you are exactly right. If you haven’t drawn breath in more than a week there is a good chance that you may, in fact, be dead. A visit to the doctor could help delay the onset of early rigor mortis and severe bad breath. Please, do not drive to your doctor if you have this symptom. You may be lucky and just be one of the legions of undead zombies that walk the earth, but why risk an accident?
Spontaneous Combustion
A silent killer ends the lives of nearly 1.8 million Americans every month. Four thousand humans accidentally burst into flame every ten seconds around the world. This horrible affliction turns average, normal people into human blowtorches at a moments notice. It often goes unrecognized, but people all around us are exploding all the time. If you notice profuse sweating, overwhelming thirst and flames shooting from your chest your body may be telling you something.Americans who have been diagnosed with pyrokinesis are especially susceptible to this ailment.
An Overwhelming Urge To Eat Someone You Know
Some cultures practice ritual cannibalism. We, unfortunately, are not one of them. Besides the risk of social embarrassment that acting on this fantasy could create, there is the issue of indigestion and potential consequences from improperly prepared human remains. If you are looking greedily at a friend or family member thinking of eating them…DON’T. It’s unhealthy, dangerous and just plain gross.
So, the moral of the story is see your doctor. The American Doctors In Need Of Pensions Because They Invested In Tech Stocks Association recommend visiting your doctor at least 3 times a week. American men who visit their doctors regularly, don’t smoke, avoid ingesting large amounts of heroin or arsenic and eat more than once a week are four times as likely to live into their 70s. And as everyone knows, the most important thing is not being dead.
Dumb Metal Rumors and The People Who Love Them
Posted by Keith Spillett in Articles I Probably Shouldn't Have Bothered Writing on April 17, 2011
Metalheads, as a lot, tend to be some the most cynical people on the planet, but we are often willing to believe some amazingly suspect information. Get a roomful of bangers together and most of them will agree that the government, in league with a group of rancorous aliens who crashed in New Mexico, are conspiring to enslave the human race and force us to listen to Black Eyed Peas records until our ears bleed. What can be said of a group that seems to have a universal distrust Christianity but believe strongly in the existence of Satan? We tend to be suspicious of any sort of authority structure, but have complete faith in strangers who happen to arrange a series of musical notes in a way that makes us want to run into each other screaming “KILL!!!!”. In short, we are a group that is susceptible to getting caught up in some bizarre rumors.
Over the years there have been a some I particularly enjoyed. Here are a few of them…
Paging Dr. Goregrind
The story goes something like this…A bunch of frustrated med students dropped out of college moments away from becoming doctors. They took their wealth of medical training and used it to write a series of revolting metal albums in the late 80s and early 90s. These albums, which featured songs with catchy titles like “Swarming Vulgar Mass of Infected Virulency” and “Cadaveric Incubator of Endoparasites”, must have been penned by people with an acute understanding of human anatomy, the type of understanding that could only be gained by hours of study at a medical college. It’s a great story and it actually makes some sense but it is completely untrue. Carcass are, in fact, brilliant musicians with highly overdeveloped vocabularies and no medical training whatsoever. This didn’t stop a friend of mine, years back, from sending a letter to the band offering to allow them to remove his spleen onstage.
Malevolent Obfuscation
The saga of Phil Fasciana, guitarist from the band Malevolent Creation, and his heroic killing of a “80-pound homeless crackhead” Kwik E Mart robber gripped the metal world back in 2009. Apparently, Phil stumbled in looking to buy some chocolate milk and was shot at by the thief. In a scene that seems right out of a bad Don “The Dragon” Wilson action flick (because it probably was), Phil tackled the bad guy and wrestled his gun away. But this cagey crackhead reached for his hideout piece located, in of all places, his sock. Phil was forced to fire on the guy and kill him. There were more holes in the story than in the USS Bismarck. The poor, desperate homeless guy with enough money for two guns. The lack of a murder weapon, a dead body or a witness. Days afterwards, the police confirmed the story was complete nonsense. This didn’t stop a good number of metalheads, myself in particular, from running wild with this fable.
The Parable of The Cave
Wolves in the Throne Room are just your average Rudolph Steiner reading, eco-anarchist black metal band. Over the years, they have rightfully gained a reputation for being somewhat eclectic. This, however, does not mean they live in a cave. Nearly every description I heard about the band went like this “They sound like ____________________ and they remind me of ______________________ and, get this, they live in a cave.” In fairness, they do look like they live in a cave, but so do 2/3rds of the metalheads under the age of 25. They live on an organic farm. There are clear structural differences between a cave and a farm that I shouldn’t have to explain.
Dead…Again?
Death rumors are a favorite among metalheads. Back in 2005, Type O Negative pulled off the ultimate hoax when they convinced the world that singer Peter Steele had died. This became quite confusing when Steele actually died last year. Was he really dead this time? Would he rise on the second day as some sort of ironic, Easter-themed publicity stunt? The last album was named Dead Again for gosh sakes! And Rasputin was on the cover. That zany Russian died something like 28 times and kept coming back! This had to be some sick joke. Unfortunately, it was not and Steele has not risen…yet.
The 2005 Steele death was the most convincing death rumor I have heard, but far from the first. I’ll never forget spending an embarrassing evening back in 1993 mourning Pantera singer Phil Anselmo’s untimely death. The word was he had dove off of the stage and the crowd had parted, unwilling to take seriously their responsibilities as members of the metal community, allowing Phil to slam into the floor. His neck broke and he was pronounced dead in the pit. The injustice! I remember mournfully looking at the sky and shouting “I would have caught you, Phil! I would have caught you!”
The Tyranny of Tradition 