[the mixed metaphor is intentional]
So ... I found my own blog -- a forgotten blog, to be sure -- totally by accident ... I don't even want to try & describe how that happened -- but it did.
Anyway, I read my last post, from late October, 2010 (that's just over FOUR YEARS AGO), & two things struck me:
1) That blog post -- about the NC State Fair -- was actually pretty fucking good! ... and
2) The differences between then & now are VAST & really difficult to sum up.
But I'm gonna attempt a "sort of" summary of those differences ... Bear with me, O Nonexistent Reader ... I'm doin my best here.
I now live in Atlanta. Roswell, Georgia, to be precise. I have a life partner, the mother of my daughter, Charlotte Isis P-----. I have two step children, J-----, female, age 13; & G------, male, age 11.
Charlotte was born on April 28, 2011 at 12:58 PM. She is now 3 and a half years old. She is my hero & the light of my life & the source of 70-90% of my frustration (sources of frustration: myself 45-79%; my wife 25-45%; my job 25-95%; my family 10-99.99999% [goes up during holidays]; politics 15-90%; religion 5-99%; hypocrisy 85-99%; "New Math" 99.999999999999%).
I work in an Atlanta restaurant as a server & bartender; it's the only job I've had in Atlanta, & I love my job in a way that I never thought would be possible. I NEVER drive to work thinking "Oh God I do NOT want to go to [restaurant] today" which is something I NEVER thought possible.
I have always wanted to teach, but haven't really set myself up for that while I've been here. But I wanna start working on that.
I'm gonna have to continue this tomorrow. In the meantime, invisible reader, go read my previous post, about the fair. It's hilarious.
29 October 2014
26 October 2010
Why the NC State Fair SUCKS
Right around this time every year, when it starts to cool off a bit -- which everybody loves -- and football starts showing up on television (college football, on saturdays & NFL on sundays) -- which almost everybody loves -- and all the kids are firmly entrenched back in school, the colleges are starting to roll at full speed -- which maybe some people love, I know I do -- right around this time, we start hearing about the Good Ol' State Fair. Which everybody loves -- EXCEPT FOR ME. In my opinion, the State Fair is the most overblown, overpriced, overhyped bunch of stupid idiotic crap that is available to the modern human. I know I'm in the minority here, because I NEVER hear anything but "Oh boy, the Fair is coming! Yay! Woo-hoo! Yippee! I can't wait to go!!!!" And this whole time, my only thought is this: The State Fair flat-out, unequivocally SUCKS. I think I could have more fun at a sadistic dentist -- and for less money.
Let's address what happens at the State Fair, shall we? First, you have to get there. So you drive over to the State Fairgrounds, and the first thing you have to do is park. And what a well-run parking experience it is! It costs money -- $5, if I remember correctly -- and is basically a free-for-all; after some half-wit "volunteer" takes your money, you basically progress onto a grass field and try to park next to someone who maybe looks like they knew what they were doing. (I'm not even going to TRY to address getting OUT of the fair, at the end of your "experience"; suffice it to say that I would rather try to leave a sold-out Lynrd Skynrd concert in a broken-down '72 Ford pickup with a manual transmission and no first gear.)
Then, you proceed to the fair. If you are "lucky" or have "foresight" to plan out your "fair experience," you have purchased the all-powerful "ride tickets" in advance, which means they were slightly cheaper. So, as you are digging those Wonka-tickets out of your pockets, be sure to grab the EIGHT DOLLARS it costs just to walk into the damn thing. Oh, and did I mention -- you better have at least EIGHTY BUCKS for you and your date, or more like $120 for you, your wife, and your only child. If you have more than one child going to the fair, I suggest that next August you take out a second mortgage on your home, or sell your car, or like 200 pints of blood. Or you could take your excitement about the upcoming redneck-fest & make some serious coin at the sperm donor. But yer gonna need a wheelbarrow for the cash required to "have a good time," I promise you that.
Now you are in the fair proper. Take a look around; it's a sight that bears remembering. See all those people around you? They are, like you, retarded. They have deluded themselves into thinking that all this stuff is FUN. Yer walking around in a big dirt field, with the occasional plot of concrete. This is where they park cars for the REAL events that occur around here (that's why you had to park in farmer Johnny's cow pasture, btw). Oh, and look at all these great rides! Wow! A set of cars, connected by duct tape, super glue, and cast-off leftover Model T parts, goes around in a circle like, 6 times! And it was only 8 tickets! Hey, can we go again? And then there's that great big Ferris Wheel, concocted of even MORE dubious parts, put together by a travelling work crew comprised of recently paroled felons who are paid in alcohol and sleep on the actual rides. With a view of. . . the crappy fair! From 3 stories up! Wow, mom, look at all the dirt! I think we can almost see our car! And these "rides" of full of screaming, terrified children -- always MY favorite company -- and half-drunk puking high school students who act like they're outside of their homes unsupervised FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER! Ain't this exciting? We have to ride ALL of these rickety, podunk, mom-and-pop contraptions! They're SO MUCH FUN!
Then, when yer finally sick of the rides -- or just plain sick -- it's time to EAT THE FOOD (in case you aren't actually sick, the food should cover you). Ahhhh, the wonderful food that is available at the fair. Someone, please, please, PLEASE explain to me the appeal of ANY of this crap? A fried turkey leg? Really? Crusty and sticky on the outside, dry and chewy on the inside, cooked into leather by some 72-year-old Rotary Club misfit who's basically doing this "volunteer" work cuz their only other option was the hospice detail...YUM. There's 400 people in line to get this thing, and the lady taking money can't count to 25 without a pencil and a piece of paper -- which is what they are using as a cash register. Or, you could buy an italian sausage with a piece of onion and an over-cooked nickel-sized chunk of green pepper -- for EIGHT DOLLARS! Oh boy -- home-cookin' at its BEST. But wait -- let's head over the deep-fried stuff! These people have proven that they will deep-fry ANYTHING coated with ANYTHING. Last year, I heard -- I almost went, just to verify this, but I refuse to attend that godforsaken redneck-fest ever again -- I heard that they were making DEEP-FRIED BUTTER. Yep, you heard me -- fried butter. Say wha-? I guess they freeze it, batter it, & deep fry it real quick, and you eat it like a popsickle. But seriously: why? Why would you eat this? Novelty? I mean, come on -- just head over to a college fraternity during initiations & see what they cook up. I'm sure it's interesting -- but does that make it worth eating? This year it was chocolate covered twinkies. Oh, boy, yummy; the most disgusting, industrial, manufactured chemical-laden "sweet" covered in dime-store chocolate & dipped in hot oil. . . It sounds revolting.
And the thing is, it IS revolting. All the food is revolting. It's SUPPOSED to be revolting. And people have been conditioned to tell themselves that they actually like this stuff; personally, I think everyone KNOWS that they hate this crap and they just smile, and nod, and then say how great it is. The "games" work the same way; they're OBVIOUSLY rigged, you can actually SEE it -- the milk bottles have cement in them, the basketball goal is 12 feet high & a fraction of the size of a real hoop, the pool tables look like a topographical map of the moon. And the prizes? Giant stuffed animals? Oh boy, I want one. . . to do what with? Have you EVER seen anyone KEEP a prize from the fair? Except for maybe when they were kids, or a couple of dead-end doper kids who threw darts at a balloon and got a mirror that says "THE DORS" and hung it up in their basement over the bong table? What in the name of all that is holy are you going to do with a three-foot long purple whale? Put it in the middle of your dining room table?
Which actually leads me to bring up my primary point: the fair is the greatest scam in the world. Because everyone involved KNOWS it's a scam, and yet they do it anyway. We all KNOW it's overpriced, we KNOW the food sucks, we KNOW the games are rigged, we KNOW the rides are crap -- people even talk about it, you can overhear them discussing it AT THE FAIR -- and yet we go anyway. Because there's some sort of false nostalgia that surrounds the whole thing -- when we were kids, our parents told us how fun the fair was when THEY were kids (even though they KNOW it's no fun they TELL us it's fun), and then we grow up, realize it's no fun, turn a blind eye to the lack of fun, and pass on this same propaganda to our own children. 'Tis a vicious, never-ending cycle. Any time you have an activity that is, in essence, over-hyped, over-priced drudgery, and you tell yourself that it's not -- you tell yourself that it's fun -- you are creating a level of delusion that is unassailable. Because you KNOW it's a delusion, you secretly admit it, and it's like you enjoy the fact that you are being deluded.
Really, I guess, it's the ulitimate in capitalist consumer ideology. It's every advertiser's wet dream -- a cheap crappy product that never has to be changed or updated. The people just file in like lemurs, or cattle, and pay their $40 for something that costs, in the grand scheme of things, about five bucks.
So, ya'll just keep going, every year, until you wake up & realize that there's a lot better stuff to do with your fall evenings.
Let's address what happens at the State Fair, shall we? First, you have to get there. So you drive over to the State Fairgrounds, and the first thing you have to do is park. And what a well-run parking experience it is! It costs money -- $5, if I remember correctly -- and is basically a free-for-all; after some half-wit "volunteer" takes your money, you basically progress onto a grass field and try to park next to someone who maybe looks like they knew what they were doing. (I'm not even going to TRY to address getting OUT of the fair, at the end of your "experience"; suffice it to say that I would rather try to leave a sold-out Lynrd Skynrd concert in a broken-down '72 Ford pickup with a manual transmission and no first gear.)
Then, you proceed to the fair. If you are "lucky" or have "foresight" to plan out your "fair experience," you have purchased the all-powerful "ride tickets" in advance, which means they were slightly cheaper. So, as you are digging those Wonka-tickets out of your pockets, be sure to grab the EIGHT DOLLARS it costs just to walk into the damn thing. Oh, and did I mention -- you better have at least EIGHTY BUCKS for you and your date, or more like $120 for you, your wife, and your only child. If you have more than one child going to the fair, I suggest that next August you take out a second mortgage on your home, or sell your car, or like 200 pints of blood. Or you could take your excitement about the upcoming redneck-fest & make some serious coin at the sperm donor. But yer gonna need a wheelbarrow for the cash required to "have a good time," I promise you that.
Now you are in the fair proper. Take a look around; it's a sight that bears remembering. See all those people around you? They are, like you, retarded. They have deluded themselves into thinking that all this stuff is FUN. Yer walking around in a big dirt field, with the occasional plot of concrete. This is where they park cars for the REAL events that occur around here (that's why you had to park in farmer Johnny's cow pasture, btw). Oh, and look at all these great rides! Wow! A set of cars, connected by duct tape, super glue, and cast-off leftover Model T parts, goes around in a circle like, 6 times! And it was only 8 tickets! Hey, can we go again? And then there's that great big Ferris Wheel, concocted of even MORE dubious parts, put together by a travelling work crew comprised of recently paroled felons who are paid in alcohol and sleep on the actual rides. With a view of. . . the crappy fair! From 3 stories up! Wow, mom, look at all the dirt! I think we can almost see our car! And these "rides" of full of screaming, terrified children -- always MY favorite company -- and half-drunk puking high school students who act like they're outside of their homes unsupervised FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER! Ain't this exciting? We have to ride ALL of these rickety, podunk, mom-and-pop contraptions! They're SO MUCH FUN!
Then, when yer finally sick of the rides -- or just plain sick -- it's time to EAT THE FOOD (in case you aren't actually sick, the food should cover you). Ahhhh, the wonderful food that is available at the fair. Someone, please, please, PLEASE explain to me the appeal of ANY of this crap? A fried turkey leg? Really? Crusty and sticky on the outside, dry and chewy on the inside, cooked into leather by some 72-year-old Rotary Club misfit who's basically doing this "volunteer" work cuz their only other option was the hospice detail...YUM. There's 400 people in line to get this thing, and the lady taking money can't count to 25 without a pencil and a piece of paper -- which is what they are using as a cash register. Or, you could buy an italian sausage with a piece of onion and an over-cooked nickel-sized chunk of green pepper -- for EIGHT DOLLARS! Oh boy -- home-cookin' at its BEST. But wait -- let's head over the deep-fried stuff! These people have proven that they will deep-fry ANYTHING coated with ANYTHING. Last year, I heard -- I almost went, just to verify this, but I refuse to attend that godforsaken redneck-fest ever again -- I heard that they were making DEEP-FRIED BUTTER. Yep, you heard me -- fried butter. Say wha-? I guess they freeze it, batter it, & deep fry it real quick, and you eat it like a popsickle. But seriously: why? Why would you eat this? Novelty? I mean, come on -- just head over to a college fraternity during initiations & see what they cook up. I'm sure it's interesting -- but does that make it worth eating? This year it was chocolate covered twinkies. Oh, boy, yummy; the most disgusting, industrial, manufactured chemical-laden "sweet" covered in dime-store chocolate & dipped in hot oil. . . It sounds revolting.
And the thing is, it IS revolting. All the food is revolting. It's SUPPOSED to be revolting. And people have been conditioned to tell themselves that they actually like this stuff; personally, I think everyone KNOWS that they hate this crap and they just smile, and nod, and then say how great it is. The "games" work the same way; they're OBVIOUSLY rigged, you can actually SEE it -- the milk bottles have cement in them, the basketball goal is 12 feet high & a fraction of the size of a real hoop, the pool tables look like a topographical map of the moon. And the prizes? Giant stuffed animals? Oh boy, I want one. . . to do what with? Have you EVER seen anyone KEEP a prize from the fair? Except for maybe when they were kids, or a couple of dead-end doper kids who threw darts at a balloon and got a mirror that says "THE DORS" and hung it up in their basement over the bong table? What in the name of all that is holy are you going to do with a three-foot long purple whale? Put it in the middle of your dining room table?
Which actually leads me to bring up my primary point: the fair is the greatest scam in the world. Because everyone involved KNOWS it's a scam, and yet they do it anyway. We all KNOW it's overpriced, we KNOW the food sucks, we KNOW the games are rigged, we KNOW the rides are crap -- people even talk about it, you can overhear them discussing it AT THE FAIR -- and yet we go anyway. Because there's some sort of false nostalgia that surrounds the whole thing -- when we were kids, our parents told us how fun the fair was when THEY were kids (even though they KNOW it's no fun they TELL us it's fun), and then we grow up, realize it's no fun, turn a blind eye to the lack of fun, and pass on this same propaganda to our own children. 'Tis a vicious, never-ending cycle. Any time you have an activity that is, in essence, over-hyped, over-priced drudgery, and you tell yourself that it's not -- you tell yourself that it's fun -- you are creating a level of delusion that is unassailable. Because you KNOW it's a delusion, you secretly admit it, and it's like you enjoy the fact that you are being deluded.
Really, I guess, it's the ulitimate in capitalist consumer ideology. It's every advertiser's wet dream -- a cheap crappy product that never has to be changed or updated. The people just file in like lemurs, or cattle, and pay their $40 for something that costs, in the grand scheme of things, about five bucks.
So, ya'll just keep going, every year, until you wake up & realize that there's a lot better stuff to do with your fall evenings.
19 October 2010
a tree in the forest, of sorts
well, since no one is reading this, it sure makes it easy to post. to be totally honest with you [that would be "with me" or "with myself" since i'm the only one here], i had forgotten about this here blog. i mean, TOTALLY FORGOT ABOUT IT; i went looking for how to post something to my bob dylan blog & found this other thing sitting underneath it. i wondered "what the hell is this?" & clicked on "view this blog" & found the previous post. whew. even though, really, it still makes NO sense to me -- i have absolutely no idea what it was that i was writing about, or supposed to write about, or what i was trying to address, or really anything about what in the world was going on in the first place.
& yet, of course, i must must have some sort of idea what i wanted to do: i've been thinking/planning/plotting one of these here blogs for YEARS now. & when i was just sitting around thinking -- okay, i was sitting in the bath trying to read "against the day" by thomas pynchon, but you know what i mean -- sitting around thinking about getting back into writing, wondering what i could come up with to talk about, & i came back into my room & thought "well, i COULD put something on the old dylan blog, check & see if anyone's checking to see," & then i found that i had this here blog going, which is a "non-dedicated blog", subject-matter wise. . . & now? here we are. well, at least i'm here!
so let this be a warning to ya, folks: i might just have to start posting stuff on here. right now? well, it's late, i've been at work all day, i have to work tomorrow, & it seems i had just a little bit too much to drink, which, coupled with having a LOT too little to eat, has caused me to feel a tad nauseous, & more like reading than writing. so, like i was TRYING to say, before i so RUDELY interrupted myself, right now?
right now i gotta go lay down. but i have some plans for this here blog, don't you (& i'm speaking to myself, here) worry. not a bit. it'll all turn out. . . okay.
i think this might just be my "secret blog", the one where i get to say what i want, not tell anyone i'm saying it, & one day my child will be able to come on here & learn things about me that i typed up -- things i wrote while ASSUMING that no-one would ever see it, but KNOWING that they might be able to, if they are/were diligent enough to find it in the middle of nowhere.
ha! middle of nowhere. it's a nice place -- surrounded by the entire internet.
sleep tight, self. i know i will.
& yet, of course, i must must have some sort of idea what i wanted to do: i've been thinking/planning/plotting one of these here blogs for YEARS now. & when i was just sitting around thinking -- okay, i was sitting in the bath trying to read "against the day" by thomas pynchon, but you know what i mean -- sitting around thinking about getting back into writing, wondering what i could come up with to talk about, & i came back into my room & thought "well, i COULD put something on the old dylan blog, check & see if anyone's checking to see," & then i found that i had this here blog going, which is a "non-dedicated blog", subject-matter wise. . . & now? here we are. well, at least i'm here!
so let this be a warning to ya, folks: i might just have to start posting stuff on here. right now? well, it's late, i've been at work all day, i have to work tomorrow, & it seems i had just a little bit too much to drink, which, coupled with having a LOT too little to eat, has caused me to feel a tad nauseous, & more like reading than writing. so, like i was TRYING to say, before i so RUDELY interrupted myself, right now?
right now i gotta go lay down. but i have some plans for this here blog, don't you (& i'm speaking to myself, here) worry. not a bit. it'll all turn out. . . okay.
i think this might just be my "secret blog", the one where i get to say what i want, not tell anyone i'm saying it, & one day my child will be able to come on here & learn things about me that i typed up -- things i wrote while ASSUMING that no-one would ever see it, but KNOWING that they might be able to, if they are/were diligent enough to find it in the middle of nowhere.
ha! middle of nowhere. it's a nice place -- surrounded by the entire internet.
sleep tight, self. i know i will.
11 October 2009
fool me once. . .
or: was it that i was The Fool, once? hard to say. all i know is that i WAS paying money -- all of $5 a month, or something like that -- to have a blog hosted on another site. . . doesn't matter which one, does it, really? it's just funny to me -- now, thinking about it -- that i was paying for something that should have been free to begin with. . . it was dave felton -- i pray that you know who he is -- who laughed at me when i told him that my blog was down because i could not afford it anymore. . . he laughed, and said "BLOGSPOT, man!. . . it's FREE!"
so: here we are, free at last. . . or was it free at first? matters not.
plan, the first: let's keep this blog going, you & i, you beautiful losers. . . we don't have to tell anyone, we don't have to advertise, we just have to post. . . and link to things, i guess. . . & things will just, well. . . things will just sorta build themselves, won't they? we hope, for sure. . . i can only imagine the day that someone actually reads any of this: i imagine i'll feel somewhat like the little girl in "Poltergeist:" "They'rrrreee heeeeerrrreeeeee. . . . " . . .so creepy.
coming tomorrow: "Did I REALLY See a Preview For A "Nightmare on Elm Street" Prequel -- A Preview That Started With the Tagline/Credit 'A Michael Bay Production'? My God, Have the Zombies Taken Over? Are They Parading Around Disguised As Movie Producers? Please God Help Me. . . " [but that's for tomorrow. . . ]
so: here we are, free at last. . . or was it free at first? matters not.
plan, the first: let's keep this blog going, you & i, you beautiful losers. . . we don't have to tell anyone, we don't have to advertise, we just have to post. . . and link to things, i guess. . . & things will just, well. . . things will just sorta build themselves, won't they? we hope, for sure. . . i can only imagine the day that someone actually reads any of this: i imagine i'll feel somewhat like the little girl in "Poltergeist:" "They'rrrreee heeeeerrrreeeeee. . . . " . . .so creepy.
coming tomorrow: "Did I REALLY See a Preview For A "Nightmare on Elm Street" Prequel -- A Preview That Started With the Tagline/Credit 'A Michael Bay Production'? My God, Have the Zombies Taken Over? Are They Parading Around Disguised As Movie Producers? Please God Help Me. . . " [but that's for tomorrow. . . ]
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