A Guide to Proper Crowd Violence

Before the Guide
It's been a rough few days, physically speaking. On Saturday I played ultimate for over two hours , which would have been strenuous on its own, but I was also wearing my brand-new Nike Mercurial Vapors and they took the skin off my heels. That's the actual color, by the way. I thought I might be able to get neon pink, but they only had the green in size 12. I could not have gotten a tasteful color if I wanted to (and why would I?). Anyway, we're way past blisters--the blisters have developed, been popped and sheared away, and the skin beneath them as well. It's just what happens if you don't take it easy with new cleats--and honestly, it's gonna hurt even if you take it easy. So have fun, deal with the pain, and complain about it afterwards on your blog. Also, buy Neosporin and a lot of band-aids.

That was Saturday. Sunday night, The Humboldt hosted a group excursion to San Francisco's "DNA Lounge" to see the Australian metalcore band Parkway Drive. The DNA Lounge has no genetics- or helix-themed themes whatsoever, not even a spiral staircase. Slim's is presumably named after some shifty and probably fictional proprietor, who put Playboys in the bathrooms back when people were capable of being offended by something so tame as exposed breasts and genitals. I should be able to understand why you gave your club this name, is all I'm saying. The East Bay punk/hardcore act Set Your Goals opened, and they owned pretty hard. The crowd was ROWDY AS HELL during their set, which was obviously enhanced by the fact that these guys were local. I was getting knocked around pretty well and the stage dives were going--it was clear at this point that we were all in for a bumpy night. If these relatively tame punk rockers ("Gaia Bleeds" might be their heaviest song) had the crowd this riled up, the very legitimate brutality of Parkway Drive might actually incite a riot.

When the time came, even I was not prepared. To be fair, it's not the first time this has happened. It was the most violent show I've ever been to, though a couple others have come close. Circle pits--typically the most dangerous things you'll encounter at metal shows--were the least of my problems. We all got separated immediately, and the surges going back and forth across the crowd were easily enough to knock people off their feet. Stage divers, when they started up in the first song ("Samara/Unrest"), were wild and got wilder. The singer made matters worse at every turn, escalating the violence by demanding MORE MORE MORE. See, a true frontman makes YOU want to please HIM. Only by the intensity of your devotion will he ever accept and love you, and you NEED that love. As Stephen Colbert has noted, the craving for the love of a distant authority figure whom you can never truly satisfy marks all the best relationships. Parkway Drive's Winston McCall was insatiable on Sunday, demanding more stage dives and more circle pits and more crushing of the floor. Always more. It does help that the whole band is really appealing in general; not only do they write amazing face-crushing music, but they're all effortlessly handsome, fit Aussie surfer guys. My sister (who came to the show and risked her surgically repaired back on multiple stage dives, proving yet again that she's way braver than me) was drooling over them, and even if you don't want to bone hot Aussies you can't help but be dazzled by their smiles.

The problem was this: the crowd's energy was probably the best I've ever experienced personally, yet it was so sloppy and out-of-control that it ultimately detracted from the experience. It's not Winston's fault (I would never blame you!). It's the crowd's fault. It was a young crowd (all-ages show, what can you do?) and so I understand their sloppiness. What I don't understand is their fashion taste, or their utter lack of shame in promoting said taste. Shame is an important part of teenaged life; it's one of the few things that can actually regulate their awful behavior. Every teenager is an awful embarrassing stain on the Earth, and if you aren't appalled by the memory of your teenaged self you don't have a good memory. The point is, I'm here to help. But you've gotta cut your fucking hair.

Now It's The Guide
First, let's talk about general behavior; you're up near the stage in standing room, but not looking to do anything crazy (crowd surfing, stage diving, or going in a circle pit). We'll leave wall-to-walls out of this; that's some really advanced stuff and honestly if you ever participate in one you need to evaluate your life choices. If you're standing and the crowd is surging back and forth, these are the important things:
--KEEP YOUR FEET. No matter what happens, keep your feet on the ground. Falling is the worst and most dangerous thing that can happen. If you are really confident in your footing, you can dance or jump around. If you choose to do this, try to keep your movement vertical only. You've seen what happens when a basketball player lands on somebody's foot? He gets hurt, and like all mammals you also have feet. Plan accordingly.
--ELBOWS OUT. These are your best friends in the crowd. Keep your arms up and elbows out, to make sure you have a bare minimum of space. If you're crammed so tight that your chest and back have other peoples' chests and backs pressed against them, you can be pushed off your feet. Remember rule 1? Yeah. Also, like in rule 1, this rule can be broken if you expand vertically (putting your fists/hands in the air) and you have enough space.
--CORE STRENGTH. This isn't really something you can work on at the show. But if you do a lot of push-ups, sit-ups, or other core exercises you'll find it MUCH easier to deal with occasional surges. Go along with them, bend, but don't break and fall. Also, if you have a cut stomach or something there's always the chance somebody hot will notice. I mean, it's never happened to me, but there's a lot of things my ass don't get. "Like pussy and respect!"

Next, circle pits. This is the biggest problem a typical concert-goer will run into. Or rather, get run into by. Because that's what happens; people careening at high speed around a pit smash into the walls. The walls are made of people! It's an irritant up until the point when you're getting hammered so hard that you have to turn away from the stage to watch the pit and protect yourself. If you do decide to get into the pit, they can actually be a lot of fun. I dove in several times myself during particularly awesome segments of particularly awesome songs. Normally I don't do this, for two reasons. First, I'm a pussy and I don't like getting hit. I love watching football, but I'm sure I would have hated playing it. Second, in my experience the circle pits are always dominated by the most orc-like denizens of the venue. 5'9" guys who weigh 230, took their shirts off before even entering the club and probably have at least one neck tattoo. I'm willing to bang bodies with my fellow rock fans, but I'm not looking to get drilled by a drunk'n'angry bulldog. See: the above speculation on playing football. At this particular show, there were so many teenaged kids that I was one of the bigger, stronger men in the venue (standing an imposing 6-foot-nothing and 160 pounds).

If you hop in, go with the flow. Clockwise or counter, try to move in the same basic direction as the other moshers. This lets you enjoy yourself without high-speed collisions, where people fall. KEEP YOUR FEET. If you hit other people, use the meat of your shoulder or the palms of your hands. Stay away from joints and bones, because they hurt. Above all, beware of a particular kind of mosher. He's young, often a teenager, and possessed of all the myriad jackasseries endemic to his race. He will often wear a shirt commemorating over-caffeinated guttertrash bands like A Day to Remember or Bring Me the Horizon (if there's a four-letter acronym, that's a bad sign). His style of moshing can best be described as "fighting the invisible ninjas," as he kicks his legs and windmills his arms in furious punching motions. Nobody knows why they started doing this, but on the Internet these children will actually defend their ridiculousness by claiming "it's about protecting your body." I suppose so, in the sense that punching a complete in the face is self-defense. Space is limited in a circle pit, and the last thing you want to do is piss everyone off by smashing your fists into their bodies if they get anywhere near you. Honestly, the best solution is to drill the kid directly in the back with your shoulder. It's the one part of his body he can't protect with his fists, and it'll typically wipe him out into the wall of the pit. He might get kicked in the face, and it might be a learning experience.


Finally, stage dives. These were a big thing on Sunday night, since the only security employed by the DNA Lounge was stationed outside the venue. Which made sense, I think, in case an army of gun-toting hoods tried to take the club hostage Die Hard-style. That didn't happen, so the arrangement was a smashing success. People could jump onstage at any time, and did so with abandon. Mr. McCall encouraged this by letting them scream into the mic, high-fiving them, and explicitly demanding more stage dives after every song. I heart you, Winston. During the set there were an average of 1.4 non-band-members on the stage at any given time. During the encore, it was probably 2.3, which is to say a LOT of people were taking dives. And, well...a lot of them were getting fucked up. This happened for a variety of reasons, because 16-year-olds are prone to a variety of mistakes. Let's review some important tactics:
--PEOPLE ARE NOT FURNITURE. If you want to stage dive, you need to get up to the stage and climb up on it directly. While you can be crowd-surfed to the stage, getting up over that crowd should be done with the assistance of your buddies. Your buddies, not random strangers. I had a half-dozen kids try to vault over my shoulders to get up, and it feels really weird to get jumped from behind like that. The good news? I don't have to put up with it, and would just drop my left shoulder every time. The stupid kids then lose their balance and fall on their faces, serving the cause of Justice. For those kids: use the stage, or your buddies.
--THE CROWD HAS LIMITS. Any time you stage dive, you are asking up to a dozen complete strangers to carry you, lest you smash your face into the concrete floor. Keep this in mind. Particularly if you take a leap, that's a lot of work that needs to be done. If stage dives are happening fast and furious--as they were on Sunday--divers need to take care that they dive into a region of the crowd that can actually support them. If one long-haired douchebag kid dives and is absorbed by the crowd on the left side of the stage, and his skinny-jeans-wearing douchebag friend dives into the same general area, what's going to happen? Sorry, skinny jeans, hope somebody grabs your arm before you faceplant. So, no matter your size, even if you're a girl (they always get caught), wait at least ten seconds before diving into roiling waters.
--BACK OR STOMACH. If you're willing to take the extra risk, you can take a big leap. But remember, somebody has to catch you, and that somebody really needs to be like five somebodies. Those five guys need to have somewhere to grab, so you present surface area, meaning your stomach or back (ladies should obviously go back-first to keep the groping to a socially acceptable level). If you lead with your head, nobody's going to catch you. If you do a backflip, nobody's going to catch you. If you jump feet-first, I hope you break your fucking legs because the LAST thing anyone's catching is a pair of rock-hard shoes flying at them. You're going to kick somebody in the face. Speaking of which, I was kicked in the face by some guy at the show who pulled this exact shit. He hurt my neck and cut my forehead, and I went after him with the legitimate intention of socking him in the eye. Because if you get to kick me in the face, I get to punch you in yours. My initial shove of challenge caused him to fall, terrified and flailing, back into the circle pit where he got stomped on. Call it a draw. Interestingly, I could have beat the shit out of this kid without a single security guy in sight. Something to think about, DNA Lounge.

We'll close this with a Parkway Drive live video, to commemorate their spectacular performance. I wish they'd played this song and a few others, but that's how set lists go. Also, the show started late and had to end at midnight. It's not a perfect world.

Unifying Theories, vol. 1: Romantic vs. Industrial Societies

Welcome to the Unifying Theories course, here at the Mountain View Scientology Center! I presume you all brought your copies of Dianetics and a check for $2,000? Seriously, though, there really is a Scientology bookstore/center/future site of mass suicide in Mountain View, California. It's downtown right next to an amazing Turkish restaurant. Come for the food; leave with both diarrhea and reading material for the toilet! This is the first of what may be a multi-part series on my larger unifying theories for how the world works. The next one could be "Men are stupid, women are crazy." But maybe not--you remember Ludicrous Video Game Tropes? Only two issues. Sometimes bad things happen to good ideas.

The Idea
I submit that among European societies, all can be divided into two broad categories: Romantic and Industrial. The theory is limited to European societies because I'm broadly ignorant of most others. If there's one thing I've learned about humor, it's that if you're going to generalize about other peoples' cultures they should have at least the same skin color as you. And honestly, I'm not sure it even holds for others. Third-world countries by definition aren't industrial. East Asian societies seem to exhibit characteristics of both. So let's stick to what works. And by the way, you should treasure this paragraph. How many times do I proclaim my ignorance on my own blog? You should probably make a wish, as you would for any other cosmically rare event.

Anyway, the theory is that Romantic and Industrial societies share common weaknesses and strengths. It starts from the bottom, from the collective Ids of human beings over the course of centuries. Eventually, a national character forms, with a number of tendencies that shape the aspirations and capabilities of the entire society. If nobody in France cared about painting, they'd have far fewer painters in general and likely no great ones. I think you get the idea.

What do I mean by Industrial societies? To name a few, Britain, Germany, Australia, America, and Canada because that's basically America.

What do I mean by Romantic societies? To name a few, France, Italy, Spain, and Quebec because that's basically France.

Russia is kind of an exception. It's got elements of both societies, but it's really a Fucked Up society. In Fucked Up societies, they drink vodka. Russia is a fucked-up place filled with fucked-up people and always has been. I took a Russian History class in college, and it was more depressing than my Milton class.

Industrial Societies

Beer
The drink of choice for the industrial man. And his woman. And their children. Beer was one of the few things that was actually safe to drink a thousand years ago, and countries like England and Germany specialize in it. The unique brutality of Australian metal is made possible only by throats well-lubricated with Foster's. Americans similarly love their beer and metal, and while we do produce wine I should note that all our wines are rip-offs of French and Italian wines. So there. Beer is the result of production, not cultivation. You can craft it, yeah. But you can't have beer until you can process grain, and beer is essentially liquid bread. It built the fucking Pyramids! Well, beer and whips. Lots of whips. By contrast, you've never had an Italian or French or Spanish beer, and it's not because they don't exist. It's because nobody outside of those countries wants to drink their particular flavors of swill.

Cars
American cars, though they suffered a decline in the past couple decades with the rise of Japanese manufacturers, were long considered the standard across the world. The British and Germans also make great cars. For Industrial societies, automobiles represent the cutting age of engineering and manufacturing. The two greatest highway systems in the world are the US Interstate and the Autobahn. England might be able to compete if they weren't concerned about rampaging bands of Picts destroying any infrastructure they invest in. Don't believe me? King Arthur, Centurion, now The Eagle. All involve battling shitloads of Picts. I don't make these things up. In contrast, Romantic countries make shitty cars. French cars are such a joke that Paris drivers routinely jostle each others' parked vehicles around to wedge into a space. Nobody cares, because these are such pieces of shit. "But Tony, what about all those Italian sports cars?" While flashy, they are more products of visual design than amazing cars. Ferraris in particular are known for their unreliable transmissions. They make Vespas. I guess those are cool.

War
This is closely related to cars. Why? Because the same kind of technological superiority represented in a BMW as opposed to a Peugeot translates into battlefield superiority. The Spanish Armada was sunk by England. Need I remind you of the tempestuous relationship between France and Germany? It was a rivalry in the sense that the Yankees and Red Sox had a rivalry prior to 2004. When France used the spoils of World War I to build the mighty Maginot line, Germany was like, "You realize that there's another French-speaking country to your undefended North, right?" The greatest French military leader of all time was defeated by snow. Germany is so fantastic at war that we had to essentially ban them from the local ballcourt. And the greatest war speech of all time? English.



Romantic Societies

Wine and Food
They get a combined section because they're intrinsically linked. Wine is an accompaniment for food; beer is a substitute for food. I've never developed a taste for the stuff personally (one of a thousand misconceptions I had about adulthood: that I would "grow to like" wine) but I can acknowledge its role in human civilization. In fact, this might be one of the earliest determinants of whether a society becomes Industrial or Romantic: thousands of years ago when alcohol was the only way to ensure the safety of your beverages, did your society turn to wine or beer? If it's beer, your men will spend the next few centuries taking enormous shits, designing toilets to handle them, and eventually applying that toilet engineering to cars and war. If it's wine, your men will spend the next centuries eating too much and trying to get laid. German food essentially exists to keep you from throwing up your beer; it's just sausage, sauerkraut and heavy grains. Mustard is a food group for German people. English food is so legendarily bad that Nobel-winning economists have written papers on it. Swedes are incapable of creating any food or drink that isn't REALLY WEIRD. Indeed, the best food you can get in either England or Germany is from kebab stands run by Turks or North Africans. Meanwhile, just walk into a sandwich shop somewhere in Barcelona. I defy you to come out of there with something that isn't one of the five greatest things you've ever put in your mouth.

Art and Music
The single most important edge the Romantics have over us stuffy Industrialists. The greatest artists and creative forces in the history of Western civilization were all French, Italian or Spanish. England and Germany have some good prose fiction writers, but the novel is an industrial product. Compare that to poetry, which the Romantics are awesome at but which we can't touch without being embarrassed. "But Mozart was German!" No, he was AUSTRIAN, and both Austria and Switzerland are Romantic societies who happen to speak German. Visit those places sometime; fairy-tale whimsy practically drips from their architecture. Mozart's Austrian operas are amazing; Wagner's German operas are fourteen hours long and inspired the aesthetic of National Socialism. And shall we talk about painting? Italian artists brought about the Renaissance; French artists gave us Impressionism, which is exactly like having your contact lenses get all dry and blurry but without the scratching sensation. Picasso was a Spaniard (and probably un-trustworthy for that reason). And here, by contrast, is the most representative sample of English art I can find:


"It's dreadful, isn't it? God, it's a bore." Those words were actually used by John L'Heureux to describe Joyce's Ulysses, but it's utterly appropriate here. The painting is called "The Northwest Passage" by John Everett Millais, and it's supposed to represent the English national shame at being unable to find and navigate the Northwest Passage--the mythical shipping route across the Arctic ice cap. So, what does Millais give us? A women looking sad as she pores over charts and ship logs. Meanwhile, her grizzled sea captain husband sits inert in his chair and stares out to sea. He's a broken man, confined to his chair for fifteen hours a day by joints corroded by salt and suffering. His arthritis is so bad that he can't un-ball his fists. Erections are a distant memory. He's got nothing to do but sit and rot here in drydock, like his barnacle-encrusted vessel long since broken apart for scrap lumber. Inside, he's already dead, and the sadness in his wife's eyes is less shame for her husband's failure than shame for her own. She wasn't meant to live like this, locked away with a mouldering ghost until at last her Sad Keanu goes to his meager reward of damp earth.


Sex
This is a tricky one; everyone thinks they're good at sex just like they think they're good at driving. The good news is that sex is easier than driving; there's less to pay attention to. It's also lamer because you're allowed to change the music at any point while you drive. Anyway, let's be real: Industrial societies are bad at sex. Our women are intimidating, and our men aren't emotional enough to crack their shells. Industrial societies also tend to be cold and sunless, especially in the winter, so everyone ends up pale and unattractive. As a result, Industrialists are like Pandas: they're just not that into sex. They recognize the practical need for it, but MAN would it be easier if we didn't have to think about this. Interestingly, everything I've just written describes the prevailing sexual attitudes at Stanford University during the time I was there. Girls in general seem to have become skankier since then; maybe it's different. Industrial people are embarrassed by their inner drives in general; the idea of taking our clothes off and flopping around to fulfill a biological need seems...un-dignified.

By contrast, people in Romantic societies spend huge amounts of time and effort on these pursuits. It's why we Americans fear our women going to Italy or France alone; it's not that we fear direct competition with those greaseballs, it's that we know Romantics will happily embarrass themselves for sex. A French dude has no problem begging any attractive woman he sees to sleep with him; after all, if you ask fifty women to sleep with you, at least one of them probably will. And by corollary, if your girlfriend is directly propositioned by fifty greasy long-haired dudes in skinny jeans with unbuttoned shirts, she's going to bang one of them. We can't compete with those guys; they're not even playing the same game.

Thanks for reading.

"How High:" A Close Reading

Ever since Nick finished hooking his TV to his PC, we've had access to a broader selection of entertainment. Typically we were restrained to cable TV, which in practice meant a lot of Man vs. Food reruns and terrible long-dead sitcoms. Not only does Nick love That 70s Show, he's also partial to According to Jim. It was horrific. Anyway, we've taken advantage of this new set-up to have a couple late-night How High viewings. I've referenced this movie many times and talked about it at length once in this post, which on second reading I like a lot. My friend Drew once referenced "Casey's Razor" at work and I wanted to marry him as long as we didn't bang (I prefer blondes). You notice something new every time you watch How High, but these viewings occasioned a major revelation. I'd like to share it with you. "But Tony, I haven't seen that movie! The Comcast Guide gives it one star!" Well, then obviously you've learned nothing in all the goddamned writing I've done for I Drop Things (nearly 100k words!) and you're not gonna start learning now. C'MON WIT' IT!

First, I propose we examine this film not as a low-budget stoner comedy with "urban" pull, but as a work of philosophical fiction akin to Voltaire's "Candide" or that other they made us read in Winter IHUM. To begin with, this explains the truly lousy storytelling that permeates How High. The film takes what might be generously described as a casual approach to plot, characterization and continuity. Characters and plotlines enter and exit the story with a dreamlike serendipity not replicated until 2010's Avatar. Director Jesse Dylan is clearly unconcerned with the story itself; that story serves his philosophical ends.

What is that philosophy? I propose we view the film as a critique of capitalism, seen through the lens of a world where only marijuana (hereafter referred to as weed, pot, and bud) has value. To begin with, currency of any kind is largely absent. The primary characters never purchase anything, and what external objects they acquire are stolen. There are some references to money, but only in context-appropriate circumstances when interacting with outsiders. Silas (Method Man) accepts money for weed, but never buys any. When asked by the hookers, "Y'all gonna pay us, right?" Silas and Jamal state "We got dough, and if not our best friends got dough, and if not THEY best friends dot dough." They deflect the question, and never produce any cash of their own. Even when the hookers are banging Jeffrey and Tuan (the roommates), no money is exchanged on-camera.

By contrast, pot is pure value. The only cash we see exchanged is for pot. Silas goes to Harvard in order to further his pot-growing career, and Jamal ostenibly goes to appease his mother. But what's behind that? He doesn't care about her opinion or education; he just wants her off his back. All he really wants is to sustain his lifestyle, which consists of one thing: smoking pot. The character of Ivory is entirely worthless in life; he can't do anything right, he has his "Mark of Buddha," and he can't get a girl. He acquires value posthumously, and only after Silas uses his ashes to fertilize the "Ivory" pot plant. Silas and Jamal are only able to ace the THC exam and get into Harvard because they're smoking Ivory. Once there, they are able to stay in school and pass only because they're smoking Ivory. Once they lose the plant, they proceed to fail miserably and only Silas's truth-serum strain of weed saves him. Dean Cain becomes temporarily cool (adding value) because he ingests pot brownies. Finally, when Silas and Jamal make a desperate attempt to see the ghost of John Adams by smoking tissue from his exhumed body. It doesn't work; since they're not smoking weed, nothing works and no value is added.

Next, we examine the core characters: Silas and Jamal. The story is theirs; they cannot be separated from its telling. I propose we view them through this lens: in a world where only marijuana has value, Silas is defined by the creation of pot and Jamal by its consumption. They meet because Silas has lost his rolling papers, and Jamal has lost his weed. The first words they exchange define them in the film's larger context. Silas: "Got Blunt?" Jamal: "Got weed?" Silas, the producer, lacks only the blunt--a tool for consumption. Jamal, the consumer, has a blunt but needs weed--the resource only Silas can provide. No marijuana is smoked in the whole movie--and they smoke a LOT--that didn't come from Silas.

The two hammer home their identities when they introduce themselves to Bart. Silas: "Silas, entrepo-negro." Jamal: "I'm Jamal. A pothead." Silas explicitly characterizes himself as a producer in the business sense, and Jamal's one word to describe his motivations is accurate. Jamal joins the crew team to stick it to Bart, but he can only maintain the effort necessary to persist by smoking pot--as seen in the scene where he's pulling on a joint while on the rowing machine, or the scene where Silas uses a combination of a joint and Rammstein's "Du Hast" to wake him for early-morning crew practice. At one point, Volunteer Officer Picklestein steals the Ivory plant and both Silas and Jamal begin to flunk out of Harvard. They can't succeed without their magic weed. Jamal eventually flunks out (though he's set for life by virtue of his relationship with Jamie), but Silas is saved because of his ability to produce weed--rather than merely consume it. His truth serum weed enables him to pass Botany, though it's unclear whether the work ethic he developed in desperation will stick. Or maybe with Dean Cain gone, it's moot. Remember, the plot is ridiculous.

How, then, to regard the character of I Need Money? His name is the film's most explicit reference to actual currency. He's a caricature of the degenerate consumer; barely a character at all. In fact, I Need Money is best viewed as a manifestation of Jamal's Id. He behaves like an imaginary character, speaking only in mimery. Additionally, he's able to enter and leave scenes more or less at will, and has agency only as an extension of Jamal's will. Thus, a projection of the Id: I Need Money represents Jamal's most primal desires, which is why he compulsively steals. As Jamal himself says of their meeting, "He wrote down, 'I Need Money.' I said, 'shit, me too.' And we started makin' it together!" I Need Money's pure desire (Id) interfaces with Jamal's practical approach to life (Ego), and the combination is effective. It's why he destroys Officer Picklestein's bicycle. He's is the part of Jamal that most literally, primally NEEDS. In the real world, he needs money. In the framework of the film, where money has no value, he needs weed.

Mr. Dylan's ultimate aim is to highlight the vulnerability of the common man in times of economic turmoil. Though the film was released in 2001, it eerily presaged the "Great Recession" beginning in 2008 after the end of the housing bubble. When the demand spigot was shut off--when the Ivory was stolen--both producer and consumer were thrown into crisis. But the two had wholly different tools at their disposal. When Jamal ran out of Ivory, it became impossible for him to pass his classes; he was like an unemployed worker. Silas, on the other hand, is an ardent capitalist: though an avid consumer, his capacity to produce lets him metabolize what assets he had remaining. He finishes his truth serum and comes out on top--and I haven't been paying much attention, but I hear Wall Street is doing okay for themselves at the moment. Like Silas, they always will.

Which isn't to say that Silas is a negative figure, or that the film is even anti-capitalist. Silas is the hero of the movie; he's more likable and intelligent than the oafish Jamal. When hard times come, Silas doesn't cast Jamal to the wolves. He merely takes care of himself, accomplishing things Jamal doesn't. Jamal turns out all right because he happens to have Jamie and this is a Hollywood comedy. But what separates Silas from Jamal is precisely the capacity to produce. So what Mr. Dylan is proposing is essentially a small-scale fix to the Great Recession: a culture of personal entrepreneurship, finding ways to create value even in the absence of structure. This is the other side of unemployment: had I not been laid off from EA and dumped by my girlfriend and cast out of the apartment we shared, I wouldn't have started this blog. I wouldn't have tried to write a book proposal, or picked up the extra freelance work that makes my weird lifestyle function. Life isn't that simple, of course, which is why we need the sorts of complex allegories laid out by Messrs. Voltaire and Dylan.

Thanks ever for reading.

Vier Verruchte!

"Holy crap, there's posts listed under consecutive months on the timeline! Are you back for real?"

This the kind of question I might get if anyone sent me questions. I might get questions if I had a legit readerbase. I might have a legit readerbase if I did the bloggy things you're supposed to do, like include a giant list of blogs I read and websites I enjoy, so I'd have more links per page and get more favorable treatment from search engines. Yes, that's why everyone does that. Finally, if I did the things people are supposed to do to be successful, I might have a girlfriend and a successful career. A lot of things might be true if other things were true. And no, there's no regular posting schedule. There hasn't been much work this week. That's how it goes.

A Dirge for Four Loko
Much has been made of these beverages' demise. Personally I think it's a little more paternalistic over-reach from a government that's a little too eager to reach over, but this is hardly The Death of Liberty. That already happened when George Soros installed a Muslim in the White House. If they were really, truly, uniquely unsafe that would be one thing--but people have been mixing alcohol and caffeine forever. Quibbling over the amount (in milligrams!) of recreational drugs in essentially harmless consumer products? I don't see how that benefits society. I've had a couple Four Lokos, and would not recommend them to any human person, but this was my experience:

First, there is a hierarchy of flavors. I've sipped most of them; Blue Raspberry was the best, followed by Tangerine. Every one of them smells delicious when you pop the can; like fruit soda. Tasting it is different. I've never been a fan of Red Bull or other energy drinks, but it shared the sharp bite in flavor--you know, that weird kind of spiciness that might be from cinnamon or might be from chemicals not of this Earth. It's hard to tell. Every taste of Four Loko is an experience; a symphony in several parts. After the bite you get the flavor of the drink, which is basically that of a can of fruit soda with a touch of cough syrup. The Grape flavor tasted exactly like Dimetapp, which brought some nice childhood nostalgia. No matter what flavor you've selected, the second you try to swallow Four Loko will spring its little trap: a truly foul aftertaste that reminds you, "This is 12% alcohol!" and slithers down your throat like some kind of parasitic worm. I mean that in the best possible way. "I'll get used to it." No, you won't. Every single pull from the can will bring it back, as shocking and profound as the first time it touched your lips. The experience is almost bracing, like a blast of wind on the prow of a boat as it sails through an ocean of cough syrup.

That's the "good" flavors. I use the marks because Four Loko is fundamentally a Mexican drink. This isn't racist; it's reflected in the name, and most of the advertising I see is in Spanish. I saw garishly colored 24oz cans strewn around the local temp workers' depot (where dozens of Mexican laborers and hundreds of seagulls spend their days) long before I heard about kids going to the hospital. Mexican snacks are either weird-tasting and REALLY salty, or weird-tasting and REALLY sweet. Buy a bag of chips from your local Mexican convenience store and try to finish it. Point is, these things taste fuckin' weird under the best of circumstances. And sometimes you don't have the best of circumstances. Sometimes you have Watermelon or Fruit Punch.

These were the flavors at the absolute bottom of the totem pole. Watermelon was slightly better, so we'll start with that. It had all the structural hallmarks of Four Loko: the bite and the aftertaste and the stickiness, which are universal. The drink doesn't resemble an actual watermelon except insofar as they're both red. Imagine a person whose only experience with watermelons was that he had, as a child, once eaten a watermelon-flavored Jolly Rancher that had languished at the bottom of the school nurse's jar for years. That person formulated Watermelon Four Loko. I will say that while drinking this one, I began to appreciate the latent danger in these beverages. They're 24 ounces and four drinks, and between the lousy taste and vile aftertaste you really want to drink it as fast as humanly possible. Very easy to go overboard this way, especially if you've been pre-gaming. As for the Fruit Punch, I only sipped it. I should say this was the only one that didn't even smellgood. I don't really know how to describe the flavor; in the absence of human words to describe that vile brew I'll just use the Garth Algar formulation of "pralines and dick." The more I look at that, the more it works.

And the final chapter: aftermath. I consumed two whole cans over two separate evenings; one Watermelon and one Blue Raspberry. After the former, I was fucked up. I should note I was smoking pot on both these occasions. Honestly, I shouldn't even have to say that. I wasn't so much drunk as fucked up. My stomach felt weird, my head was simultaneously heavy and buzzing with caffeine. Time seemed to move very slowly. Eventually I went to bed and that was the end of it. On the second occasion, I had similar feelings of fucked-upness, though they weren't as pronounced and unpleasant. But when I went to bed...well, I had bizarre dreams.

I don't remember them really, but I kept waking up and falling asleep to the same things. At about 3am, I woke from some really harrowing apparition with awful stomach pain. I wasn't very sensible at that point, but I remember distinctly feeling like something was rotten inside of me. I went to the bathroom and returned to bed, and fell back into the same dreams. Trying to keep my eyes open, they started creeping into my waking state. I tried to fend it off and focus on my stomach, but eventually the dream becoming real was part of the dream--some character told me as much. When that happened, I realized my mind was really tied in knots and I needed to take action. Getting up from bed, I stumbled to the bathroom and knelt in front of the toilet. Never had to put my fingers down my throat, since I can usually will myself into vomiting if my stomach is upset. What came out was...well, it was blue raspberry. Whatever chemicals they use to flavor it didn't digest quickly. Nor the dye. What was most remarkable was the acidity; vomit is always pretty corrosive, but this went beyond anything I've ever felt in my throat. It was worse than bile. The burning at the time was awful, but for the next two days I couldn't swallow without serious pain--that's how bad it was. What came out of my mouth wasn't really vomit; it more closely resembled the acid blood of the monsters from Aliens. I'm surprised it didn't melt through the bottom of the toilet and down into the first floor. Once I was done puking, I went back to bed with my throat on fire but my stomach and mind at peace. The rest of the night passed without incident. That's how fucking toxic Four Loko is, apparently; it destroys your mind and burns your body.

By the way, the director's cut of Aliensis on Netflix on demand. One of the greatest action movies ever made, without exaggeration. Mechs, space marines and dual wielding! Can't do better. Two final administrative notes:
1) The title of this post is "Four Loko" in German, roughly. It's alliterative and way better. Surely that's got to be worth some money to somebody? Hmm?
2) I'll try and think up a good Christmas post, but happy holidays to everybody all the same.

Thanks for reading.

Cause ain't no ships at the dock

The title is more or less what inspires my blogging these days: underemployment. Specifically, when my side gig (which typically sends me work via e-mail on a daily basis) does NOT send me work for a given day, I end up with time on my hands and I have to spend some of that time writing. If not, I'll melt into a noxious stew consisting of self-loathing broth mixed with assorted chunks of neuroses. When you're self-employed, this is called "motivation." Two last points before we get our hands dirty: I really wanted there to be some neat stevedore lingo for ships, but it turns out "ship" and "boat" are pretty short words. Also, "stevedore" is a really great word and your friends will be impressed if you ever figure out a way to use it at a bar.

On the ephemeral nature of shit
Shit is fascinating in its duality; it's waste, but it's necessary. It will exist as long as life does, and a universe without shit would be a dead one. Delicious food eventually becomes shit. Good TV shows couldn't exist without shit TV shows anchoring the line-up. "Community" couldn't exist if NBC weren't also checking their demos with shows like "Access Hollywood." I'm just kidding--NBC's prime time lineup makes no sense, and their dismal ratings demonstrate it better than I ever could. Anyway, you take my point about how shit is inevitable. I go "Ugh" in my head every time my puppy adopts her poop-squat, but my feelings don't change what's going to come out of there.


Lately I've had the feeling that the world is a little overwhelmed with shit. Like somehow the great cosmic balance between value and shit had shifted. As though I'd spent 20 minutes on the toilet after eating a sushi roll. You know what it is, honestly? Justin Bieber. And not him specifically--it's not as though there's anything unique about this particular child pop star. It's the idea that entire sectors of our culture are dominated by the most vacant silliness imaginable. We live in a time where talented people labor in obscurity and the children of celebrities get paid mouthpieces. I didn't mind when Will Smith's son starred in the Karate Kid remake, because children in movies have to played by children. I minded when Will Smith's daughter released a pop single about her bizarre haircut (pictured above--she looks like the Gestapo agent from "Raiders of the Lost Ark" just after his conversion to Scientology). I minded when Bristol Palin started getting paid $15,000 per appearance for talking about safe sex. Has she even had safe sex? Ever? Under the official line, didn't she move directly from unprotected baby-making sex to abstinence once she got pregnant and realized her mistake? Could she put a condom on a banana? Has anyone ever asked her? Meanwhile, want to guess the complete renumeration I will receive for the year-long process of researching and writing a marine biology book? $15,000. One moment:

Attention, teen pregnancy organizations. My name is Tony Palumbi. I have, in my life, never had sex without contraception. I have also, pursuant to your interests, maintained a perfect lifetime record of NOT knocking girls up. I do not believe these things are coincidental. I would be happy to speak at any of your events for less money than Bristol Palin, that talentless slutwagon. By the way, Bristol, you're not a "single mom." "Single" is your dating status on Facebook. You're a mom whose family has millions of dollars to care for your infant. Single moms have real problems. You don't.

And we're back! I had an epiphany; an insight to the universe's inner workings. While walking Bella (my puppy), I stopped to let her poop in her customary kudzu patch. She has pooped in this location an average of 1.2 times per day for the last three months. It's not that big. Honestly, the entire area should be carpeted with "processed" dog food. She should be stepping in it every time, but it never happens and she never takes any care to keep it from happening. Why is this? It's because shit, among its many traits, just doesn't last. It's the lowest, most broken-down form of its component substances--the last phase before they're absorbed back into the environment. Bella isn't constantly stepping in poop because shit, unlike value, is ephemeral. It dissolves and is re-absorbed into the system. So the volume of shit waxes and wanes, but it decomposes at a rate proportional to its creation.

This made sense. After all, while American culture has been turning out some real tripe, we've also managed to shorten our attention spans to the point where we honestly believe Lady Gaga's music is not identical to Ace of Base. Where we re-make movies that came out only 20 years ago! And while the New York Times columnists of the world tut-tut about these distractions, they're actually a defense mechanism saving Western civilization! The Internet and its eyeblink fads are the second prong of Al Gore's plan to save the world. He'll save the planet with his climate change initiatives and save humanity with the Internet. That man is amazing. And that's probably enough about Al Gore's prongs.

And while we're on the topic of shit...
I'd like to take a moment and talk about a particular flavor of shit: the San Francisco 49ers and their blighted season. For all their miserable failures, the Niners have actually met one of the goals for their 2010 season: figuring out Alex Smith. We now know for certain that Alex Smith will never be a good NFL QB. The world's been waiting on this verdict for years and finally we've got it! Why isn't anyone excited? I am, and I'm equally excited to see a 7-9 team win the NFC West while Frank Gore sobs into his "hope your hip feels better" ice cream. Poor Frank Gore. And poor Tony's Fantasy Team (title: JA-MAR-CUS), which was 8-0 before injuries exploded the roster.

My Patriots are having a surprisingly good season, but for the Niners fans there really is no hope. Even once this year is mercifully over...what's next? You have a question mark at coach (what's Mike Singletary's function aside from giving speeches?), a shoddy and disturbingly old secondary, and absolutely NOBODY at QB. And looming over it all is Jed York, the 30-year-old doofus who was born in a silver-spoon factory and was given full control of the team after his parents bought out Corrupt Uncle Eddie. Typically, when your team has identifiable holes, you rely on the GM to fix it. But Jed York is the GM, and he lacks two important traits: a) the ability to identify problems; b) the ability to fix problems (if he even knew they existed). So, in the words of the punk band Therefore I Am, "still there is no hope in moving on." The owner's not going to fire himself. Which leaves Niners fans...uhh...getting into baseball? I cannot wait for the offseason, when Jed York cites "the emergence of Troy Smith" as the reason why he didn't draft a quarterback.

MO' SHIT
Bella got her tail clipped over Thanksgiving. I didn't get it clipped; my parents' dog Carly did the honors by chomping the end of it. In Carly's defense, Bella was hitting her in the face over and over with that tail. She wags it so hard that her entire back half swings with it; this means that she can't walk straight if she's excited about something. But what it really means is this: she's missing a little chunk of flesh at the very tip of her tail, and if it bleeds...hooooly shit.

See, the tip of Bella's tail is all scabbed over. But she wags it SO HARD (if you've met Bella, you have known the stinging lash of her tail) that she inevitably smashes it into walls, corners, door frames, stair railings...basically any hard surface you can imagine. And when that happens, the scab gets broken open and Bella's wound starts bleeding. If it were anywhere else on her body, that would be fine. But it's on the hardest-wagging tail in the Western Hemisphere--when she really gets going, the tip is moving so fast that it's covered by the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. You can't say where the tail is located at any given moment in time--you just have to predict based on statistical probability.

So what happens when an oozing, bleeding wound is placed at the end of a puppy's tail and accelerated to relativistic speeds? Decoration happens--all over the furniture, all over the walls, all over EVERYTHING. If Bella is not restrained and put in her crate within seconds after re-opening her wound, she will Jackson Pollack the pristine white walls of The Humboldt with dog blood. It's a nightmare. And it's not like she's really gushing blood; like any broken scab, it just oozes slowly. But even the tiniest 0.05 nanoliter droplet of dog blood, when accelerated to 30% of light speed, leaves a hell of a mark. And because it's getting re-opened twice a day, the wound heals very slowly. Because it's at the end of a long, furry tail, I can't even affix a bandage to it. Any tail-wagging just sends the tube of gauze and medical tape flying. This is a bizarre injury that was put together by God himself to test me. Like Job, only without real problems.

I'll leave you with this Youtube video of Imogen Heap's "Hide and Seek." It's not a new song, and it's been sampled in some tragically bad hip-hop, but it demonstrates the proper use of Autotune. Turns out the trick is to be a genuinely creative person. Thanks always for reading.