Thursday Afternoon(ish) Lights

As you can see by the length of this post, I have had a lot of free time on my hands as of late (and we’ll leave it at that). What inspired me to write another blog? Well, there’s the free time. And, I had kinda already written this to post someday and then thought that I shouldn’t. But then I read today that Friday Night Lights, the best show in the history of mankind and executive produced by Jesus Christ himself (at least, that’s my guess), would finally be going off the air after next season. This doesn’t shock me. No one watches this thing. I’m amazed it made it this far, seeing as how I am their only viewer. But it makes me sad. It also makes it a perfect time to post this.

I’m not going to lie to you and say that, because I am a male who grew up in Texas, I felt it was my obligation to try out for the junior high football team the second I got the chance. Or that I joined out of some sense of male pride and wanted show the other kids in school that I was more than just the weird son of their reading teacher and that I possessed more quality traits than a weird set of teeth. No, I actually generally, enthusiastically, like football. People always assume that I would hate the sport (and sports in general), because, you know, I’M FAAABULOUS! To which I respond: have you ever even watched football?

But beyond my love of the sport, I probably signed up for seventh grade athletics because I am a male that grew up in Texas and I felt it was my obligation to try out for the junior high football team the second I got the chance.

I would not call Gatesville a football town per se. I mean, they have a prison so there are other things going for it. But football is naturally pretty big in Gatesville, your stereotypical Texas small town. For example, the Lion’s Club meets at the Dairy Queen, tractors have the right-of-way down main street, and I have heard more goat-fucking stories from classmates than I care to recall.

I stepped into this world in 1996, eleven going on twelve. This is the perfect age to NOT move from a city to a small town. My parents, God bless them, apparently wanted to make the move as unnatural and completely awkward as they possibly could. So I was adrift and confused and awkward and weird and lonely and looking at other boys too much and I figured football would be the perfect thing for me because it would make all of those problems go away!

Practice started the first day of school. August in Texas. I don’t think miserable is the correct word. I don’t even think les miserables is the correct word. First off, the helmet is absolutely the most uncomfortable thing I have ever put on. It was like placing my head in a vice grip that itself was in a vice grip and then wedged in between boulders. My mouth guard almost made me pass out. Because I had braces, the rubber implant had to cover both the top and bottom of my mouth and since I was a heavy mouth breather, hilarity ensued. And I could never get the knee pads and thigh pads to sit just right in my pants. They would overlap on each other and wedge themselves between my legs and give people the general impression I had elephantitus. All of this would suck in nice weather. It bears repeating: August in Texas.

And then they expected us to shower in front of other people? This is something that I absolutely would not tolerate. Thirteen is an awkward time, especially if you were going through what I was going through.

When people try out for the team, I assume most of them aspire to be the quarterback or the running back or one of those big glamor position. Looking back, I find it kind of fascinating that I never harbored dreams of any of these positions. I knew I was going to be a line backer or something, and I never though anything more of it. So when I was assigned the position, I was not at all surprised.

I was surprised, however, that I did not make the A Team. Or the B Team.

I would be a lineman on the Gatesville Junior High Seventh Grade C Team.

My confidence was shot, but I figured I would have to make the best of it. It did not help that I had bragged to people about my abilities, and that I was assured a spot on one of the higher teams. The situation was not terrible, however. Both of my best friends were on the team, albeit in the more flashy positions of running back and wide receiver.

And then there was the coach to beat all coaches: Coach McKamie. Coach Charles McKamie moonlighted as our Texas History teacher during the day, a Baptist minister on the weekends, and a poet and philosopher to us young men in between. He was huge, unhealthily so, and wore big Coke-bottle glasses. But the guy rocked. He wasn’t a hard ass like the other coaches. He knew his place and what this all meant. If I faced certain disappointments in being selected to this team, I had to wonder what Chuckie McK thought about being selected as coach, especially compared to the others in his position.

The B team coach was Coach Morgan, who would one day be my sophomore world geography teacher and would eventually lead the high school varsity. His tale ends rather sadly: Morgan replaced a coach who had led the team to an undefeated season and a state championship. When Morgan failed to reach these heights, he was run out of town. So it goes.

The A team coach was Coach Price, a Vietnam vet from California who yelled until his face turned red, ran at least five million miles on the weekends and after school, and frequently had Nam flashbacks in the middle of his eighth grade American History class. He was certifiably, bat-shit insane. Whenever you were injured, or had any problem whatsoever, his response would be, “What are you telling me for?!? Put some ice on in and go run a mile!” When I twisted my ankle once, and I dared to inform him, Coach Price screamed, “Ah, Ament! What are you telling me for?!? Go put some ice on it and run a mile!” He probably wouldn’t have cared if I told him following these instructions would result in my premature death.

However, even though I did not play on his team, Coach Price and I eventually developed a rapport, since he was my teacher the next year. He was incredibly taken by me, and sometimes amused himself in my humiliation. Once we had to write constitutions for a class project. Price assigned the groups and stuck me with every looser and deadbeat in the room. When I dared to complain about this, he told me, “Ah, Ament! What are you telling me for?!? You gotta’ motivate these people! Put some ice on it and run a mile!” I ended up doing the entire assignment myself. Another time, he asked me point blank what my views on abortion were. Revealing my views on abortion to Coach Price was a greater moral quandary than abortion itself, especially since I was a freaking eight grader and no more had a view on abortion than I did on nuclear proliferation between India and Pakistan. I weighed my options. If I told him abortion was great, he would yell, “Ah, Ament! What do you mean? You want a bunch of innocent babies to get murdered?!?” If I told him I was against it: “Ah, Ament! What do you mean? You want a bunch of unfit mothers to have babies they can’t take care of and kill them?!?” So I gave him the only viable option: I replied, “What’s abortion?”

“Ah, Ament!” he screamed. “I thought you were one of those genius kids!” But he let it go. At the awards banquet at the end of the year, when every teacher gives a medal or something else useless to their favorite student, Coach Price selected me. Of all the awards I was… awarded in my school years, this was my favorite. Coach Price eventually retired and moved to California. As far as I know, no one has heard of him since.

But I digress.

C Team. Seventh grade. Coach McKamie. I was left guard on offense and occasionally tackle and middle linebacker on defense. This is how practice went. The team trotted onto the field and tried not to pass out the second the heat worked it’s way under the helmets. No one was benched at practice. Half the team played offense and the other half defense. Coach McKamie tried to teach us plays. I imagine this was difficult work for, say, the quarterback or a receiver or something. My instructions were the same on every play: hit the guy in front of you. So we would run a few plays and then complain about the heat. Coach knew we were a lost cause, so he let us take water breaks whenever we wanted. Water was run from a garden hose into a series of plastic pipes and tasted like ass. But drinking it was better than actual practice.

I’m serious, all we did was bitch and moan about practice. We were the C Team. We were only out there because we were males who grew up in Texas and felt it was our obligation to try out for the junior high football team the second we got the chance. When our bitching was too much, Coach would assign us “bear crawls” after practice. A bear crawl consists of running up and down the field on all fours like a goddamned bear. It was humiliating, and doing these back and forth for hundreds of yards in the Texas heat with all that equipment on is probably the closest I will ever get to torture by the Iraqi guard (I say “probably” cause I don’t like to rule things out).

Occasionally, we would scrimmage the B Team at practice. We never scrimmaged the A Team, who practiced far away from us on top of a fucking hill like they were the gods of Olympus and just because their asses looked better in the football pants than ours they were not allowed to fraternize with us. Funny thing is, every time we played the B Team, and I mean Every Single Time, we beat the crap out of them. Coach Morgan would yell at his B Teamers, “What the hell are you doing, getting beat by the C Team?” and Coach McKamie would laugh and my friends would run all over the field and I would stand and stare with my mouth agape, dreaming of 5:00 when I could go home and watch The Drew Carry Show or play Goldeneye or read a Michael Crichton book and maybe listen to my No Doubt or Spice Girls CD.

I. Fucking. Hated. Football. Practice.

But I stayed in football. A) I was a male in Texas yadda yadda yadda. B) No way was I going to join gym class with all the losers and deadbeats who would eventually be my group partners in the “Write Your Own Constitution!” project for Coach Price. C) I liked football and actually liked playing in games (especially away ones). And D) The Locker Room.

The Locker Room.

Teenage sex comedies usually include a scene where the guys drill a hole into the girl’s locker room so they can see the opposite sex shower and frolic and giggle and all that girl horseshit.  This involved great feats of engineering to achieve, and the risk of stiff punishment. And I do mean stiff punishment. I got all the pleasure out of this scene in real life but without the girls, without the feats of engineering, and without the threat of stiff punishment. The stiff punishment came later as I drifted off to sleep. Boo yah!

I think it’s fairly safe to say I knew I was gay back then. I mean, I wasn’t exactly familiar with the concept or anything since absolutely no one in Gatesville could ever possibly be gay. But I knew something was going on when I was forced to change before and after practice and, while it scared and scarred the crap out of me, I must confess I looked forward to it all day. That semester I spent playing football taught me leagues about myself, and most of that learning was off the field and in the locker room. I grew as a human being. Literally. I grew.

Practice, heat, learn plays, drink ass water, tackle, scrimmage, bitch, bear crawl, run, put ice on it, change, rinse and repeat. That was my life five days a week during the fall of (shudder) 1996. That is, every day except glorious, glorious game day.

Game day meant you got out of class early. Game day meant you might get to ride on a bus and eat with the team afterwards. Game day meant you got to show off for your family. Most importantly, game day meant no practice.

Games for the C Team were scheduled at the weirdest, stupidest times. Some days it would be 2:00 on a Tuesday. Some days it would be 9:00 on a Wednesday. Most of the time, however, we battled for glory and honor on Thursday afternoon, the undercard to the B and A Team matches scheduled after us. Home games were only moderately exciting. Home games usually meant a full practice and then a thirty-second march to the varsity stadium across the street. Often, we would be the only team playing that day and our march to the stadium would bring us past the A Team or even the eighth grade practices. The coaches would blow their whistles and the practicing teams would pause, stare at us, and then start clapping as we passed. Like they gave a flying fuck what the C Team did. Like they didn’t make fun of us in the halls. Whatever. How many of those A Teamers have a blog today, huh? Huh?

I’d be lying if I told you I remembered every game. I don’t. Even I knew how stupid and insignificant they were, and I had yet to develop my finely tuned sense of sarcasm and cynicism. Scheduling teams for us to play must have taken some fancy footwork. All the schools in our district were small compared to the mighty Gatesville Independent School District, and most didn’t even field a B team, much less a freaking C team. So we often had to play far away, in distant lands such as Stephenville and Brownwood, and against B and sometimes A teams. I remember the Stephenville game well. We played their A Team. Even our moms were beaten that night.

Our first game was against Clifton. If you’ve heard of Gatesville, you’ve probably heard of Clifton. So you probably haven’t heard of Clifton. It’s something like and hour and a half away from G’ville. They have an exceptionally good Dairy Queen.

So, anyway, the Clifton game. My whole family was there. They came to every game. I often get frustrated at how little I can get emo about my childhood, which was supposed to be miserable like everyone else’s. My parents were (are) far too supportive of me. They weren’t (aren’t) even Republicans! What do I have to rebel against?!? We won the game by a score of 16-6, which implies that no field goals were made. I’m pretty sure none were attempted and we just had to go for two every time.

I chiefly remember three things about this game. I remember going to the bathroom right before the game and discovering I was incredibly nervous because my junk, which was just starting to get respectable, had shriveled to pre-What’s Happening to My Body? size. I remember making my first tackle and immediately drawing a face mask call. Everyone was frustrated by this so I kept my hands at my side for the remainder of the game, tackling with the force of my body instead of using my arms and probably looking pretty stupid in the process. And I remember winning and thinking how cool winning was and that we were going to win every game that year cause this wasn’t hard at all and that would show those A Teamers on the hill with their perfectly-fitted pants and their hair and their party invitations and their talent.

We lost the next game at home to Hamilton. Hamilton. What a stupid name for a stupid town.

Games for us were a combination of barely-succesfull plays mixed in with utter confusion and the chaos and banality of war. I paid attention maybe 30% of the time. Since I could give two shits about the actual play call, seeing as how my action was the same every single time, I only had to know if we were on offense or not. I only played defense in the rarest of circumstances. I instead spent most of my time on the bench, staring at clouds, waving to my mom in the stands, drinking putrid water out of green Gatorade bottles, talking to people, and thinking about where we were going to eat after the game. When the offense went out, I went out with them and hit the guy in front of me. Maybe we scored, maybe we didn’t. I trotted back to the bench and repeated the process. I didn’t even have to listen for the coach to call on offense, since it was obvious when a bunch of players were coming off the field that I would be going on next. Point it, I just rolled with it and didn’t pay attention. This is called foreshadowing.

Our biggest game of the year was against Brownwood. The game was big not because we were big rivals or that the game would win us the championship or any of that shit. Haven’t you been reading? C Team. No, it was the biggest game of the year because Brownwood was three hours away and we got to miss almost an entire day of school. Plus, since other teams were using the Brownwood High Stadium, we got to play at the local regional college, Howard mother fuckin’ Payne, bitches! Howard Payne was (I think) a Baptist seminary and home of the fighting, praying Yellow Jackets. I would later attend a band camp here in the summer between my junior and senior years and room with a guy who used shampoo for soap. But that has no baring on this story. Point is, we, the lowly Gatesville High School Fightin’ Hornet Seventh Grade C Team (or GHSFHSGCT for short) got to play at a real college stadium, something those asshole A Teamers on the hill never got to do with their shiny helmets and their tied laces and their getting-to-third-base-before-I-even-knew-we-were-playing-a-game and their eventual spot on the 2000 state championship team where they got to play in bigger, better college stadiums. Nope. Coach Price’s A Team didn’t get to play at Howard Payne!

I can’t remember if we won or lost this game. I think we won. I’m just going to say that we won, since no one remembers. But what I do remember, and what my two friends on that team still remember, is this.

So on one play, the defense is out on the field. I am not paying attention. The next play, our offense goes out, the regiment I am a member of. Nope, I’m still not paying attention. I’m talking to the guy next to me about how Ellen really is a great show, probably my favorite, and who cares if she’s a lesbian, it’s still a funny show! I hear Coach McK say something to the effect of, “Who the hell is missing out there?” (Baptist preacher on the weekends, remember?). This causes me to look up and out to the field. That’s funny. Our quarterback is out there. My friends, the wide receivers, are out there. There’s a big gaping hole on the offensive line. It dawns on me when the guy whom I should be next to on the line looks over at to the bench and throws in my direction a look of absolute horror and panic. Yes, it dawns on me: I am supposed to be filling that big gaping hole on the offensive line.

I bolt off the bench and make my way to the sideline just as the ball is snapped. Alas, I am too late. A Brownsville defensive tackle shoots through the hole vacated by yours truly and makes a bee line towards our quarterback (more appropriately, a yellow jacket-line). The glorious GHSFHSGCT QB is going to get sacked. But he has quick feet, this quarterback of ours. He hands the ball off to one of my fiends, who bolts ahead for a gain. It might even have been a first down.

Coach McKamie is waddling my way, a steam of rage fogging his stylish Coke-bottle glasses. “Ament!” he yells. “What the hell was that? Why the hell weren’t you out there?”

What do I say? “Sorry, but have you ever watched this Ellen show?” Or, “It’s exactly what I planned, sir! Now we have them right where we want them!” Or, “What’s abortion?”

This is what I think I said: “I thought we were on defense… sir…” And then: “We moved the ball… sir?”

“Do you want to sit on the bench for the rest of the season?” he screams, belly sloshing this way and that.

“No? Sir?”

“Get out to the huddle! NOW, AMENT, NOW!”

He really couldn’t say much more than that. We were the C Team. Who. Cares.

The other guys, they are loving it. “Austin,” they say (we always addressed each other by our Christian names), “why don’t you go sit back down? We got this!” I have no comeback to this. I smile, let the fuckers know that I am in on the joke, and take my place on the line. Three plays later and we punt. With me off the field and a man short, they had positive yardage. With me on the field, it’s three and out. This story is still rehashed when I see the two guys on the team that I still talk to. And to the others: I bet you feel sorry now! You had no idea that your mean comments were going to live forever, in a story written at 4:30 in the morning by the gentlemen who would one day be voted “Most Likely to Succeed” by the GHS Class of 2002 (colloquially known as Brew Crew ’02). I bet you feel silly now. And I was totally checking some of you out in the locker room, so bite me.

And that pretty much sums up my football playing career. I performed my duty as a male growing up in Texas and made the team. I showed up to the games. What else did you want me to do, it’s the C Team for Christ’s sake!

Like I said, I don’t know how many games we won or lost. There was no trophy or nothing at season’s end. I told people that I was going to go out for the team next year and try harder, but I already knew when I took my helmet off after the last game I would never put it back on. Playing football was not for me. I would have much more fun watching it from the stands as a member of the Gatesville High School Marching Hornet Band, The Pride of Coryell County (GHSMHB, PCC for short). But I am proud to say that I played beside a few champions. Several of these guys, these C Teamers, they eventually made varsity years later and helped bring to Gatesville the school’s only state championship. I mean, they were total dicks in school, for the most part. But the football field is the great equalizer I suppose.

After that, I did not go out for the basketball team, seeing as though I am incredibly clumsy despite my height (might I remind you, I fell off a roof trying to get a tan). I did not go out for baseball either cause who the hell would want to do that? I stayed in the athletics class, but only so I didn’t have to go to P.E. When I was confronted with my lack of participation, I lied and said I was conditioning for next year (we had to run like 85 miles each day during the off season) and then tried my hand at making the discus squad in track and field. I failed miserably. Evidently, it ain’t like throwing a Frisbee. When it came time to sign up for eight grade classes, I discovered I did not need another P.E. requirement and decided to get a head start on high school with First Year Spanish. And we all know how my Spanish skills turned out (“Tengo… big stick?”).

No, I was not destined for football stardom. But on some nights, as I sit exactly 100 miles from Gatesville High School’s McKamie Stadium, I hear the city sounds around me and cars passing on the street morph into the roar of a crowd. The air is crisp and the moon is full and the lights from Memorial Stadium on the UT campus blind the starless sky and I dream of gridiron glory. Everything is on the line, the clock is winding down, the time outs are spent, and there exists just One. More. Play. The ball is snapped, the lines crash, and I am not in the trenches but running down the sideline, my cleats striking craters into the perfectly manicured earth, my hands outstretched in the air, hanging there, waiting for that perfect spiral pass. I am beyond coverage now and the quarterback see this and the ball is thrown and darts to me, like a hornet, and alights in my hand. I am off, no one can stop me now, like a longhorn on the stampede I quest for the end zone and when I am there the game is over and my name is legend. That night I bang the quarterback and my world is perfect.

Remember, Remember, the 23rd of October

Please join me in forgetting the fact that I am turning 26 in a few days (lies, I tell you!), and instead focus on how awesomely cool the 23rd of October is. By the end of this post, you will totally hate your birthday because it is lame and is not invited to the cool birthday birthday party (I’ve only had one cup of coffee this morning, leave me alone!).

October 23rd falls on an astrological cusp. This is a day where two zodiological (which apparently isn’t a word, says spell check) signs merge to form an awesome, uber-starsign (which also isn’t a word). Some horoscopes say the 23rd is the last day for Libra, others say it is the first day for Scorpio. So you know what that means? I get to read TWO horoscopes! Let’s say the Libra one claims I’m going to get run over by a car. No problem, I’ll just be a Scorpio on that day! Can you do that? No. I didn’t think so. Now, technically, if you are born in the morning you are a Cusp Libra, and if you are born in the afternoon you are a Cusp Scorpio. But this is stupid, cause if someone asks you your sign, and everyone does this still, right?, you’re not going to say “Well, technically, I’m a blah blah blah WTF.” You’re going to say “Scorpio,” cause they’re good in the sack. Libras cry a lot. Or so I’m assuming, based on personal experience.

The stock market started to crash on October 23, 1929. The full melt down didn’t happen until a few days later, but the Great Depression technically started on my birthday. So without my birthday, you would never get the Great Depression and therefore no World War II and therefore no Raiders of the Lost Ark and Wolfenstein 3D. No, you’re welcome. Also, that little recession we are still going through would have been called the Great Depression. So now you didn’t have to live through the Depression. No, you’re welcome.

Oh, we ain’t done yet! October 23 is also Mole Day. Because I have no idea what the fuck this means, I will copy and paste this line of text from Wikipedia and let you sort it out: “Mole Day is an unofficial holiday celebrated among chemists in North America on October 23, between 6:02 AM and 6:02 PM, making the date 6:02 10/23 in the American style of writing dates. The time and date are derived from the Avogadro constant, which is approximately 6.02×10^23, defining the number of particles (atoms or molecules) in a mole, one of the seven base SI units.” Yeah, suck on that October 24th!

Hey, anyone here like Communist Russia? Sure, who the heck doesn’t?!? Lenin called for the October Revolution on October 23, 1917. So without October 23rd, there would be no Cold War or campus Marxists clubs or James Bond movies or Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Oh, and Hitler would have won World War II. Kinda puts it all into perspective, doesn’t it?

Hey, believe the Earth is only a few thousand years old? In 1650, an archbishop for the Catholic Church (cause they’re always right) used the Bible and the dates within to calculate the day the world was created. What date would that be? Funny you should ask! October 23, 4004 BC. So I was born ON THE DAY THE WORLD WAS CREATED (supposedly, according to 1650 theological science). Your birthday = FAIL.

Boy, iPods sure are great, aren’t they? It would suck if there were no October 23, 2001, because then Apple would not have released the iPod and would have gone bankrupt and you would still be listening to your Sony Discman right now. Or a (shudder) Zune. But without an iPod there would be no crappy alternative from Microsoft, so that’s a moot point. And, perhaps most tragic of all, the world would have never seen Feist’s “1234″ video. And there wouldn’t be an iPhone. And you couldn’t download the cool songs from Glee the next morning on iTunes. And you’d probably be iDead, killing yourself out of boredom. Suicide? There’s probably an app for that… thanks to October 23!

There are also 69 days left until the new year. Tee hee.

Goodness gracious me, we haven’t even gotten to the birthdays on October 23! Let’s list some, shall we?

- Isabella of Portugal (whom I thought sponsored Columbus or something but then I realized I was an idiot and she did practically nothing. Still. She was smokin’)

- Johnny Carson (you might have heard of him. Jack Nicholson is a big fan)

- Harold P. Warren (any Mystery Science Theater 3000 fans surely knows of Manos: The Hands of Fate. Mr. Warren was the El Paso fertilizer salesman responsible for that. My success in filmmaking is assured!)

- Pele (who apparently plays some sport called “soccer.” Never herd of it either)

- Michael Crichton (we have a T-rex!)

- Ang Lee (another director! Is this fate? He made Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and Brokeback Mountain. So my dreams of making a gay samurai movie are all but assured!)

- Dwight Yoakam (of Panic Room fame)

- Nancy Grace (actually a little ashamed about this one. WHY IS SHE YELLING AT ME?)

- Sam Raimi (what’s this? Another director? The maker of The Evil Dead and Spiderman? So my dreams of making a superhero horror movie [where everyone is gay] are all but assured!)

- Weird Al Yankovic (this ALONE makes my birthday cooler than yours!)

- Doug Flutie (Flutie Flakes!)

- Augusten Burroughs (did you know that’s not his real name?)

- Ryan Reynolds (Google a picture of Ryan Reynolds, then tell me you ain’t jealous )

- Meghan McCain (meaning that John McCain and Cindy McCain had sex around roughly the same time my parents did, albeit a few years later. It’s science, really)

- Princess Mako of Japan (meaning that one day I, too, can be empress of Japan! Oh, joy!)

So I basically went through all this research to make me feel better about turning 26. Whatever it takes. And I’ve decided it takes alcohol. And the knowledge that your birthday sucks and mine doesn’t.

In other news, I’m turning 26 in a few days. This concerns me.

Catching Up Is Hard to Do

-Wait, wait, wait. I have a blog? Why the hell didn’t anyone tell me about this?

-Here at the old advertising agency, we’ve had a problem with solicitors coming up to sell us stuff. This has prompted outrage among the staff, who have decided they don’t like to be interrupted by people selling them stuff. The irony is more ironic than the amount of irony in Alanis Morisette’s song. And since that song was not at all ironic, this is pretty ironic… don’t you think?

-So in reading a review on the new Beatles box set today (cause apparently the Beatles albums have simply not been released enough times), a sobering fact was pointed out to me. I will share that fact, now, without a “Works Cited” page. When The Beatles’ last album, Abbey Road, was recorded in 1969, George was 26, Paul 27, John 28, and Ringo 29. I’m turning 26 in a month and I can’t even update my damn blog in a timely fashion. In addition, and this is where things get really mind-blowing, their debut album, Please Please Me, was released in 1963. So in the span of SIX YEARS, The Beatles went from unknowns to boy band to hippie drug freaks to artists to the most important band ever in the history of the world until Matchbox 20. So, 1963. Imagine a band that came out in 2003 and having that kind of impact today, in 2009.

-Summer movies? Well, Star Trek was the best. And I think I have a specific reason why. No, it’s not because Star Trek is cool, cause it’s really not. What I appreciated above all was the movie’s inability to take itself too seriously. I was afraid the filmmakers would try to darken up a story that doesn’t need to be dark. “Dark Knight” it, if you will. And while that works for Batman, ignoring the fact that he’s a billionaire that flies around like a fucking bat at night, it doesn’t work for Star Trek, especially old-school, Kirk and Spock Trek. So ignoring the stupid time travel story (I swear, between this and Lost, if I never see another time-travel related story again, I’ll be as happy as I would be if I never saw another time-travel story again), I loved the movie. It was funny and exciting and did not try to be what it wasn’t supposed to be. Also too, Chris Pine. Other summer movies:

Inglourious Basterds: More like Glorious Non-bastards. It totally wasn’t what I expected it to be, and it was better for it. I was expecting Kill Bill 1 and I got Kill Bill 2. And this works just fine. I’ve seen it twice and can’t wait to see it again.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince: More like Harry Potter and the Half-Assed Movie. I swear, I don’t think I’ve seen more of a lack of plot progression since the third season of Lost. This is the first of these movies that my brain has flat-out rejected. It worked fine as a book. But as a movie? Bleh.

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen: More like TransfAHHHHHHH SHITS BLOWING UP PAY ATTENTION TO THE SCREEN YOU FUCKING PANSY OR WE’LL SHOOT YOUR FUCKING DOG! AM I SHAKING YOU TOO HARD? WHY YOU CRYING? If you ever wanted to know what it felt like to be in a plane crash, this is probably close. Not saying it was bad or anything. It was actually really fun. But the migraine, oh, the migraine.

District 9: More like District…um…good movie? This was a good movie. I had no idea what it was about going in. So it made it better. Also, props for a lot of these movies returning to 80s-style violence. 80s violence is cool.

I can’t remember any more.

-I traveled to two places this summer. The first was Lubbock, where I played beer pong and drank for about three days straight. I also think I picked up some sort of horrendous disease during my stay. The second trip was Jacksonville, Florida, to shoot a commercial with a real, live Olympic gold medalist! As I have referenced before, I love the Olympics, and the opportunity to prance (and prance is the correct word here) around with a gold medal around my neck was just the bees knees. Also, Florida smells like feet.

-So let’s talk about that horrendous disease, eh? Circa end of July of this summer, I got sick one night. Nothing major, felt like a sinus infection. I stayed home from work, I drank orange juice, I thought I had recovered.

But the sickness had other plans…

As did my liver, apparently. So one night after getting absolutely embarrassingly drunk the night before, I’m over at Billy and the Gretch’s, about to go party, and I feel weak again. I check my temperature, and it’s 99. Any normal person would say, at this point, “You know? Maybe I should sit this party out. You know, seeing as how I might have assassinated my liver last night.” Not P.A. Austin though (the P.A. stands for Party Animal!). But it’s a hat party, and I really want to wear this hat made for Gretchen’s schnauzer Emma, so I go and hope more alcohol makes things better.

Of course things don’t get better. When we arrive back from the party, I’m up to 101 and officially, on the record, sick. I stay over at B and Gs cause I literally cannot move. I don’t even want to eat, which if you know me, is immediate cause for concern. We throw on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I’m too sick to even cry when Splinter “dies.” Yadda yadda yadda by three or four in the morning my fever is up to 105. My fever is so high that I require freaking surveillance (thanks, Gretchen!).

I haven’t even explained the worst part of all this yet. Fever, pain, nausea, aches, I can take all that. But oh my Christ, the sore throat. I wanted to cry every time I swallowed (TWSS). Imagine, if you will, swallowing a samurai sword covered in other samurai swords covered in bee stingers dipped in poison and on fire. And there’s eight of these sword-bee contraptions going down your throat.

The sore throat and the ungodly temperature and the weird-ass dreams that I can’t remember scared me enough to go to an emergency care clinic the next day, since it was Sunday and my doc was unavailable. Two things about emergency care: 1) I felt safer there than I did at the St. David’s emergency room and, 2) don’t go to one. Your insurance probably doesn’t cover it. I have the bills to prove it. But they give me meds and by that night, my fever breaks, my appetite returns, and I am able to go to work the next morning. The throat still hurts, but it becomes more manageable each day.

So I think I’ve made a full recovery.

But the sickness, which I have named “D1FU1,” or colloquially “Douche Flu,” had other plans…

I’m at work, a week and a half after. Feeling great. I’m telling you, I had made a FULL recovery. I could even swallow again (TWSS)! But I’m sitting at my desk, watching J-Pop music videos, and I feel it. The ache. A slight scratching in the throat. Fuck. Douche Flu is back.

I go home after work and collapse. Fever gets up to 101. Samurai-bee-fire is back in my throat. I watch Close Encounters of the Third Kind. I’m too sick to even cry at the end when the cute little alien comes out and shares hand signals with the French guy. At the doctor the next day, I’m all like, “what the fuck?” Only I don’t say fuck cause he knows my parents and I want him to think that I think my parents will be mad at me if they think I think saying fuck is bad.

Here’s where the plot thickens. He says but one word to me: mono.

Mono? Am I thirteen and at summer camp? No, I’m 25 and on my way to becoming an old spinster. How the fuck did I get mono? I mean, I’ve got theories and all, but seriously. The mono screen he gives me turns out to be inconclusive, meaning I could have mono or it could still be Douche Flu. I swear, every medical test I ever take always turns up “inconclusive.” I always show the symptoms of something, but then that something doesn’t show up on the test, and I don’t get the good drugs.

Doc proceeds to tell me that it could also be a bacterial infection. But since the fucking strep screen came back negative to, I’m a medical-fucking-enigma, worthy of a guest spot on House. Doc decides to treat it as mono AND bacterial infection. So not only am I a whore, but I’m a dirty whore.

More antibiotics, more rest. And I make a full recovery. I am able to attend my grandpa’s 80th birthday party, the Redskin Ranch housewarming, and clean my entire filthy-ass apartment, top to bottom. Feeling great. Great great great. Things could not get greater.

But Douche Flu (mono and bacterial infection combo) had other plans…

Sunday a week later and I’m freaking out. My throat STILL HURTS. But this time, there is no fever or aches. Just a sore throat. And the sore throat is not severe, just a pain in the ass…er, throat. So I convince myself that it’s all over and I’m dying. I mean, this has to be throat cancer, right? And throughout the week, my throat continues to bother me even though I feel fine in every other possible way. Except emotionally, of course.

It takes another entire TWO WEEKS for the scratchiness in the throat to go away. And I can occasionally feel it back there, scratching, waiting like the douche that it is. Douche Flu can strike at any moment kids.

Finally, the moral of this story is I was sick for an entire month and I somehow gained a pound. Other people drop like twenty. I gain one. Mother. Fuck.

-Boy, it’s sure gonna be fun when we all get Swine Flu!

-After a few months off, you’d think I’d have more to say. But I don’t. This is assuming you don’t need my recap of the VMAs?

In Which I Talk About Star Trek and This Becomes the Dorkiest Blog Ever

In preparation for what is likely to be the best movie of the summer, I thought we’d discuss a little Star Trek. Doesn’t that sound like fun?

It seems to me that Star Trek is the most absolutely divisive form of geek pop culture entertainment ever, if that makes any sense at all. It is the definition of dorky. People are willing to give a pass to anything, and accept the quirks of most any random geeky thing. For example, no one really hates Star Wars (or am I just being optimistic?). Even if you don’t necessarily care for the goings on in our favorite galaxy far, far away, your mouth doesn’t fill with bile at the very mention of its name.

Not poor Star Trek. People HATE Star Trek. It’s not cool. It’s never been cool. It was the original, weirdo, outcast, fan convention-y, dork show by which all others are based and it has never escaped that stigma. For some reason, people find it absolutely impossible to accept that there is such a thing as a causal Star Trek fan. When I say, “Oh, that new Star Trek movie. That looks good. I think I’ll go see that,” people are like, “OMFG, are you some sort of weirdo looser dork? Are you lining up at midnight? Are you going to dress up? Do you speak Klingon? Have you gotten laid? Were they wearing Vulcan ears when you did it? Or was it just a Vulcan blow up doll? Why are you such a fucking dork, you dorky fuck?” This is what people say.

I consider myself… wait for it… a causal Star Trek fan. Such a thing exists. It is possible. Now, people know I am a dork and just assume that I am head over heels in love with Gene Roddenberry’s vision of life in the 23rd century. I admit that it would be an accurate assumption to make. But let me just make one thing ABSOLUTELY clear before we get any further into our discussion: Star Trek and Star Wars are two absolutely, completely distinct and separate things. While there is a ton of overlap, liking one does not mean you will like the other, and they are in fact two COMPLETELY different approaches to COMPLETELY different stories. I am a huge and unapologetic Star Wars enthusiast. I love the hell out of that stupid thing. If you want to make fun of me for something, make fun of me for that. I have a Yoda poster and a Han Solo painting both hanging in my apartment. I DO NOT have a Star Trek anything hanging anywhere in my apartment. So there.

…

No, I’m not done with that yet, I’ve decided. I mean, it’s like saying Nintendo and Sega are the same thing. I mean, Christ! I once read something a long time ago that said Star Wars was the ultimate Republican view of the future (even though it takes place a long time ago, bitches) and Star Trek was the Democratic view. I can kinda see that. Star Wars is about a huge bureaucracy that fails and requires a small revolution to overthrow and install a, theoretically, smaller government body. Star Trek is about a quasi-utopian federation that completely rules all the star systems. They don’t even have money! So there. Star Wars and Star Trek are as completely incompatible as Republicans and Democrats. I trust I’ve proven my point.

So, I consider myself a casual Star Trek fan. I’ve watched some of the TV episodes. I’ve seen all of the movies multiple times. I know the difference between a Vulcan and a Romulan. But I have not seen every episode. Hell, I haven’t even seen complete episodes of Deep Space Nine and Enterprise. I have never read one of the books. I do not speak Klingon. I have never had a sexual fantasy involving any of the characters. I like to keep things casual.

I think the reason I’m not more of a Star Trek fan is that there is simply too much crap to keep up with. I mean, we are talking about six television series, hundreds of books and comics, ten (soon to be eleven) movies, and so on. I mean, who seriously has time to sort through all that? And a lot of it is not all that good. Star Trek is primarily a series of TV, um, series, and a lot of the episodes I’ve were pretty terrible. Not just from the original series but from the recent ones, like The Next Generation, as well.

My admiration of Star Trek comes primarily from the movies. Instead of watching 100+ hours of a TV show with bad special effects, all the good stuff about Star Trek is boiled down to just under two hours in a movie with slightly better effects. I actually like all the movies for different reasons, but the quality on those things are absolutely all over the place. Some are awesome and some are considered the worst movies ever made. The general rule of thumb is that the even numbered Treks are the ones worth watching, and anything with an odd number should  be thrown in the garbage. This rule actually holds up really well, except part VII (Generations), which is one of my personal favorites.

So just a quick go over of the movies since you care (and really, it’s my blog so I can do this). Part One, The Motion Picture, is pretty freaking boring. Wrath of Khan is pretty freaking good. The Search for Spock is alright. The Voyage Home is the one with the whales and really funny. The Final Frontier is not as bad as everyone makes it out to be. The Undiscovered Country is my favorite. Generations is cool cause it has The Next Generation cast, finally. First Contact is fantastic. Insurrection is the worst of the worst. Nemesis ain’t much better. It’s a shame that the movies with The Next Generation cast aren’t better, since I like that show better than the original, as I think most people my age do since it was the series airing when we were growing up. I mean, come on, Worf and Data and Jordi LaForge/Reading Rainbow guy? And Captain Picard? They are cool.

So I think the new movie looks really fun. There’s already a big stink about it cause it changes a lot of the timeline and isn’t completely true to the original series. But, you see, that’s the point. One of the big reasons Star Trek fans are so shat upon is because they refuse to accept anything that isn’t absolutely true to the characters or stories. I mean, I was reading an interview with the guy who plays Sulu and he talked about how he had to punch the buttons on his computer on the bridge just right so fans would not have a moderate to serious stroke.

Don’t you think this is taking it too far? But then I think, “Hey, Austin? What if they did this to Star Wars? What if, twenty years down the line someone remade the first Star Wars movie and changed a whole bunch and stuff? What would you think then? Why do you even have this inner voice that asks the stupidest hypothetical questions?” I honestly wouldn’t care. I mean, George Lucas has already remade the movie like three times anyway, so who gives a shit, right?

Point is, it seems this movie is kinda really its own little thing, almost completely independent of the other Star Trek stuff. It’s made for people who haven’t seen a single episode and for people who have translated the Bible into Klingon. There’s a balance that has to be struck. In the end, I really don’t think it will matter to most people. There is one thing that both Star Trek fans and people who have never heard want out of it: a good movie. And I think it looks like such. And it doesn’t hurt that it’s made by J.J. Abrams, who wrote and directed some kick-ass episodes of Lost.

But a warning before I end. I remember writing a similar post like this before the Indiana Jones movie came out last summer. I told people to calm the fuck down an not worry that they were changing stuff. And then I saw The Crystal Skull. And it just… wasn’t… Indy. The stuff they changed wasn’t that bad. But they delivered a movie that kinda stripped away what made Indiana Jones Indiana Jones. I’m sorry, I love aliens to death, but there is a time and a place for them and an Indiana Jones movie is neither the time nor the place. And no movie should EVER feature Shia LaBeouf swinging from trees (badly CGIed, I might add). At least Star Trek won’t feature that, right? RIGHT?!? It also can’t be any worse that that Wolverine movie. Jeeze. Co-starring Ryan Reynolds MY ASS.

One Year

Exactly one year ago today, Morgan and I were bored and said, “Hey, blogging, that could be fun!” And it just so happens that I was almost run over by some douche as I walked to my garage after work. Thus, Just Like the City was born, and it’s been a hell of a ride.

I really don’t need to expand from there, cause you know the rest of the story. Just Like the City went on to become one of the most popular blogs in America, a bastion of truth and humor in these turbulent times we call the… um… have we still not come up with any name for this decade besides “the aughts?” America needed a voice for the little people, to stand up against hipster douches, killer roofing, and militant Mormans, and by God, the blog delivered! It’s been hard to update lately, what with the book deal and talk show appearances, but rest assured I have not forgotten. When I have something to bitch about, you’ll hear it hear first. Unless you hear it from me personally first. But really, is there a difference?

Okay, so maybe I haven’t set the world on fire, but it has been fun! When people ask me when I’m ever going to post again, it kinda makes me feel good. It’s almost like they are saying, “You just don’t work for me in real life. But the blog! It’s hilarious!” So, hey, at least someone’s getting something out of it, right?

I really don’t know what to say beyond things that are self serving right now. I just wanted you to know that I know it’s been one year. I just wanted you to know that I know it’s been yet another month since I updated. I just wanted you to know that I know that you don’t care. I want you to know I WANT you to know (Quiz Time: name that movie! Unless your name is Billy. Hint: you can’t like this movie AND believe in God, candlestickers).

And because you care, my most popular post so far has been the Glow in the Dark concert review, followed by my Indiana Jones review, followed by my original hipster douche screed, followed by my favorite post about how my favorite book ended up in the trash (though, not literally. I sold it for drug money).

Anyway, moving on, the reason I haven’t posted in so long is cause A) I’ve been hella busy at work, which is when I do all my blogging and B) cause I’m cooking up a pretty good post as we speak. The thing is, I accidently erased it like I was a sixty-year old woman using the interwebs for the first time. So I had to construct it from scratch, cause it was a long one. But I hope you like it. How’s that for antici…. pation? (Quiz Time: name that movie! Unless your name is Billy. Hint: fishnet stockings).

And now… cake!

SXSW: A Local’s Perspective

I knew on Saturday, when it took me approximately eight hours to travel from 183 to 38th Street on I-35, that it was that special time of year again. The internet is sluggish, cell phone service has crashed, streets are blocked, the air is heavy with every type of smoke imaginable, and everyone looks like mannequins from Buffalo Exchange.

SXSW 2009 is here.

I bet you think you know where this is going but, for the record, I do not hate SXSW, nor do I begrudge the legions of hipster and techy douches descending on our city. I am fully aware of the amount of money this thing brings into the local economy, a fact even more important this year. I am also incredibly proud that so many people would spend their spring breaks going to this thing, making Austin an actual tourist destination. Seriously, people LOVE this city. And for a week it becomes their playground. And that is totally fine with me. I love it when people love Austin (in every way imaginable).

But I came to the conclusion last year that SXSW simply isn’t for people that already live here, unless you happen to be hardcore into the music, film, or interactive scene. I mean, think about it. A typical SXSW-goer spends their nights drinking unfathomable amounts of alcohol, wandering the streets in a drunken swagger, and listening to some shitty band that you’ve never heard of play in a venue that has the acoustics of a Styrofoam cup filled with a hobo’s change. I ask you, resident of Austin, how is this any different from any other weekend?

Ya see, as far as the whole live music and drinking thing is concerned, I’d say we are a little spoiled in Austin. So SXSW is just a typical Austin weekend, except it’s extended to a week and there’s a shit ton more yankees than usual. And the other thing to think about is this: it’s probably like this all the time in places like New York (and I’m basing this assumption ENTIRELY on the movie Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist. It was cute). They just get to do it in a different locale. And Austin, as big and as cool as we think we are (and we are pretty fucking awesome), does not really have the capacity to handle this type of thing and these types of crowds. I mean, supposedly EVERY FLIGHT into the city was booked solid yesterday. This is amazing.

Then, there’s actual access to the shows to consider. Now, I’ve never had an actual SXSW pass or wristband. Last year, I did borrow a wristband for a day just to see what all of the fuss was about, but I came to the same conclusion I did earlier in this piece: this is just a Saturday night, there’s just MORE of it. And it’s not like I could have gotten into one of the BIG shows with my wristband. Oh no, you need a pass and credentials for that. So if SXSW is not for locals, it certainly isn’t catered to the average fan. Like most things, it’s just a big trade show or convention where people in a similar industry get together and enjoy (or in the case of hipster douches, not enjoy) the thing they love. There is so much press coverage on the thing cause there is SO MUCH PRESS here. I mean, what else are they going to talk about? What else am I going to talk about?

Now, these are certainly not ground breaking conclusions. But I think it’s important to keep these kind of things in perspective. And for all the Salvation Army Thrift Store rejects (also the name of a band playing at The Parish, incidentally) running about, some of them are actually kinda hot. So, for the most part, I think I’ve finally made peace with SXSW.

However.

Were some of these fucking people raised in a fucking barn? I know that’s the stereotype for us goat-fucking Texans, but come on! I’m working downtown (across the street from The Paramount, the SXSW Mecca no less!), and I have to see and put up with these people all day long! It’s like they have no concept of laws and rules and society and traffic flow or smoking ordinances or any of that type of stuff! I don’t know what kind of magical land yall come from where there simply are no rules and no structure to society, but people actually LIVE in Austin. It’s not  Disneyland!

Take the worst offenders: street crossers. Apparently, in Hipster Douche Land, it is perfectly acceptable to cross the street whenever the fuck you please, regardless if traffic is barreling towards you and people have to ruin their break pads just to make sure they don’t run into you and spill your Parliaments all over the goddammed ground. I’m going to let you festival goers in on a secret: PEOPLE IN AUSTIN CANNOT DRIVE. We simply cannot master this skill. So you are probably going to get run over. Just use common fucking sense and cross where there is not a car right in front of you.

Lesson number two: ordering at a fast food restaurant. You order here the same way you do everywhere else. This is not a completely foreign country! I swear, you’d think some of these people had never seen the inside of a Wendy’s before. They’re all, “Oh…yeah…um…what’s this hamburger thing?” They don’t have a concept of a line (which they should, since they will be waiting outside so many clubs). And no concept of monetary exchange. When it comes time to pay, they’re like “Oh…yeah…ummm…I forgot about money.” And then they have to maneuver past eighty press badges hanging around their necks to get to their wallets.

Back to traffic. It is perfectly UNACCEPTABLE to stand in the middle of the street and take pictures. Yes, the capitol building is gorgeous, and the largest one in the country for you trivia buffs. Yup, even larger than our nation’s capitol. But stopping traffic so you can take a snap of it with your iPhone is A) going to get you a crappy picture, and B) is going to get you run over by yours truly. Going back to something I said in a post almost a year ago, we live in a SOCIETY with RULES. And yes, even a place as fucking deranged as the ATX has them!

And just so you know, there are other BBQ places not called “Stubb’s.” And if you think their ribs suck it does not mean ALL ribs suck. In fact, their ribs do suck. Come on, you like indie bands! Why not try another restaurant as well? This also applies to Tex Mex/Chuy’s.

And all together now: it’s I-35, not THE 35. 183, not THE 183. Streets around here have enough names as it is. Don’t confuse us anymore than we already are.

So this weekend I will officially brave the SXSW and become one with the masses, only because Explosions in the Sky is playing a free show at Auditorium Shores.  Hopefully, the hipster douches will decide Explosions are not cool anymore and avoid the show. But whatever happens, it’s going to be a gorgeous weekend. And I’m glad everyone is here to see how nice the weather in Austin can actually be before summer (and ACL) sets in.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to navigate around a mass of people in front of the Paramount just to get to my car. These are the same people I will probably be running over in a few seconds. So it goes.

Sega Isn’t All That Great, In Retrospect. There. I Said It.

Sorry for another post about video games. For some reason, they have been consuming my thoughts lately. Maybe because I’m not entirely happy with everything and reflecting on my glorious childhood is the only thing that gets me through the day? Or maybe I really am just that big a dork. Whatever the reason. I’m warning you to stop reading now. 

As a “grownup,” I’ve never really had all that big a problem with Sega games. Yes, I will always be a Nintendo boy (4 life!), but I’ve always been kinda respectful of the Big N’s big rival (and don’t give me that Sony or Microsoft shit). I’ve enjoyed their games. I effing LOVED the Dreamcast. I even count Shenmue as one of my favorite games. 

This wasn’t always the case. The world is always split into dichotomies. As adults, it’s stuff like Democrats vs. Republicans, America vs. The World, Poor vs. Rich, etc. etc. You know, important stuff. And we prepared for these showdowns on the playground as kids. There were a lot of arguments at my school. Some of the biggest ones: G.I. Joe vs. Ninja Turtles (Ninja Turtles), Longhorns vs. Aggies (Longhorns), Kelly Kapowski vs. the girl on California Dreams (Zack Morris), Street Fighter vs. Mortal Kombat (this was a particularly vicious one at Old Town Elementary, but Street Fighter, doy!), Marvel vs. DC (Marvel back in the day, although I wasn’t that into comic books), etc. etc. You know, important stuff. 

The biggest showdown was always Nintendo vs. Sega. Both companies were at the height of the console wars during my days on the playscape, and we carried this fight from our rooms to the monkey bars. I was, and will always be, a complete, biased, and unequivocal Nintendo apologist. The fucking Genesis didn’t have shit on the Super Nintendo, “blast processing” be damned. 

I always thought it was weird that kids fell solely along one of these parties. It was like parents absolutely refused to buy their children another system (“why do you need another one, Timmy? Don’t you already have one of those Mario machines? Why would you want another one?”). So we were stuck with what our parents bought us and we defended it like we were defending The Alamo (as in, poorly but with lots of enthusiasm). 

And weren’t those Sega kids weird? It was like their parents didn’t really love them. They knew they were on the losing side of this battle, but being the little brats that they were, they simply could not admit defeat and had to go on and on about how much better Golden Axe was than Zelda. Seriously. You have got to be shitting me. They just had this superior attitude about them, like they were better than us or something. And it was at its worst when they would pull those stupid Game Gears out. Even the most diehard Nintendo fan can admit that the Game Boy didn’t have the best graphics ever, but at least it had the games. And the friggin’ battery life. What good was full color graphics if A) the thing ran out of batteries every hour(ish), 2) it was so bulky it felt like holding a frozen fish, and 3) the games all kinda sucked? 

Now, eventually I kinda caved and asked my parents for a Sega Genesis. I figured I could split the difference and at least be a fan of both and thereby cement my status as the coolest kid in school (which I wasn’t and never was). So mom calls one day and says she found a Sega at a garage sale and I’m like, “oh, you gotta get it!” She brings it home. It was a Sega Master System, not the Genesis. If you thought the Genesis was iffy, did you ever try to play a Master System game? Sheesh. God evidently did not want me to be a Sega fan, so I gave up. No need to tempt fate, right? Stupid Master System. 

When the Dreamcast came out, years later, I was determined not to get one. I already had an N64 and a Playstation, and they were both great, and Sega was basically dead in the water, so why would I need one. Screw Sega, I hope they die and rot in hell! But then I saw Soul Caliber in action. It was like watching real life! Who could have thought graphics could look this good?!? And my dad saw one of the football games and swore he was watching a live NFL broadcast. And since I didn’t have anything better to ask for for Christmas, I got a Dreamcast. 

And I loved it. Still love it to this day. And I became, for that year and a half, a Sega fan. 

So recently, they release this huge Genesis game collection for the Xbox 360. I’m talking 40 something of the “best” Genesis games all in one collection. Sure, I could just emulate them. But that’s too much trouble. And I want the experience of playing some Sega games on a TV with an actual video game controller. And since I was all like, “Sega’s the shit!” I got it in an attempt to uncover an entire treasure trove of games from an era I missed. 

My excitement quickly turned to horror when I found that most of these games, to put it as nicely and maturely as I possibly can, sucked ass balls. I don’t really know who ever thought this shit was better than the Big N, but they should be in therapy cause these aren’t necessarily video games. They are attempts at simply making a game. And the attempts, for the most part, seemed to have failed. 

I think my big problem with Sega games is that they are typically ports of arcade games, since they were really big on the arcade scene and Nintendo really wasnt (apart from like Donkey Kong and the original Mario Bros.). And what works in an arcade, where games are specifically designed to steal all your money, doesn’t really work as well at home. If I pay a quarter (as it was back in the day, before the Great Recession), and get my ass handed to me, but have mildly distracting fun for five minutes, that’s one thing. But to plop in excess of $50 on one of these things only to have the gameplay remain largely unchanged? And be stuck with it cause my parents won’t buy me anything else? That’s not good. 

And I really don’t know how to put it, but Sega games just feel clunky. When you tell Mario to move somewhere, he pretty much does it precisely. If you die in one of the 2D Mario games, chances are it was probably your fault. When you tell Sonic to move somewhere, he kinda chugs along at first before getting up to speed, gets stuck on a hill, and takes a freaking runway to stop. And it’s not just limited to Sonic. ALL the Sega games control like this. They just don’t respond well. Maybe they controlled better with an actual Genesis controller, but even old Nintendo games play alright today on analog sticks. Add to that graphics that are a little too big and a little too muddy and you got a bit of a problem. 

Then, there’s the fact that a lot of their games are rip offs of Nintendo games that are simply not as good. Golden Axe Warrior, a Master System game, is pretty much a complete Zelda clone. The layout of the game is EXACTLY the same. The dungeons are EXACTLY the same. But it really has none of the charm, just slightly better graphics. Phantasy Star tries to do Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, and it’s actually not all that bad (especially IV), but it is so needlessly complicated. And simply not as fun. And could someone please tell me what I am supposed to do in Ecco? I can’t even get past the first screen. 

Now, Sonic is kinda alright. Not as great as people remember it I’m sure, but kinda alright. But one of the big Sega classics, Altered Beast, is without a doubt one of the worst games I have ever played. And I’ve played some crap. Can someone tell me why Sega fans hold this game in such high regard, cause I’ve obviously spilled the proverbial Kool Aid all over myself on this one. The game controls just about as well as if you were playing with a turd, and the gameplay is so repetitive and boring that I can’t even will myself past the first level. No, not even to unlock an achievement point! And this was a game that came with the system, so it was pretty freaking high profile. If I had played this as a kid, I probably would have ended up a serial killer (albeit one that wears the skins of animals). Since I had Mario, I am a wonderful human being. 

The Streets of Rage series is an exception. Ignoring the fact that it’s a rip off of Final Fight, the three games are a hell of a lot of fun and probably the only things really stopping me from snapping the disc in half. I think it’s because they control like Nintendo games, as in good. They move fast, they are fun to play, and the music stands on the same level as Nintendo music, maybe even better (don’t get me started on Genesis music in general). 

So this is the best that Sega put out during the Genesis days? Seriously? This is what all the fuss is about? Can you even IMAGINE what a Nintendo disc like this would be like? Say Nintendo came out with a compilation of all their Super Nintendo first-party games, as Sega did here. Oh my Lord. Super Mario World, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, Super Metroid, Donkey Kong Country (technically second-party, but it passes), F-Zero, Star Fox, and so on. Just those six games right there are better than any of the forty put forth by Sega. And I didn’t even mention the original Super Mario Kart or the Mario All-Stars collection. But now I did. So there. 

Look, long story short. If you were as privileged as I to grow up a Nintendo kid, consider yourself truly blessed from above. You are probably smarter, better looking, your parents took an active interest in your well-being, and are probably just an all around better person than your Sega peers. After seeing all that I have typed on this subject, I am considering not posting it. I feel dorkier than I ever have in my entire life. Yes, even more so than any of the Star Wars conventions I have attended (but I’ve met Chewbacca and Carrie Fisher and you haven’t, so there). But I am clearly passionate about this subject. Thank you for letting me vent. And now, commercials from the early ’90s. Ah, to have been a marketing director at that time…

First, Sega: 

 

(Blast Processing my ass)

 

 

And now, Nintendo:

(Was that not the most 90s commercial you have ever seen? I mean, they used the Butthole Surfers)

Odds and Ends: Search Engine Edition

-For my blind readers who can’t see and are instead having this blog read to them (maybe by one of those cool automated computer voices), I got totally bored and decided to experiment with a layout change. Just for shits. I really liked the old one, but it bugged the heck out of me that the titles of posts were green when my scheme was trying to be bluish. WordPress would not let me change this. I like this one, apart from the frilly flowery things above the links and whatnot. Flowers don’t really say “Austin” (me or the city). But at least they aren’t fraking green.

-The Oscars!…. were a little boring this year. I only saw one of the best picture nominees, and it did not win. And while my two favroite movies from last year, Milk and The Dark Knight, did get a lot of love, I’m starting to wonder why I even care about this stupid show anymore. Every year I think, “Oh, this ceremony is gonna be off da hook!” By the time 3:30 CST rolls around (the average time the show ends), I’m mad, bleary-eyed, and reflecting on my wasted life not making movies. Such is the lot of a commie homo-loving son of a gun.

-I’ve been working on my Spanish. “Escoba” means “broom,” according to my Spanish Mac Dashboard Widget (or SMDW for short, which sounds like a sex act). Thus, what I should have said last week was “tenga escoba?” Yes? Si?

-So, running was going well for a while. I made it up to SIX MILES the other day, further than I have ever probably even WALKED in a single sitting (walking?) in my life. Maybe I pushed myself a little to hard, cause my knee hurts like a somabitch. It’s usually fine during the day, but the second I start running… disaster. I only made it 15 minutes today because of the knee, not even enough time to reach Lady GaGa on my “Rerning” playlist. Sigh. Something tells me a Knee Storm ’09 is in my future, and a Chris Redfield is not.

-Chris Redfield.

-I’ve seen this done on other blogs, and I thought it was fun, and since I have nothing else to say right now, I’ll do this. Below is a list of some of the various terms people have used in search engines to get to this here blog. Some are quite funny. In the interest of public service, I will address a few of these queues with some helpful advice. Remember, these were all terms used to get here. Some make sense. Some prove the internet is weird.

1. Rihanna Austin review

By far my most popular search, along with Kanye. If you look around you can find it, but long story short: it was good and she was cute. And it was, like, a year ago so get over it. But we do all need to stay strong for our beloved Rihanna. This whole Chris Brown thing is kinda sick, and the only thing that comforts me is Rihanna has Jay-Z on her side. Double your pleasure, Chis Brown, double your PAIN!

2. Wearing an arm cast

Wear it on your arm. How fucking hard is that?

3. How to be a hipster elitist

Attend SXSW. Hate everyone else’s band. Yadda yadda yadda.

4. Men dicks/Big dick men

Okay, hey now! This is a G-rated blog, for fuck’s sake! I imagine these searchers where disappointed when they came here but, the internet being what it is, probably eventually found gratification somewhere else. But seriously, I don’t think I’ve mentioned a single dick on this site? Or have I? Was I posting in my sleep again?

5. Sling cast

I have a picture somewhere on here that explains this.

6. I’m melting!

I’m so sorry to hear that. Try jumping into water or, you know, not standing by the microwave with the door open.

7. Review chesney concert

I didn’t even go to this one. I imagine he wore a hat and sang.

8. I want to wear skinny jeans

You poor, poor thing.

9. My blue arm cast

Mine was probably prettier than yours AND probably had more signatures AND probably smelled worse. Advantage: me.

10. ^fullfuck

Seriously, huh? “You know, I’m really tired of those semifucks,” search engine guy says one day. “I need to find me one of those real, bona-fied fullfucks! Hmmm, Just Like the City? Maybe there’s a fullfuck in here!”

Two hours later… “Why did I need to read that much about a wedding? And E.T. shopping at American Apparel? WHERE THE HELL IS MY FULLFUCK!”

And scene.

11. family reunions

Fun fun fun! I hope this person wasn’t scared off from family reunions forever, though…

12. gymnastics 2008 pictures pictures/cut olympic gymnasts

I got a lot of these and their variations, and they are something I think I actually helped with! You are welcome! With that new search bar in the corner, see if you can find the picture again!

13. rain cloud wii mario cart

You misspelled “cart,” you wii-tard. No wonder it’s always raining around you.

14. men and big dicks/big men with big dicks

Honestly, this has gotten out of hand. Or has it gotten… in hand? Mwa ha ha!

15. hipster douche

Hipster douche! Go ahead… go outside and scream it! I promise you will feel better. I think that was the answer you were looking for.

16. shirts to wear with skinny jeans

None.

17. how to wear skinny jeans

Don’t.

18. orson scott card

Now let’s talk about a douche. I didn’t literally throw his books away, but I did pack them up and turn them into Half Price for 12 big ones. It was quite emotional. There were like twenty of them, ask Morgan. With the twelve bucks, I purchased The New Joy of Gay Sex. Okay, not really, I bought a Michael Crichton (RIP) book. But wouldn’t that have been funny? I kind of thought it was wrong, potentially placing these books in other people’s hands. But I am no censor, people can read and say what they want. And 12 bucks!

19. nerd; all the ladies stranded in the lin

The ladies standing in the “lin” for the nerd show did not get in. Sorry to break it to you.

-And just as I go to post this, I see another search: “pictures of men with big dicks.” I suppose I’ve found this site’s calling…

-And in honor of my blog’s new “dark blue” look…

Gringo Loco, or Where Three Years of Spanish Got Me

This was an especially shitty week, and it could have had a shitty end except that a really funny story came out of it. 

Allow me to set the scene. It’s six ‘o clock Friday evening and I am leaving work. I have to run to the building next door to drop of two FedEx packages and one Lone Star package (a small regional delivery service). This is my job cause everyone I work with is too fucking lazy and too fucking fat to waddle their fat fucking asses over there when it takes no fucking effort at all (I said it was a bad week). But I don’t particularly care, it’s not like it’s a hard thing to do. 

So I enter the building next door and go to the mail room on the second floor. I’m tired and trying to think of all the adventures I am going to go onto that night. I have the FedEx things in one hand and the Lone Star in the other. And what do I do? Not paying any attention, I place the FedEx packages in the Lone Star box. 

Well, shit. The packages fall in slow motion, I yell out “NOOOOOOOO!” in slow motion, and the FedEx envelopes crash to the bottom of the Lone Star bin, far, far from arms length. I stick my hand in there to fish them out. They might as well be a mile away. There is no was I am getting to them. Have you ever had to fish something out of a standup mail box before? It’s kinda sorta impossible. 

I take heavy breaths and try to regain my composure. These packages HAVE to be in California by nine the next morning (this morning as I type this), or one of our pain-in-the-ass clients isn’t going to have their stupid little spot run at EXACTLY the right time. So I can’t just say, “Oh, well, cest la vie!” I have to get the packages out. 

I’m not MacGyver. I’m not even MacGruber. I can’t look around the room and try to put something together that will make this whole operation a piece of cake. The only way I can usually take care of things is with some sort of force. Like, if something is wrong with my computer. I don’t try to calmly restart it or force quit things. I just slap it a few times. If that doesn’t work, I kick it. 

I decide the best option is to turn this thing over to where the packages will fall out. No problem, right? Except that it’s really, really heavy. And it’s jammed up against a corner, scraping the edges of a UPS drop box and the wall. But I don’t think about these things. So I’m trying to tip this thing over and it’s not going well. It keeps getting stuck on the wall and threatening to topple over on top of me. Which technically is what I want it to do, but I don’t want to get stuck or anything. Imagine if I got pinned under a Lone Star mailbox? And no one came in cause it was the weekend? And I starved to death or my pinned leg got gangrene or rats came out of the walls and nibbled my face away? No, I couldn’t take those chances. I shoved the mail box back to the wall. 

Dammit, think, Austin, think! Rational plan one is to go to a bar, get a drink, and come back at eight when the pick up occurs and explain the situation. But I kinda want to go home and nap. Rational plan two is to leave a note. But then I figure the note might get lost, and the Lone Star guy and the FedEx guy probably hate each other and would not go out of their way to make sure a rival company gets a package. 

I go over to the supply table on the wall and get a huge roll of Priority Mail tape. This is my big plan. I’m going to fish the tape down in there, attach it to a package, and reel it up. ‘Cause that’s fucking gonna’ fucking work. But I’m desperate. I unspool a line of tape and drop it into the abyss of the mail slot. And of course it attaches to everything BUT the package. It goes to other letters. It gets stuck on the wall. And the tape can’t get a good enough grip of the packages in the first place for me to hoist it up. So I’m screwed. This was my last big plan. 

Unless…

Unless I can find a broom to stick in there, or a vacuum cleaner pole or something. 

And wouldn’t you know it? At that point, a cleaning lady came in, only to find me with my head and hands stuck down the mail chute screaming, “Why, God, why?!?” 

I jerk to attention and smile at her. I don’t want her to think that I’m stealing mail, cause I’m sure she cares. “Hi!” I say. Maybe a little to friendly. She smiles back. 

I point at the mail box. “I got a package stuck in here and I was wondering if you have a broom or a large pole or anything I can use to fish it out?” 

She’s just staring at me like I’m speaking jibberish and I’m like, oh shit. I’m really going to have to do this, am I? I’m really going to have to try… Spanish?!?

I gather my composure. She hasn’t responded to anything, Maybe she’s just deaf? Very shyly, and with seemingly mounds more hick accent then I normally use, I ask her, “Habla Ingles?” God, I hope that was the right conjugation. 

I get a reaction. She shakes her head and says, “No, no.” 

So I say, “Um… I… uh… quiero… no, that’s not right… tenga…. tenga… how the fuck do I say broom… tenga big stick?” I shit you not. This is what I say. Cause it doesn’t matter if it’s a broom. I just need a big stick! And I make a motion with my arms, like when you are describing how big the fish you just caught was. This could not get anymore white. 

Another cleaning guy shows up. I ask him, “Habla Ingles?” He nods, “Si.” Well, if you speak English, why did you say “si”?!? I don’t tell him this and instead try to explain my predicament to him. More cleaning crew is coming into the room. And this other guy just looks at me. Something tells me that his English is probably about as good as my Spanish, and that this isn’t going to work. 

So I’ve exhausted my Spanish repertoire. How, HOW do I know so little Spanish? I mean, I know more and I guess I was just on the spot, but I literally COULD NOT FUNCTION. And I had even made a Spanish joke earlier in the day (a coworker told me that her kid was doing bad in Spanish class, and I was like “Don’t you mean muy malo?” Ha ha, fucking brilliant, Austin). And I order Mexican food all the time! And I have friends that are fluent in it! And I live in Texas! How, how am I this bad? Why did I think taking Japanese was a good idea? It’s not like there’s going to be a Japanese cleaning crew that I can converse with some day. That language is fucking USELESS! 

In that moment, I regret every decision I’ve ever made. 

But there’s hope! I see a duster on the side of one of their trash cans, one that’s kinda long. And I point at it. And I say, “Can I borrow this… uno momento?” Blank stares again. So I just grab it and say “Uno momento” and hold up one finger cause, you know, don’t want to confuse anyone. 

Okay, now they’re on board. They smile and nod and agree and I take this FUCKING DUSTER back to the mail box and start fishing the packages out again. It’s not quite long enough, but I managed to hit the packages up against the wall of the mail box and then slide them up and, just like that, they are in my hands again. 

I turn back to the cleaning crew. There’s like four of them now and they are just staring at me. I place the duster back in its holster and say, “Um.. muchos, muchos gracias!” I put all the packages in their respective bins. I high tail it out of there. I hear a little bit of laughter. I’m listening for the words “gringo loco,” but I don’t hear it. I sheepishly walk to my parking garage. I need that nap. 

Moral of the story: learn Spanish, not Japanese. And don’t be stupid.

The Killers Kill Austin

(This picture is not from last night’s show, nor did I take it. It was hijacked from the internet. His face looks funny.)

Last night, I returned to the Frank Erwin Center in beautiful Austin, Texas, to see one of my faves, The Killers, in concert. You’ve heard of them. Tickets were graciously provided by the vivacious Mprint, and I cannot thank her enough.

In short, the glamorous indy rock and roll show was amazing and we were on top of the world. Somebody told me that The Killers were no good live. Well, this show would change your mind. For reasons unknown, we smiled like we meant it. We went to the place where the white boys dance. And we danced like humans and like we used to when we were young. (see what I did there? Mr. Brightside.)

The seats were up in the mezzanine (which is just a fancy arena word for “if this were the Titanic you would die”), but it was still a decent vantage point. While I would have liked to have gotten closer to Brandon Flowers (cause, you know, his jacket is nice? And he finally shaved off that creep-ass mustache?), I certainly ain’t gonna complain. The opening act was M83, which is a band I always pretend to know but really have no idea. Apparently they are French. Anyway, I confess I didn’t pay much attention to them. I have this habit of being completely catatonic during opening acts. And late. But they were pleasant, something I might have to download someday if I can stop my current habit of listening to The Killers 24/7.

So anyway, The Killers! I will say up front that the set list relied a little too heavily on the new CD, Day and Age. Of the ten songs on it, eight were played (and “A Dustland Fairytale” was not one of them… le sigh). While I understand that this was the “Day and Age Tour,” and that the CD is new, come on. You could have gotten rid of “The World That We Live In,” to make room for something else (say… “On Top”? Pretty please?).

But this is a minor complaint, cause the rest of the show was hit after hit and the songs from Day and Age are, you know, good. I’m kinda constructing the set list from memory here, but they opened with “Spaceman” and “Losing Touch.” Good opener. This went into “Somebody Told Me,” which is a song people apparently like. You can probably guess the songs from there. No, they did not forget “Mr. Brightside.”

There were a few surprises, I thought. They played “Shadowplay,” the Joy Division cover, with footage from the Joy Division movie, Control, in the back. Travis provided a nice backing synth line to this. Also, they played “Bling” from Sam’s Town, which is a song I’ve always liked. Sadly, no “On Top.”

On to highlights from the concert! I thought “Human” was really good. Yes, I know, you are sick of the song. But when everyone is singing along (cause it’s the one song everyone knows the words to right now), it’s pretty cool. And they played my favorite, “Read My Mind,” which was beautiful. Then they “closed” with “All These Things That I’ve Done,” the song that made me really like The Killers in the first place (ya know, back in the day).

I say “closed” cause of course there was an encore. (Little side rant real quick: what’s the deal with encores? You know you are going to come back out. We know you are going to come back out. I’ve already blown my voice out singing “Smile Like You Mean It” at the top of my lungs. Please, just get back on stage! Quick! It’s all dark in here! Someone is touching me! Someone’s calling my name from the back of the restaurant! I think encores should not be a given. They should be earned). Anyway. The encore started with “Bones,” which is not my favorite song by them but whatev. However, they did finish it off with “Jenny Was A Friend of Mine.” It’s kinda creepy, everyone in the arena singing about strangling a girl at the top of their lungs. And finally, “When You Were Young.” You might have heard this one too.

So, fantastic show, and this was my first Killers concert. I’ve always liked them cause their songs are over the top, and they certainly sounded that way live. Stage design was good too, with lots of neon lights and pretty colors. This was complimented with occasional bursts of confetti, bubbles, tiger skin backdrops, and fireworks. Yay, fireworks!

No celebrity sitings this time. I guess they don’t buy nosebleed seats. At at the Erwin Center, they’re not really nosebleeds. More like a light sniffle. And how do people get drunk off of $7 beer? I mean, I thought we were in a recession. You probably had to mortgage your children just to afford tickets! How are you getting drunk on beer that’s that expensive? Seriously. Priorities, people!

Now I gotta work on those Bruce Springsteen tickets…

Also too, one of my dream trips: going to Japan with The Killers.