Friday, July 29, 2011

I Wonder If They'll Fit in Brown Paper Bags?

So, who's ready for the greatest invention EVER?

The Assassination of Common Sense Pt. 7

For those of you who are regular readers of this little piece of heaven called 'Preserved Disorder' (all 2 of you), I don't have to go into how this works. For those of you who are just popping your cherry with this blog I will provide a brief explanation. This won't be a typical blog that focuses on one topic. This is more in the vein of George Carlin's "Fee-Floating Hostility" bit. I'll instead focus on the general idiocy that we all encounter daily as an attempt to point out areas of modernity where common sense has not only failed, it was been shot in the face and tossed into a watery grave. Got the premise? Here we go....

It's Just Easier

This phrase has become the banner slogan for American sloth and lack of self-respect. Whenever I encounter someone who is making a stupid life decision and press them as to why they don't just make the obviously smarter decision, the person replies with "I dunno, It's just easier". For example, here is an actual conversation I overheard while at the grocery store yesterday:

Brainless Idiot: "I really hate going to Amanda's when Chris is over there. He is just such an asshole all the time."

Actual Human Being: "Well, why don't you just tell her you're not going to come over when he's there because you don't get along with him?"

BI: "Cuz then she gets all worried that I don't like Chris and starts asking me like a thousand questions about why I don't like him. It's just easier to go and deal with it for a little while, ya know?"

And this is easier how? The only person this seems easier for is Amanda and unless she's saved you from a burning building (completely plausible) then why is it easier for you to suffer than for her to deal with her asshole boyfriend on her own? It's also easier to just let someone murder you and not attempt to fight back, but you don't see people jumping on board for this idea, do you?

"It's just easier" has become a valid, reasonable solution to problems in cases where smart or reasonably intelligent people just don't give a damn enough to give a damn.

Suburban Talladega

When did driving on regular city streets become the qualifying race for the Indy 500? Ever day I'm almost killed by some fuckwit who thinks that he's Rusty Wallace in a Chevy Aveo doing 60 in a 40 during rush hour traffic. I really want to bludgeon with a spiked bat ask these people exactly what the rush is. Do you think the rest of us want to sit in bumper to bumper traffic all day? Because let me tell you I personally love it when it takes me 35 to 45 minutes to get home when I live 15 minutes away from my job. It really is the best part of my day you fucking mongoloid prick!

I'm sure you've had this happen to you before: You're driving (at the customary 10-15 mph over the speed limit, of course)when you spot a driver waiting to pull out of a parking lot/alley/cavernous vagina directly ahead of you. The driver of said vehicle is starring directly at your car as you approach him/her and they have plenty of time to pull out onto the road before you get close...but they don't. They just sit and stare at you until you're 10 feet away and then frantically pull out in front of you causing you to curse their father's polluted semen and slam on your breaks so as to not kill everyone involved. Every time that happens to me, I want to throw a Molotov cocktail through their windshield.

We hear about fatal car accidents on an almost daily basis in the news so it baffles me as to why people are so willing to take a chance with their lives in this circumstances. We've all heard the cliché about how you're more likely to die in a car crash than you are a plane crash, but why is that logic only applied to instances where people are about to fly and never to driving? Why is the douche nozzle in the Volvo behind me riding my ass like I have control over the speed of the 2,000 people in front of me who are also NOT GOING ANYWHERE! He must be special or something.

Hipsters

Hipsterism, which is an actual fucking term, is the layup drill of common sense. It is the actual definition of the phrase "low-hanging fruit". Why, oh, why would anyone of sound reasoning latch on to this shit sandwich of a sub-culture (which is way too mainstream to be a sub-culture)? Every time I see someone with a sweatband on their head and wearing a "vintage" purple t-shirt, dark brown cargo shorts, tube socks, and Chuck Taylor's I want to cry bloody tears.

The thing that annoys me the most about hipsterism is the feigned exuberance for all things cheesy and bad. It's like they actually want you to hit them in the face with a flaming brick. Old Atari games? Check. Excruciatingly bad music? Check. Irony as life's condiment? Check. There is no authenticity, no purpose, and no common sense to this "sub-culture". These are the same people who were listening to Dave Matthews and wearing Birkenstocks a few years ago, but now they want you to believe they are way too cool to care.

In a "sub-culture" where the whole point is to avoid being defined by a label, why is it so easy to walk into a room and spot the three hipsters without so much as a second glance? Because this culture is bullshit. A bastardized amalgamation of awkward and fun turned into a too brutal to watch train wreck of forced ambivalence and manufactured coolness that looks almost as pointless as it actually is. Fuck off.

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Oh, My God! You Don't Like Yellawolf?!

Try this little excercise: walk over to the person nearest you and ask them what kind of music they listen to. If they say something like "Oh, I listen to everything" or "I like a mix of different things" I want you to bow down and worship at the altar of my genius. One of those two responses is the answer you'll get from 90% (totally valid and heavily researched percentage by the way)of people when you ask that question. I'll even go so far as to say that 100% of those people are lying directly to your face. No one listens to "everything". Find me someone who has pop, rap, bluegrass, zydeco, acid jazz, Gregorian chant, blues, classical, afro-punk, funk,soul,techno, 70's rock,country, and shoegaze on their iPod and I'll show you a avocado made from oranges.

Most people like one or two types of music and a couple of additional artists that are mainstream forms of various musical styles. For instance if you love Christina Aguilera, Kanye West, and Linkin Park you like one type of music: pop. Just because those three artists present their pop in different formats doesn't change what it is. If you also happen to like Miranda Lambert, that doesn't make you a country music fan that makes you a Miranda Lambert fan.

Think about this: When did the term Indy rock become the definition of a musical sound and not music that was written, recorded, and distributed on a shoe-string budget by a tiny record label with no connection to the big music labels? Answer: the minute record execs discovered that some people will go out of their way to listen to obscure, poorly-played music just so they can feel unique. Speaking of unique, where did this idea come from that just because an artist doesn't sound like anyone else makes them exceptional musicians? I don't care if you're fusing afrobeat and delta blues with crust punk if it sounds like you're playing three styles of music poorly at the same time. Then there is Lady Gaga different or as I call it marketing different. Here is a woman who sounds EXACTLY like 80's Madonna with a splash of R&B, but somehow gets lauded as being the most original artist since the dawn of man because she wears odd outfits. But I digress...

Who cares, right? Why does it matter if someone is into one specific style of music or 36? It matters because it is indicative of the state of the American psyche. Everyone wants to fit in despite all of the stories we've been told of this country being the one place in the world where you're free to be an individual. No one is going to come to your home and arrest you for banging out to some Blut Aus Nord if you so choose, but the social consequences can be interesting. I often get curious glances when I tell someone that I listen to a lot of hip hop and also a lot of metal (death, black, sludge, and doom being my favorite styles). People often assume they can tell what kind of person I am solely by my musical choices. That is the very reason why everyone you meet tells you they listen to "everything"; they are afraid of being reduced to a single line definition of their existence (this happens a lot more with clothing, but that is a different post altogether).

There are people out there who do listen to a wide variety of music. Some people can go from Celine Dion to Aesop Rock to Brooks & Dunn to Agalloch and not think anything of it. I'm not one of those people and, most likely, neither are you. Our fear of being judged for saying anything out of the ordinary, even about something as trivial as music choices, goes further than most people would like to consider. The same mentality that got the American public to at one time support a war against a country with no connection to 9/11 (remember 2003? It wasn't that long ago...) in two terms as president likely comes frome the same place that makes you think people listen to Arcade Fire solely because they like the music.

Monday, July 25, 2011

Not Today Man, It's Monday

I don't have to go on a rant about how Monday mornings are the worst thing since Hitler's birth because you are probably living a Monday morning hell as we speak. I will talk about something that makes the worst day of the week exponentially worse: "The how was your weekend?" questions. I'm not just talking about that one specific question, but the long list of questions people around your cubicle concentration camp let slide out of there mouths with mindless abandon. A guy knows you're a big Dodgers fan? Expect him to mention the Dodgers every time you see his slack-jawed face. That really annoying chick in Marketing? She's going to ask you how your wife/girlfriend/booty call is doing every time she sees you because she saw the two of you in a restaurant together 9 months ago. Everyone is going to put their most chipper, chatty foot forward on this lovely morning and it makes me want to slowly push them into traffic. You don't have to say anything...I know you agree with me.

Don't get me wrong, I don't look down on people for trying to be convivial with the other schmucks they have to stomach for at least 40 grueling hours a week when none of us really want to be here. I get that, I really do. What I don't get is the forced nature of these interactions. For instance, you know the guy who always seems to be walking out of the bathroom/kitchen/building whenever you're going in? How many times a day do the two of you have to pretend to genuinely enjoy awkward head nod hellos? Once? Every time you see him? What is the statute of limitations on disingenuous greetings? Even worse, Have you ever had someone actually respond to the how's it going?/How was your weekend? question by actually stopping to tell you how they are doing? JESUS H. GODDAMMED CHRIST! Are you shitting me? I actually have to stand here and here you ramble about your kid's ear infection while holding this "Aw, that is so sad face"? Shoot me...shoot me in the eye right now!!

Monday is the one day every week that people should be able to be as honest as they want to be. I don't mean the bullshit excuse people use to be assholes known as "brutal honesty", I'm talking about real honesty. The "I'm going to walk directly past you and not say hi because both of us are miserable and don't want to be here" honesty. We can chit chat about the weather, your favorite hot dog place, or the amazing cinematic efforts of the (shitty) movie you just saw on Friday...the only appropriate day of the week to be happy for no reason.

I know some people feel it makes them a good person to smile and say hello to everyone. I'm not one of those people. I think anyone who can give you the reasons as to why they think they are a good person is an assbag. Being a good person isn't some set of preordained actions that you have to master and acquire an appropriate score on; nowhere in the Bible/Koran/Torah/Penthouse magazine does it say fake smiles and manufactured politeness is the key to spiritual awakening and eternal salvation. There is nothing inherently bad about small talk, but it's Monday so please in the name of all that is holy leave me the fuck alone. Thanks and have a great day!

Sunday, July 24, 2011

The Most Insightful (and accurate) Nicki Minaj Album Review Of All Time

Hi there. So, I sat down at my computer today just looking for something interesting to read to pass the time on this lazy Sunday afternoon so I started reading music sites. I have a fairly adventurous musical appetite (LIE) so when I came across a review of Nicki Minaj's album 'Pink Friday' over at The Number of the Blog (a favorite of mine) I said to myself "I should read this because maybe there will be something unexpectedly awesome about the album that will convince me to give it a listen"...I like to at least pretend to have an open mind, ya know?

So I read the review and it makes the album sound like everything that I had anticipated it would be: abominable. No hate towards Nicki Minaj, she does her thing in the lane she's chosen and she does that better than a lot of her male counterparts (Spotlight directed onto Drake, Big Sean, et al.) It's just that, in terms of the quality of her music, I'm not the kind of person who is inclined to listen to a pile of crap just because it happens to smell less shitty than the other piles of crap. Any motherfarkin way, just read the review. It's funny, it's an interesting read, and it's pretty damn accurate as far as I'm concerned.

Friday, July 22, 2011

NFL Lockout: People Who Should STFU

The NFL lockout is something I never want to hear about again. I'm an avid football fan, but if there is no NFL this fall I will somehow manage to survive and not give a shit. BUT since so many people have their crotchless panties in a bunch over the whole ordeal, I've decided to make a quick list of people whom the NFL lockout makes me want to tar, feather, and grill over an open flame.

THE FANS


Has there ever been a group more worthy of kicking in the throat than NFL fans? No matter what city you're from, your fans are annoying, sloppy drunk, mouth-breathing shit sacks. I didn't think I could hate NFL fans more...until the lockout. Now every article about the lockout has to be accompanied by 761 comments from slobbering sloths all across the country. Never mind that most of these inbreds have never played an actual down of football in their entire lives or know much about football besides their "My team is awesome....Your team blows" philosophy. Everyone has an opinion despite not knowing much about labor negotiations, law, long division, or proper hygiene.

I also love the not-so-thinly veiled racism, homophobia, and general ass-hattery that an NFL fan will proudly share with you at any moment. It's no wonder that the country as a whole is falling apart faster than JLo's marriage (Fuckin' right I did it!) when we have these beacons of the American school system as some of our nation's most vocal citizens.

THE OWNERS


As a football fan, I can honestly say that I despise the owners. Every time an NFL owner opens his mouth he does something to ruin football. Like "Hey guys I don't think any of us are nearly as rich as we need to be, let's squeeze some extra cash out of the guys who make us richer every week". Great idea. How 'bout next week we shut down the sun? Granted, most NFL owners came to own a team by first using their business skills to amass a huge fortune and acquire an asset that is the picture next to the textbook definition of cash cow, but that doesn't make them good people.

How many billionaire businessmen do you think have any humility? *Crickets* How many billionaire businessmen can you say actually care about the common man's plight? *Crickets on fire* This is the same group of lying fartholes who wanted rule changes for "the safety of the players" and not a week later wanted to extend the season to put players in harm's way more often. They'd make wonderful politicians. Now they want me to believe that they are losing revenue, but they can't open up their books because that is private information. I think NFL owner's are actually behind the Nigerian email scams.

THE PLAYERS


In the loving words of my mother "The fuck is you crying 'bout?!". We don't need to go into the myriad reasons as to how great life is as a pro football player. We also don't need to go into the danger's of playing pro football. The reason that we don't need to go into these things is that (some) fans "get it". How 'bout we help NFL players get it: maybe just maybe if you didn't spend every cent you earned in the NFL on houses, cars, designer sun glasses, and child support you'd be able to afford to pay for health care after football. I'm not talking about the guys who played in the 50s through 70s era NFL...those guys got a raw deal in terms of pay and health. But if you've played more than 5 seasons in the modern-day NFL, you can probably afford to put some money away, make smarter business decisions, and stop banging every woman who lifts her skirt up so that you can get that knee replacement surgery after your pro days are behind you.

I've played organized football in my life, but I'll never play in the NFL which is every 10 year old football player's dream. You've made it to Wonderland and you can't stop bitching about the decor.

THE MEDIA


Less is more. As in the more you talk about the NFL lockout, the less I want to listen to you. Call me when it's over and you have something of value to say, but we don't need round the clock coverage of the NFL lockout anymore than we need round the clock coverage of my toilet. I don't care that DeMaurice Smith called his mom about the lockout or that an intern for the Rams left the meetings with problems related to diarrhea.

If the lockout hasn't ended then you have nothing to report. So, why don't you pump up another sporting event no one cares about (I'm looking at you Women's World Cup) and sit the hell down.

Black, White, and Lame All Over

Let's talk politics. I don't mean let's talk about the moronic concepts of left-wing vs right-wing or liberal vs conservative or jackass vs fat ass; I'm talking about the actual game of politics. I'm talking about the bullshit that gets shoveled around ever couple of years that has Americans foaming at the mouth to vote for new prom kings and queens every time a "sexier" candidate enters the forum. I'm talking about the fantastic shell game that has been going on in this country since 1776. I'm talking about the art of selling people a can of Budweiser and telling them it's champagne.

As a black man, I'm very proud of Barack Obama for achieving a feat that I never thought I'd see in my lifetime: a (sort of) black president. Now let me say something that is going to piss a lot of people off: I've never been a Barack Obama fan. I like Obama as a person. I'd love to have a beer and catch a game with the brotha. I'd like to hear him describe how it felt to reach a height that we as black people never thought we'd reach. Then I'd like to ask him what his long range economic recovery plan looks like. I'd like to know why he hasn't taken a hard line on pretty much anything since he took office. I'd ask him why poor people are still getting locked up for smoking pot and most of Wall Street gets to go home and sleep in complete comfort every night. You know...questions about his job.

This is not an Obama bashing excursion. I just want to know why he sold Budweiser as champagne. Speaking of Budweiser (bad pun in 3...2..1...)I know some of you are thinking "Hell, he's better than Bush!". Which is true, but that's setting the bar pretty low isn't it? I mean Steve-O could probably do a comparable job to what George Bush did. Why bring up Bush? What can you possibly use to compare Obama and Bush? Where are they equal to each other? They are both politicians.

pol·i·ti·cian   /ˌpɒlɪˈtɪʃən/
[pol-i-tish-uhn]
–noun
1. a person who is active in party politics.
2. a seeker or holder of public office, who is more concerned about winning favor or retaining power than about maintaining principles.


How do politicians win favor and retain power? By selling Budweiser as champagne. Every election cycle we get a new crop of wolves in sheep's clothing making the same promises. You'd think that by now Americans would be living in a Utopia that was the envy of every nation on the planet. My driver's license just says Illinois, but maybe that is some sort of codename (HA!) Yet you see Americans from Tukwila to Bangor in red-faced fury over which candidate is the secular messiah sent by forces unknown to right all the evils of the last 235 years. Then four years later we're all bitching and complaining about how Senator X or House Speaker Y is the reason for all of our ills, but as soon as Representative A gets into office the sky is going to pour strippers and lollipops. Right, and Lil' Wayne is gonna win best new artist at the Country Music Awards (#sarcasm).

"If you have selfish, ignorant citizens you're going to get selfish, ignorant leaders" ©George Carlin


I don't get mad at the likes of Palin, Boehner, and Gingrich when I see them on television bad-mouthing our current president. They are just trying to win one for their team just like Obama, Clinton, and Biden were in 2008. A politician is a politician is a politician. And a politician by definition (see above)is just a pimp with better education. The sooner the majority of Americans come to this realization, the sooner we get closer to actual change in this country.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

I Hate Your Phone

Do you remember where you were when the cell phone became the most important device on the face of the planet? I must've slept through it. At some point in the past 10-12 years, the cell phone made a power move to own our lives and everyone knelt down and said "Your wish is my command" in unison. Really what invention can stand up to the awe created by a shiny, new cell phone being waved in your face at a deeply discounted price? Don't worry I'll wait...© Kat Williams.

Of course, I'm just being an ass. I hate your cell phone. I hate my cell phone. I hate the cell phones of people I've never even seen. Have you ever been talking to someone about a matter that you find to be fairly important and wanted to punch them directly in the fronal lobe as they reply to a text mid sentence? Have you ever witnessed some biological mistake completely disregard your life to answer a call about how awesome last night's episode of 'The Bachelor' was? Then you feel my pain. If you are one of the people who routinely commits one of these atrocities then happily go DIAF.

I love standing in line at Restaurant X and noticing how every person in the line has to stop at some point and look at their cell. You couldn't have possibley missed a call or text or video or email since you last checked your phone 10 miliseconds ago. If you did get a phone call, we'd all know about it because your portable iriation device will spew some rythmic abortion into the air to ear-rape us all. How nice of you! You know what would be even more super awesome of you? If, when you do get a call, you can scream every single word of it at so that I can hear exatly how big of an asshole Mike is or how much you hate Audrey because "she's such a batch!". That would really make my day.

Everyday people walk down the street gazing into their cell phones with little to no regard for all of the people they are rudely staggering into. People drive home from work picking up their phone whenever it buzzes, hums, or sings because they just can't wait to hear what their single-cell brained companion on the other end has to say. Meanwhile all of us regular folk have to swerve around John and Jane Q. Fuckstick as they make your drive home into vehicular dodgeball.

The point? Put the God dammned phone down and unplug long enough to realize that your phone is worthless. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go shopping for a new cell phone. Don't judge...I gotta get something nice with my upgrade

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

The Stand-Up Comedian: America's Unlikely Last Hope

I have a friend who is a comedian. We grew up together in a tight-assed, Christian, Republican, get-me-the-hell-outta-here town in southern Mississippi where neither of us felt like we belonged to any of the rigidly defined social groups that we were supposed to file neatly into. That was one of the reasons we stuck together so tightly once we became friends. Another huge factor was the way our senses of humor seemed to exist on the same twisted plane. We shared an adoration of the outrageous that no one else we knew even came close to having and we made it a point to throw our brand of humor directly into the red faces of every person we could possibly piss off. Our teen years were essentially a living shrine to our favorite comedians: George Carlin and Chris Rock.

I remember seeing both Chris Rock's 'Bring the Pain' and George Carlin's 'Back in Town' on HBO for the first time in 1996. Beyond the extraordinarily amusing comedy of both comedians, the thing that made me such a fan and repeat viewer of specials was this very uncomfortable feeling that the performers left with me during and after the shows. They didn't push boundaries...they ran right through them. They spoke about politics, religion, sex, and the state of humanity in ways that absolutely blew me away because it was so raw, so frank, so real. That uncomfortability with the words I was hearing sparked me to do more investigating into the world around me and reevaluate all of the nice(and mostly untrue) bullshit that I'd been fed my entire life. I loved the way both Rock and Carlin packaged intelligence with painfully hilarious insight to create this very intriguing social commentary disguised as clear buffoonery.

As the years have passed, I've found myself continuously searching for another source where valid, intriguing commentary has been paired with a no BS approach to little avail. Watching politicians speak on almost any topic is simply a task of wading through Berlin wall thick layers of double-speak and partisan posturing to find a thimble of anything worth listening to. A lot of people I know worship at the altar of certain authors, but I feel a lot of the work that gets praised as being so visceral and awe-inspiring seems rather half-hearted. Journalists(with some exceptions) are now personalities who are more interested in promoting their personal brand than they are saying anything that really challenges the conventional wisdom and making people think. Time and time again, I find more value in the words of Louis CK than anything Anderson Cooper has to say.

Whether it is relationship advice from Chris Rock ("You can't just love the white bread part. You got to love the crust of a mothafucka"), George Carlin on politics ("If you have selfish, ignorant citizens you're going to get selfish, ignorant leaders"), Louis CK on child rearing ("If you hit a dog you go to jail, but you can hit a child and it's perfectly ok") I'm constantly hearing well thought out, challenging, and constructive commentary from the supposed clowns of our society.

Let's keep things in perspective while I'm on this topic. There are thousands of worthless hacks out there with nothing more interesting to say than you'd hear in a Limp Bizkit or Wacka Flocka song. I've seen so many comedians attempt to get by on fart jokes and screaming obscenities into the microphone that I can literally tell whether I'm going to like a comedian before he/she is three jokes in. Most of the time you've heard the joke before done better by someone who took the time to craft a bit into something that is worth listening to and memorable. For every Richard Pryor or Bernie Mac there are 10 Carlos Mencia's.

Go ahead, sit down and watch Dave Chapelle's pre flip-out comedy and attempt to miss the genius of everything happening on stage. Of course, the jokes are delivered with amazing timing and wit that he appears to deliver naturally...that's why you're laughing so hard. But listen closer and you'll see layer upon layer of commentary on politics, drugs, racism, sexism, and economic disparity dressed up and presented as just a joke. That is what makes the comedy of great comedians stand head and shoulders over the Dane Cook's of the world. That is also what makes the stand-up comedian America's unlikely last hope for open and honest discourse.