what, no hoverboards!?

[what, no hoverboards!? was originally published in Mountain Home Magazine.] 

Do I stand alone in my immense disappointment of this post-millennial, pre-anything-too-technologically-advanced age? I mean, twenty years ago—when I was only a boy—the year 2000 was the future. And not just the future like I’m going to save money for the future, future. No, it was—The Future—in holographic neon strobe. For countless (The Jetsons) years, and many (2001: A Space Odyssey) decades before that, the year 2000 was hailed as “::*::*::*::The Future::*::*::*::.” A Space Odyssey? Hardly. A terrorist attack is all we really got that year. But a space odyssey? Humankind—er, America—has touched the moon, what? Once? And I read in the news just the other day that we plan on going back. In 2018. But, I digress. The moon, and astronauts—please! I should be catching the three o’clock bus trip back to the moon, where my family waits in our pressure-stabilized, artificial-gravity-enhanced, feng shui spacepod. I would have just driven myself to work, but I forgot to charge the solar-powered P.S.C. (personal space craft, of course). Okay, so scrap that. I can live without lunar-life. You can keep my spacepod. I get sea-sick and I’m sure space-sickness goes hand-in-hand. And the skeptics or optimists or governments or spin doctors ask, but what about your personal computers, your Internet, your movie-ruining cell phones, your PDA, you iPod (surely, you jest), and your On-star equipped gas-guzzler? Are you not entertained? Are You Not? No, I am not. I am greatly and powerfully unimpressed. Are you telling me that these… these jokes, are my James-Bond-would-give-his-right-arm-for-these-kinds-of-toys technological advances?!? I can now make spreadsheets and Power Points, receive pointless phone calls at any given moment, anywhere, store files on a card in my pocket, listen to lots of music instead of just a single cassette or compact disc, and drive the same fossil-fueled car I’ve always driven! Am I really supposed to be impressed? Thanks for all the fish. I should be sending hologramatic messages-at the Least-to friends on Mars, not text messages to Jimmy who lives next door. I should be flying through a virtual world of an Internet, meeting-greeting-loving-real-real-real-virtual world. It’s just the other world. My music should all be stored in my microscopic, thermal-powered chip (under the skin, but painless) and in sync with my brain waves. Everyone gets their own movie soundtrack. Unless, of course, you want to project your mental will upon the home-audio-receiver (also the size of a molecule) and play your music throughout the spacepod. Spacepod. iPod? A step backwards. And don’t think I’ve forgotten: What happened to robots? A house-keeping-dish-washing-brilliant-ask-me-anything-robot-shiny-metallic-flawless-a-person-of-a-personal-robot. Did they give up on robots? Scientists and programmers and engineers and governments—did they give up on robots? Because I’m still looking forward to my humanoid-robotoid-learning-loving-nurturing-Darwin-was-a-chump robot. But, here we are, post-millennium, light-years behind that eight ball. So, fine, I could live without my robot (although, I am not pleased) and without my brain-sync-chip and virtual-life. Also, I’ll forgo the hologram-messages (h-mail), and my friends can be vacationing in Florida, that’s fine. Keep Mars for the Martians. But, for Godsake, we live in The Future and—

What, no hoverboards?

barry gets an abortion

(from the wine thieves blog)

something's been eating at me today. and not because i'm necessarily having a moral dilemna, altho i mite be... it's more of the splinter in my finger; the shard of wood of which i am aware (it itches and gently throbs) but i go about my day as if there isn't tree in my flesh. what the hell am i talking about ?!

feline abortion. cat abortion, for the layperson.

seriously, let it sink in.. cause it's real, as real as prosthetic balls for your dog. (no, seriously, don't let your best friend lose his balls and his pride, add some prothesti-testies.) but i digress. feline abortion. cat abortion. it's been the eyelash on my lense, that proverbial sliver. i don't know if it would've bothered me if i had only read about it. i found out the hard way:

a friend of mine adopted a feral (not to be confused with sterile) cat. a wild, trailor-park-running, free-as-the-wind cat. but the cat was emaciated. so, starving and probably delusional, the cat wandered on to "barry's" porch. so barry, being the kind and generous old soul that he is, fed the cat. but if you feed a feral cat, they just keep coming back.

so the next morning, the cat (now named "karen" ...never name a stray, that's the first fell step down a slippery slope) returns, of course, for breakfast. after several days of this entire scenario on pavlovian-repeat, karen will let barry pet her while she eats. ...days, and he can pet karen even when she's not eating. she comes around just for attention.
and then, like in every other seemingly-harmless-bum story, the cat decides that she wants to move in! and barry, he's a good dude-no joke-we chill with him all the time, let's karen barge right into his life, like a red-headed psycho ex.

well, you've heard the tale before: all goes well... for a while. karen has transformed, from a gutter cat into a house-cat. she plays the part alright! ..but after a few weeks, karen starts to go stir crazy.. the wild wind is calling, the dumpster cats meow in the distance... and she's in heat. yeah, she needs a good romp, you know? some wild tomcat rapesex, you dig? don't recoil in disgust, it's natural in their order of things, you see.

so if this entire time, you've been shaking your head, like, 'yes, yes!' ...if that is you, reader, then you know what comes next: yes, karen comes back. she's sorry she had to run off like that. she's sorry she's been neglecting the food and milk that barry was putting on her table! he didn't have to take care of that bitch! she was a guttercat before she met barry. fucking ingrate, i say!
but if you're saying in your head, 'i've been there, barry-' -if you're saying, i know a good dude like barry, then you know that in this story barry is the character who could be expected to do nothing other than to take back karen. it's true, barry takes karen back into his house. he nurses her sex-starved-sex-satiated feline body back to health--yet again.
now, karen is soooo sorry. and karen is doing muchhh better. she's purrrring and rubbbbing and salivating on barry, as in, 'yes barry, you're my human! you are mine, barry!' and barry gives karen milk, gently warmed, and feline food, and tuna (fresh from the can! that's a good tuna-salad sandwich barry's giving up for that cat!) and water.

but karen still has a secret. the plot thickens: karen's pregnant! ...an on-again-off-again homeless, feral cat...a wild dumpster cat, now inpregnated by some feral, homeless alley-cat, no doubt! so what?! so, barry let's this irresponsible cat make life?! re-create!? let karen single-handedly re-overpopulize the feral kitten market?!

"she's got seven in there," the vet tells barry.

"oh god," is all barry says in response. "oh god." barry's new girlfriend squeezes barry's arm in tight, then muzzles her nose into his t-shirt. he smells of catfood and his clothes are covered in inch-long white hairs."isn't there anything," barry's girlfriend says at long-last, "ANYTHING, we can do?"

the vet looks at the young couple, and he sees so much potential, love and hope... so, he procures a card, hands it to barry's girlfriend, "i know a guy," the vet says. barry looks up at the vet from his frozen stare on the floor tile. "doctor blacops," the vet says, "works for the animal control board of pennsylvania." barry takes the card and reads: dr. blacops, animal control board of pennsylvania. and then a local phone number.

it was later that night when barry called doc blacops. a smokey-grey voice on the other end of the line, "yeah?" barry's all, "ummm..." he said he could hear doctor blacops kissing the butt of a cig in the silence. then it all came rushing out: barry recounts the whole story of he and the feral cat, the dishing of milk, the petting, the adopting into his house, the runaway, the heat, the sex-starvation, the runaway--and now, the kittens.

"uh-huh," the doc says, "and so you're calling me," he says, "cause you want to get a feline abortion.""what!? no!" barry gets defensive on instinct, then goes, "i do? i- i can get one of those?!?""well you can't," doc says, "but your slut cat can.""she can?" barry asks-says, then says, "she can."and then the fateful words, "i want a cat abortion."

now, don't get it twisted, i'm not trying to make lite of abortion. this is--obviously--only a true story, which barry told to me, and i told to you. don't rush to judge! don't go bombing the animal control board's abortion clinic, cause that's not even the organization's real name! it's just something that's been bothering me: cat abortion. and now that's it's off my chest, you're free to wrestle with the moral and ethical reprocutions.

in closing, i'm happy to report that karen is doing just fine these days--sans kittens. barry is back to the every day grind, so to speak, and he lets karen come and go as she pleases. and even when she's gone, barry leaves a bowl of milk, gently warmed, on the porch.

the zombie apocalypse is upon us!!

the zombie apocalypse is upon us. i never thot i'd say that- and actually mean it!

everything was fine today. that's your first clue. that's how it always starts: the sun peeking warmly thru the crack in the curtains, the william tell overture playing lightly on some far-away whispy strings, and a slight upturn overtakes the corners of your lips. it's going to be a good day, like ice cube.

and you're driving. and you're listening to some tame-one bumping on your sounds-pretty-good-today factory car stereo. and the sun is now warming your crown from somewhere directly above your sunroof. and a musical project you've been working on is very near completion: your brand new mixtape. yes, a pretty damn good day.

so i stop at the supermarket (they have coffee and donuts and take debit cards) to use the in-store bank branch to activate my new debit card (i don't do credit). and on the way in i notice the hands-free hand-sanitizer dispenser. i partake of my anti-bacterial communion, because better safe than sorry, right?

this is where it all goes into slo-motion: i enter the supermarket thru the automatic doors and make an immediate right to approach the ATM... but i feel eyes on my back; that eerie sixth sense, when you just know someone is eyeing you... i insert my debit card and my head pans to the right: an adolescent boy's beady, blood-shot eyes meet mine. his eyes are full of hatred and hellfire, his face as flush as funeral-home-foundation. his white-knuckle grip on the cart belies his casual guise in the cart's toddler seat. i break stare to enter my password, then balance inquiry, then my eyes dart back to the waiting eyes of the inflicted child. the face-mask he's wearing is more reminiscent of jason or michael myers than the complacent masked pedestrians on the streets on tokyo. that's just ozone-holed-weather blues.

he's not a bubble boy, i say to myself, he's infected! the swine flu, the media calls it. the super bug! haven't you ever read stephen king's, the stand?! this is how it starts! i get my debit card back and hurry off in the direction of the coffee and donuts. but now i'm aware of each and every swarm of germs that makes its way onto my body. the door to the donut bin is open and i wonder, how many dirty, grimy, germy hands have been in that donut bin today? so i skip the donuts. i select a coffee cup from the middle of the stack. i do the same for the lid selection. i don't want anything that's been touched.

after i fill my coffee, as germ freely as possible, i do the lookaround. no zombie boy in sight. i make a b-line for the other end of the store, figure i'll make a left up ahead and go straight for the self-checkout. after passing about four aisles, i bang a sharp left, then i see him. it's zombie boy, his mother looking thru canned goods (stocking up for the zombie apocolypse, no doubt!), and he's staring me down; burning-red hatred toasts me to a dead-halt. i immediately u-turn, 180-it and split. i don't even want to encounter wafted air from the passing child (or the blood-thirsty monster that once was a child).

now, there are several ways to look at this h1n1 situation: there's the optimist: they wear masks and use the anti-bacterial handwash endlessly. they dress their kids in so much protective gear that they look like the late michael jackson's kids. there's the pessimist: these people believe that we're all going to get the swine flu, no matter what. then, there's the cynical optimist. this person believes that the swine flu is really just a scam. the flu is the flu, they say. nice try pharmaceutical companies, they sneer, but you're not getting my money! or you may be the cynical pessimist: this person also thinks that the swine flu is not the swine flu, but perhaps a way for the government to test new vaccines, or implant microchips, or spread a superbug that will cut down the world's population, semi-naturally.

and now, best case scenario: it really is the h1n1 strain of the flu. some people are going to get it. some have died and will die. and the world is short on vaccines; a vaccine that's relatively new and therefore, experimental. so if the superbug doesn't get us, the vaccine may... and isn't the vaccine procured from the actual virus, anyway!? so if the superbug continues to evolve, and many of us can't fight it... if zombie boy and countless others have already been infected... how long will it be until the zombie apocolypse?!?

as i prepare to face the rest of my day, i throw 800mg of vitamin c into my mouth and squirt another shot of anti-bacterial lotion onto my hands. i kind of wish woody harrelson was here. i could use a pot-smoking zombie killer to hang out with right about now.

(a good, fun zombie movie: 3.5 out of 4)

"hyperbole" from dictionary.com

hy⋅per⋅bo⋅le 

–noun Rhetoric.

1. obvious and intentional exaggeration.
2. an extravagant statement or figure of speech not intended to be taken literally, as “to wait an eternity.”