SADD Truths for the Kids

When I started junior high, we had just come out of what Wayne Campbell called "that limited skirmish in the Middle East," an act of government-sponsored violence that seemed short and noble enough not to raise a stink about.

But barely a month into my junior high days, a good kid I knew named Matthew Marino was out riding his bike one afternoon when a drunk driver smashed into him, and days later Matthew was dead.

Now that we suburban Long Island kids had something of a martyr on our hands, suddenly it seemed as if we also had a righteous cause, and a mortal enemy in drunk drivers.

(A year earlier, a local girl our age named Deanna Moon also died tragically when a retractable gym wall closed on her, but retractable gym walls and negligent gym teachers just didn't make good enemies, I suppose.)

Many of my friends started joining Students Against Drunk Driving like it was giving away free bags of Sour Power. Never again would one of our own die from such careless disregard for human life.

Some time later, SADD came up with a deliciously morbid idea. It was called 'Black Wednesday' or 'Death Day' or something like that.

SADD claimed that every 38 minutes or so, a child somewhere is killed by a drunk driver. Our class periods at West Hollow junior high were also around 38 minutes long. So one day, during each period, they would announce that a student from West Hollow was just killed in a drunk driving incident.

"May we have your attention please...today, at 10:23 a.m., West Hollow student Sara Morgenstern was riding in a car with her parents when a drunk driver ran a red light and crashed into them. She suffered massive brain injuries and was pronounced dead on the scene."

But it gets better. Since each student they named was a real West Hollow student, each kid mentioned dressed all in black that day. Then, when his/her named was announced, they could no longer speak with anyone for the rest of the day.

I'd like to propose a similar program for today's junior high kids. But instead of announcing drunk driving fatalities, make an announcement for every time a soldier or civilian is killed in Iraq. Not just in one day, but until we get the hell out of there.

And don't just stop at wearing black. Try to create the illusion of shredded intestines, amputated limbs, popped eyeballs, etc.

So Long and Mahalo - Hunter S. Thompson, 1937 - 2005

Hunter S. Thompson was arguably the looniest, most intoxicated writer I have ever admired, and yet the tragedy of his suicide feels almost as unexpected and painful as the suckerpunch to the gut that killed Houdini.

When Kurt Cobain blew his head off, I was 13, far more tender than I am now, and I cried. But I wasn't anywhere near a state of shock. Long before his suicide, in the back of my mind, I practically waited for it to happen.

I'm not crying now, but the "What the fuck?"s in my head are louder and more persistent.

Hunter saw the dreams of the sixties devoured by hideous reptiles, yet his supernatural sense of humor made him invincible in ways that Hemingway, Kerouac and Cobain weren't. He taught me that even if we fail to prevail, to engulf the nastiness that surrounds us with our sheer positive energy, we could at least keep the nastiness at a distance simply by cackling in its motherless face.

When the nuclear apocalypse came, I always thought, if I survived, I would read his editorial first, and it would make me laugh the most.

He never lost his cynicism, but even until the very end, he never seemed to lose his humor or passion either. In what may be the last piece he published before his death, he discussed his idea for Shotgun Golf with Bill Murray:

(from ESPN.com:)

HST: "I'm working on a profoundly goofy story here. It's wonderful. I've invented a new sport. It's called Shotgun Golf. We will rule the world with this thing."

BILL: "Mmhmm."

HST: "I've called you for some consulting advice on how to launch it. We've actually already launched it. Last spring, the Sheriff and I played a game outside in the yard here. He had my Ping Beryllium 9-iron, and I had his shotgun, and about 100 yards away, we had a linoleum green and a flag set up. He was pitching toward the green. And I was standing about 10 feet away from him, with the alley-sweeper. And my objective was to blow his ball off course, like a clay pigeon."

"So there it is," he writes later in the piece. "Shotgun Golf will soon take America by storm. I see it as the first truly violent leisure sport. Millions will crave it."



In spite of the state of things today, I feel my faith in our invincibility is stronger than ever. I still feel the way Hunter felt in the sixties, as he wrote in "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas:" "You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning..."

But the fact that the world just became too much for even Hunter S. Freaking Thompson to bear no doubt extinguishes a few of those sparks, and kicks a big fat dent in the Chevy convertible I'm cruising down the Nevada Highway at 100 miles an hour.

To Hunter, I raise my glass, plus two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers...and also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of Budweiser, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls.

So long and Mahalo.

fun n games - Mentioned in Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire" Or Not?

1. Cassius Clay
2. Mr. T
3. "Wheel of Fortune"
4. Dick Clark and Ed McMahon's "Bloopers and Practical Jokes"
5. Heavy Metal
6. Punk Rock
7. Electroclash
8. "Peter Pan"
9. Batman
10. Russians in Afghanistan
11. Japanese-Americans in Internment Camps
12. Pasternak
13. Kerouac
14. Cadillac-ac-ac-ac-ac-ac
15. AIDS
16. Fetal Alcohol Syndrome




Mentioned in "We Didn't Start the Fire": 3, 5, 6, 8, 10, 12, 13, 15
Not: 1, 2, 4, 7, 9, 11, 14 ("Movin' Out (Anthony's Song)"), 16

R.O.T.I.F. Needs Your Help

I normally don't like to publicize my philanthropy- I never told anyone that I coach a wheelchair hockey team on Thursday nights (they're also autistic), or about my volunteer work as a guinea pig for the Institute of Psychosexual Behavior.

But I need to tell you all about my latest charity project, only because it's kind of my baby, and if I don't start spreading the word, no one will. And I really, really believe my new charity can make a big difference.

I started Reading On the Toilet Is Fundamental (R.O.T.I.F., rhymes with 'motif') this year as a way of getting the public, but especially children, to read more while on the toilet.

Factual Science Magazine has reported that the average person spends between 5 and 45 minutes per day sitting on a toilet or hole in the ground. They also report that reading comprehension increases by 236% in the distraction-free environment of the restroom.

This means that in one year, a person can absorb over 1,000 extra pages of information simply by reading everytime SHe sits on the toilet.

My mission is simple: "A book for every toilet."

All we need are books, chains to secure the books to the toilets so they don't get swiped, and a modest advertising campaign. (As far as advertising is concerned, we're already off to a good start; former baseball and football superstar Bo Jackson has just signed on to do a poster campaign, featuring him reading "The Old Man and the Sea" on the toilet.)

If you have any books, chains, advertising know-how, or legal tender you can donate, please send them to Reading On the Toilet Is Fundamental, 128 St. Mark's, Apt. 2C, NY NY.

The future of America's toilet readers depends on us.

A Very Special Ninth Anniversary

It was nine years ago today when you first became mine, and I became yours.

I was a boy of fifteen, in a strange land, on a mission from God. The land was Port Chester, NY; the mission: to see The Ramones on their second-to-last farewell tour.

I grew up in many ways that night. The Ramones show was the first concert I chose to attend. (I had no say in seeing The Dave Matthews Band with my sister in New Orleans a year earlier.)

I also smelled marijuana for the first time that night. (Though I didn't get high until months later.)

But you're the only thing from that night that remains with me in the material world. Whenever I'm inside you, I'm instantly transported back to that magical night. I'm fifteen again- innocent, optimistic, the sound of freedom surging through my veins.

At the time we met, you were ridiculously overpriced at 30 dollars, but you've proven to be one of the best bargains I've ever had.

Though you've aged considerably- stretch marks, flaky skin, that mysterious orange-brown patch across the back of your shoulders- to me, you still embody the most beautiful kind of youthful energy I've ever known.

I love you, Ramones Farewell Tour Concert T-Shirt. We've only just begun.

Poems About Girls

'Epitaph for Peach'

As a boy I loved
a girl named Peach
who rode her tricycle
on the beach.

Strangers would snicker,
"So foolish and young!"
But she just pedaled quicker
and stuck out her tongue.

She couldn't go fast,
she often got stuck,
but Peach was a lass
who could not give a fuck.

She did what she liked
which was trike on the beach,
and so I loved
a girl named Peach.

'Baby Chernobyl'

I once loved a girl
named Baby Chernobyl.
Clumps of her hair
fell out by the bowlful.

She was ostracized
by the commie society
for talking to herself,
albeit quite quietly.

O, Baby Chernobyl,
Your heart is so noble and strong,
I don't care if your hair doesn't grow full and long.

Happy Valentine's Day, Or, If You're Japanese, Happy Obligation-Chocolate Day

Mostly plagiarized from the good folks at Wikipedia.

In Ancient Rome, the day of February 15 was Lupercalia, the festival of Lupercus, the god of fertility, who was represented as half-naked and dressed in goat skins. As part of the purification ritual, the priests of Lupercus would sacrifice goats to the god, and after drinking wine, they would run through the streets of Rome holding pieces of the goat skin above their heads, touching anyone they met. Young women especially would come forth voluntarily for the occasion, in the belief that being so touched would render them fruitful and bring easy childbirth.

The connection between the Catholic St. Valentine and romantic love is not mentioned in any early histories and is regarded by historians as purely a matter of legend. The feast of St. Valentine was first declared to be on February 14 by Pope Gelasius I around 498. There is a widespread legend that he created the day to counter the practice held on Lupercalia of young men and women pairing off as lovers by drawing their names out of an urn, but this practice is not attested in any sources from that era.

In 1969, as part of a larger effort to pare down the number of saint days of purely legendary origin, the Church removed St. Valentine's Day as an official holiday from its calendar.

The first recorded association of St. Valentine's Day with romantic love was in the 14th century in England and France, where it was believed that February 14 was the day on which birds paired off to mate. This belief is mentioned in the writings of Geoffrey Chaucer in the 14th century, who wrote in the Parlement of Foules that

"For this was sent on Seynt Valentyne's day
Whan every foul cometh ther to choose his mate."

Valentine's Day was probably imported into North America in the 19th century with settlers from Britain. In the United States, the first mass-produced valentines of embossed paper lace were produced and sold shortly after 1847 by Esther A. Howland (1828 - 1904) of Worcester, Massachusetts. Her father operated a large book and stationery store, and she took her inspiration from an English valentine she had received. (Since 2001, the Greeting Card Association has been giving an annual "Esther Howland Award for a Greeting Card Visionary".)

In Japan, Valentine's Day has emerged, thanks to a concentrated marketing effort, as a day on which women give chocolates to men they like. Rather than being voluntary however, this has become for many women, especially those who work in offices, an obligation, and they give chocolates to all their male co-workers, sometimes at significant personal expense. This chocolate is known as giri-choco, from the words giri (obligation) and choco, a common short version of chokoreeto, meaning chocolate.

By a further marketing effort, a reciprocal day, called White Day has emerged. On this day (March 14), men are supposed to return the favour by giving something to those who gave them chocolates on Valentine's Day. Many men, however, give only to their girlfriends. The return gift should be white (hence the name), and is often lingerie.

The St. Valentine's Day Massacre is the name given to the shooting of seven people as part of a conflict between criminal gangs in Chicago on February 14, 1929. Although it was not a major event, it received nationwide media attention.

Seven members of Bugs Moran's gang, and an ophthalmologist who happened to be in the wrong place, were lined up against a wall in the garage of the S-M-C Cartage Company in Chicago and shot by five members of Al Capone's gang dressed as policemen. When one of the dying men, Frank "Tight Lips" Gusenberg, was asked who shot him, he replied, "Nobody shot me." Capone was conveniently on vacation in Florida at the time.

Death of a 'Crucible' Author/Ex-Husband of Marilyn Monroe - Arthur Miller, 1915 - 2005

"The job is to ask questions-it always was-and to ask them as inexorably as I can. And to face the absence of precise answers with a certain humility."

and...

"If I have any justification for having lived it's simply, I'm nothing but faults, failures and so on, but I have tried to make a good pair of shoes. There's some value in that."

fun n games - Let's Get Trivial

Inquiries:

1. According to the Internet Movie Database, who has more screenplay credits: Stanley Kubrick or Jean-Claude Van Damme?

2. Who starred in a commercial for Alka Seltzer: Orson Welles, Andy Warhol, Salvador Dali, or Marlon Brando?

3. True or false: Not only did Galileo NOT invent the telescope, but he did nothing to dissuade those who believed he did.

4. According to the Midwest Dairy Association, who was history's first "Big Cheese"?: Thomas Jefferson, Alexander the Great, Winston Churchill, or Henry VIII?

5. Who said, "When I see a dolphin, I know it's just as smart as I am"?: Douglas Adams, Captain Beefheart, Jacques Cousteau, or Ernest Hemingway?




Responses:

1. Kubrick, but at a 13-8 margin, it's a lot closer than you'd think, no?

2. Dali, though Welles did record voice-overs for frozen peas.

3. True, according to Timothy Ferris' "Coming of Age in the Milky Way." Geniuses can be real douchebags sometimes.
(The telescope was invented by Hans Lippershey.)

4. Jefferson. Says the MDA, "The phrase was coined when a cheesemaker gave a 1,235-pound cheese wheel to President Jefferson in 1801. Passers-by were amazed by the spectacle and dubbed it 'the big cheese.'"

5. Beefheart. He goes on to say, "Sometimes I'd rather be thought of as a dolphin than as a human being."

Hero of the Weekend

My hero of the weekend is Ohio resident Gary Milholland, also known as Mission Man.

When he's not working at Papa John's pizza restaurant, Mission Man busts dope tracks like "Chillin' at the Papa," "Prime Time Players," and "Weightlifting Jam."

He just finished a hot set at Lit, including a freestyle during Arbor Day's performance of "Better Off Alive." Then tomorrow, he's off to play a gig in West Virginia before returning to Ohio so he can deliver pizzas on Super Bowl Sunday.

Heroic.