swing that gospel axe!

I heard denim vests are hot this year. All the cool dudes are wearing them except the second guy on the left, but his Mon Chi Chi haircut is pretty groovy so he's still cool. And what about that gospel axe??? Praise the lord!!!!

The Killer Inside Me: The Candid Confessions of your Friendly Neighborhood Serial Killer

Catch me, catch me, if you can, for when the sun goes down I shall kill again, and again and again. Now, not all of you need to worry for I am not a random serial killer. I am not a believer in the “my-mother-told-me-to-pick-the-very-best-one-and-you-are-it” style, which to me is a disgrace to my glamorized profession. No, being an educated man I select my victims with a rigid set of methodological principles that is entirely too complex for the sane mind to comprehend. Therefore I have reduced this formula to layman’s terms so all you morally righteous pinheads can take good warning. Simply, if you mess with me your dead … dead as a doornail … eating dirt … swimming with the fishes … flushed into the haunting abyss of nothingness. Take some comfort in the fact that death is eternal life; a life filled with darkness and decay, but eternal life nonetheless.

Now before you think I’ve booted reality out of and welcomed insanity into my life, allow me to share with you a “real” experience I had just the other afternoon. While waiting in line at the Pak-A-Sak, methodically leafing though one of those mind-bending word finds, guess who I saw bagging my groceries? Yes, it was no other than the lizard king, Jim Morrison. That’s right, the Peace Frog himself was going to bag MY creamed corn and MY Sharkleberry Finn Kool-Aid. “Paper or plastic”, he crooned as only Jimbo can. He then stopped bagging, glared at me, and grabbing my arm with his dirt-filled fingernails whispered into my eager ear, “Death makes angels of us all, gives us wings where shoulders were, smooth as ravens’ claws… Have a nice day and thanks for shopping Pak-A-Sak.” So take heart you cowards, if Jim who loved life more than anyone can enjoy the luxuries that death can brings, by golly so can you.

I am not looking for the fame or notoriety that my profession can bring. I am not a pathetic wienie that kills for some false feeling of importance or some self-serving radical cause. I have cable, so my life is very fulfilling. No, I kill because there are just some people in this world who should die. My victims are not war criminals, ruthless dictators, or mad bombing terrorists. Those guys mean nothing to me other than faces I see in the news. My victims have committed personal atrocities against me and are punishable by death in anyway I, being of sound body and mind, deem appropriate. What you are about to hear is not pleasant. At this time I would like to issue a Parental Advisory Warning to all of you parents whose kids think that years of watching Roadrunner cartoons have braced them for the grim realities death can bring. In other words, “Beep-Beep, get the fuck out of here.” For those of you with inquiring minds and strong stomachs that are left, it is time to begin.

I know that killing is in my blood, for I have been killing people for many years now. I would like to start by taking a long journey down memory lane to those wonderful, formative, and imaginative childhood years that have left rosy-red rainbow memories in all of our hearts. I had a fairly normal childhood. My dad was an emotionless, corporate workaholic and my mother a disgruntled, pill-popping housewife, two real lovebirds. I also had a brother and sister, both about the same age as myself, and we had lots of fun playing Duck-Duck-Goose, Mother-May-I, Smear-the-Queer, and all those other warm, imaginative and educational childhood games. Of course that is until I killed my sister. You see at age seven, my sister, being a year older, was bigger and stronger than I was. She used her physical superiority to dominate my younger brother and I. She would take our toys from us, scrape her veggies on our plates, chase us around the yard with doggie-doo on a stick, and perform other unspeakable acts of childhood cruelty. Despite these intolerable injustices, I stoically restrained my anger and frustration until one day she crossed the line of decency. You see, back in the day I was a skilled finger-puppeteer. Finger puppets were my sole passion in life. My sister was very jealous over the standing ovations and countless accolades my craft had brought me. One day she had enough. She snatched my favorite finger puppet, Grover, off my middle finger, and then she walked on down the hall, yeah…. And she came to a door…it was the bathroom…

“Brother”

“Yes, sister”

“I’m gonna kill him”

Little did I know Grover was to be giving his last performance. She stretched her arm out to display Grover just out of arms reach.

“NEAR”, she said teasingly.

I swung desperately to save him but, alas, it was hopeless, for my arms were too short. She began to cackle wickedly. She then tossed him into the toilet and proceeded to flush.

“FAR!” she screamed.

Mortified, I gazed into the bowl only to see his inanimate blue corpse swirl into oblivion

“This is the end. My rubber blue friend the end.”

A part of me was lost that fateful day. My first experience with death had left me numb, destitute, and impervious to all feeling. I stayed awake for two nights plotting my revenge. She had to be stopped before she killed again. I remembered hearing something from the Bible in Sunday School class about an “eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth”, and decided to put it to good use. I lured my sister into the bathroom by telling her that the Tidy Bowl Man had a present for her. As she peered down into the toilet I quickly slammed the lid on her head and began flushing wildly without abandon. One, two, three, four, five…. 2000 flushes later she was gone. From her pigtails to her Pooh slippers, she was sucked into the slimy sludge of the sewer forever. For many years afterwards, when you flushed that toilet, you could hear her ghost rattling against the tank. I soon learned that by jiggling the handle a little it would frighten her off, and the rattling would cease. My parents hung up a few “Lost Child - $50 Reward” posters all around the neighborhood, which seemed like a small bounty compared to the $100 reward the Petersons’ were offering for the return of their cat. No one ever found out what really happened to my sister, and after a few weeks, no one ever asked. As for me, I learned an important lesson that day – if you feel your life would be a lot easier if someone wasn’t in it, just do away with them. They say you always remember your first kill, and even though I was only 6 years old, I remember it like it was just yesterday. But there were other memorable kills as well.

I had my eighth birthday party at a place called Chuck E. Cheese’s Pizza Time Theatre. Chuck E. was a big gray mouse that entertained all the kids while everyone waited for pizza. All my friends were there, and I was so excited. It was going to be the “bestest” birthday party ever. But unfortunately it seemed Chuck E. was having domestic problems at home, and he came to work an hour and a half late and half-drunk. By this time, the pizza was cold, my friends were bored, and I was pissed. When he finally did show up, he was in an ill mood. He came over and sung the lamest version of Happy Birthday I have ever heard, handed out autostamped pictures of himself, and then the dirty rat left the room. Boy was I steamed. I excused myself from the party, grabbed an empty pizza pan off the buffet table, and followed him out the door. There he was, sprawled out on the back steps, smoking a cigarette, not even thinking about how he spoiled the birthday party of a cute little ten-year-old boy. I took the pan and smashed him on his snout until he looked more like a Picasso painting than a lovable, oversized, pizza-pushing mouse. I took the pizza pan inside and grabbed one of those foamy hammers used in that “Smash the Gopher” game and placed it in his mangled paw. I never liked that game because it encouraged cruelty to animals. The next day the headlines read “Troubled Pizza Mouse End It All With Foamy Mallet”. As I reflect back on it now, I can say it wasn’t my favorite birthday party, but it certainly was the most memorable. Besides, it was my party and I could kill if I wanted to.

My killing ceased until I reached my college years. The stress of working and going to school took its toll on me, and I was growing tired of the intolerance coming from both ends. Don’t ask me why but I was taking one of those pointless Political Science classes my sophomore year. Fifty percent of the grade in that class was on the big end-of-the-semester research paper. In usual fashion, I forced myself to stay up all night to finish that paper. It was early morning when I was finally done and I had an hour to kill before turning it in, so I figured I would watch one of those morning news shows to keep me awake. I laid out on the couch and was watching Willard when I fell asleep and woke up an hour late for my class. I raced to campus in a panic and went straight to his office. I handed him the paper and explained to him about my untimely misfortune. He just looked at me and said that he couldn’t help me and that I would have to settle for an “F” in his class. Dejected I turned away and headed out the door when I saw a box of chalk sitting on his bookcase. I worked too damn hard on that paper to have nobody read it. I grabbed the chalk and crammed twenty pieces into his mouth, and one up each of his hairy nostrils. I then commenced to read my entire paper to him, as his face turned every color in the rainbow and even a few Crayola colors too! I have to admit he was a very good listener, for he not once interrupted me. I’m not exactly sure, but I think he died somewhere between the Cold War and the New World Order. Anyway, I ran his body thru the school’s paper shredder, which of course is located in the basement of the Political Science Building. I dumped his remains in a recycling bin with a bunch of old newspapers. You know, now that I think about it, he always said he wanted to write a book. Well, now he probably IS a book. Funny how things work out, isn’t it.

As I have said before, those college years were really tough, and it seemed like the harder I worked the more stressed out I became. I had been busting my hump in a hot greasy kitchen for four years when a few years later I was up for a raise. My kitchen manager told me he really appreciated the hard work and dedication I was putting in, and that I should expect a “whopper” of a raise. Wow, I was so happy. “You know, it’s nice to be appreciated”, I thought. When I got my next paycheck I saw just how big my raise really was – a whole dime an hour – that adds up to a “whopping” four dollars a week. Furiously I marched back into the kitchen where he was in the walk-in cooler pulling out all the rotten meat to use in the Soup O’ the Day. I grabbed a meat mallet and clubbed his noggin like it was a baby seal. I dragged him to the slicer where I proceeded to slice him into fifty, precisely weighed six-ounce portions. I mozied up to the front lobby and wrote on the Special’s Board:

Manager’s Special: Mystery Meat Surprise – Six heaping ounces of fresh savory meat, sliced thin and piled high on a Kaiser Bun. Specially priced today for a whoppingly low price of only four dollars!

In his honor I used the feet, the hands, and a few other miscellaneous extremities in the Soup O’ the ay, for he always used to tell me, “Barry, a good chef never lets anything go to waste.” I never tasted the special that day because I’m just not that twisted, but it was a big success and I heard it tasted like chicken and was especially tasty with country gravy.

After only eight years I finally graduated from college and received my diploma in the mail. O what a joyous day! I was so excited that I called my pop. He must have been holding back the tears when he said, “It’s about time, get a damn job.” I heeded my old man’s suggestion and began working on my resume that night. Midway through my second 40-ounce it was completed. If there’s one thing college taught me it was how to put a masterpiece together in a short amount of time (just ask one of professors that’s still alive). I was so pumped about joining the “real world” that I mailed my resume the next day to the local newspaper. Three weeks went by until one day I received a thin envelope back from them. Inside was an impeccably well-written rejection letter. It stated “your resume will be kept on file until a position that best suits your talents and abilities becomes available.” I had to settle for a job at the Post Office to keep the courtesy callers from MasterCard at bay. I was becoming disgruntled. Six months went by and I decided to resubmit my resume to the newspaper. I received the exact same rejection letter two weeks later. Man, was I steamed. In my cover letter I expressed I would be happy with ANY position, and that I didn’t mind starting at the bottom. I guess I was a little dejected that the hamster pellets weren’t dusted off my resume when the position of dropping shampoo samples in the bottom of the Sunday paper opened up. I suppose my having an English degree had some factor in that decision making process. I mean hiring someone with an English degree at a newspaper would be depriving them of their lifetime ambition to become Senior Fry Daddy at the local KFC, right? I had a theory and so I set out to prove it.

I changed into my gorilla costume from last Halloween, then grabbed my boombox, bookbag, and a balloon and hitchhiked over to newspaper headquarters. When I arrived I grabbed my stuff and thanked the Governor for the lift. Inside the lobby, the receptionist was extremely busy drawing a clown on her Etch-A-Sketch.

“EEP-EEP… EEP-EEP…Dammit EEP-EEP already!” I said politely.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” She said apologetically. “I’ll bet you’re here about the customer service position, aren’t you?”

No, I have a monkey-gram for the editor!” I shouted to the rafters. “By the way, that clown is most impressive. Say, you wanna banana?”

She shot me a look and then buzzed me in. I two-stepped into the editor’s office. He lifted his head up off his desk, smoothed the sleep creases from his face, and gazed at me with childlike amazement.

“Oh Boy! A dancing monkey!” he squeaked as he clapped his hands furiously.

I tied a big happy face balloon around his finger and put a Ziggy party hat on his head. I then hit the play button on my boombox. Within seconds we were both gyrating to the Bee Gee’s “Stayin’ Alive”. I have to admit I was definitely cutting the rug, however my dimwit partner could of used a few pointers from Arthur Murray. What a spaz! He was soon in his own world, dancing all over the office. When he broke out into the Marcarena I knew that showtime was almost over, so I emptied out my bookbag. As soon as he broke into a rendition of the moonwalk that would have had Neil Armstrong cursing the day he ever came back to this planet, I broad-sided him with Tony Morrison’s Song of Solomon. Before he could roll his eyes back into his head I smacked him in his nose with Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms, boxed his ears with Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Generation of Swine, and finished him off with a massive blow to the back of the head with the hardback edition of James Joyce’s Ulysses. He had no reaction, no emotion, and no pulse. As the blood poured out of his nostrils like the Red Sea, I laughed inside because I had proven my theory – he wouldn’t know good writing if it hit him in the head. I looked around the office for a way to dispose of the body, and for a moment I thought I had finally made the big mistake that would get me caught. But divine providence must have been smiling on me that day for in the back of the office I saw a closet with a sign that read “Resumes on File”. I heave-hoed his body into the mountains of paperwork and buried him with the hopes and dreams of English majors everywhere.

Now, there may be those of you who think I’m a sick twisted fellow, or who may fear that you could be my next victim. The only people on my list right now are Mr. And Mrs. Daisy, a deceivingly sweet old couple who like to drive their powder blue Cadillac down the freeway like their the grand marshals of the rose bowl parade. Obviously they haven’t had their drivers licenses renewed since the Civil War, and someone needs to put a stop to it before innocent people get hurt. So fear not you spineless cowards, for I am a sane man of principle! I do not kill anyone who doesn’t deserve it. Just always remember to treat other people with respect, fairness, honesty, courtesy and compassion. If those seem like hard rules to live by then my advice to you is to gather ye rosebuds as you may, for tonight will be your last.


PEACE!!!!

REWRITING THE REDSKIN WRONG

NOTE: this piece is a few years old, and my style is a lot different nowadays, however I like it because I take a position on what was back then a very heated debate, then used my own style to make my point. Please feel free to comment and trash at will...I love the abuse, just ask my boss at work! PEACE! BOH
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Much like decaffeinated coffee, some things are just an outrage from their very inception. Such is the case with a professional sports team that uses a racist slur as a nickname. The debate over the nickname of the Washington Redskins is so mindless it leaves me suffering with chronic cerebral flatulence of a Taco Bell proportion. The political pachyderms and jackasses of the world like to make everything black and white for we the ignorant people. However, this Crayola kid knows there is no blue and green, just shades of aquamarine. Oh now, the defender’s of this “honorable” name are doing their best to complicate the issue, but you can leave your thinking cap off for this one kids, because it’s as easy a drunk date on prom night, and a lot more meaningful.

The defenders of the “sick” name have an interesting grab bag of insulting excuses for why their lives would forever be in shambles if they are forced to accept a new name. Of course their ace in the hole is, as usual, the beloved first amendment. Now I’m no expert on the Constitution, but I don’t remember an amendment that gives every flag-waving murican the unalienable right to interpret its meaning any way they see fit. When someone starts rambling about things like forefathers, God-given rights, and the land o’ the free, I am already thinking they have a weak argument if they have to resort to buzzwords from and 8th grade history chapter. I’m wondering how many people were drawing doodlebugs in the back of class when the “all men are created equal” chapter was discussed.

The failure of our educational system in presenting an accurate and useful representation of the Constitution is even more glaring when you consider what is not taught – the importance of other cultures, such as the contributions of Native Americans, in the foundation of this country’s history. When the significance of another culture is ignored, what is then “learned” and interpreted can only be called “ignorance”, or perhaps more accurately, “mythology”. In what would be the equivalent of watching an afternoon’s worth of Chuck Norris movies and claiming you’re an expert on Vietnam, I suspect many Americans have pulled a Sally Struthers, and have gotten their degrees in Native American History from the comfort of their own couch. Hours of quality snuggle time with the Lone Ranger and John Wayne have memorialized the Native Americans as pesky troublemakers that just don’t seem to know when they are outgunned.

When education and the media fail to present a culture in a positive way, it becomes socially acceptable to be ignorant, and that is dangerous thing. And “ignorant” is certainly the word that comes to mind when I see and hear an entire stadium of folks paying “tribute” to Native Americans with the “tomahawk chop” or a rousing rendition of “Hail to the Redskins”. The pride a Native American must feel when hearing those chants must be close to the same gratification they feel when hearing someone be called an “Indian giver” or a “ticket scalper”. Receiving these types of honors is kind of like receiving a fruitcake on Christmas – it’s nasty, unwanted, and probably given to you by someone who would just assume use your stocking as a diaper bag. Native Americans are tired of being honored on margarine boxes, SUV’s, and baseball caps, and tired of being honored with war paint, fake feathers and foamy hatchets. If people would just stop honoring long enough to put themselves in the same position, they may just see how insulting and degrading their tributes really are.

The main reason people don’t want to change the nickname is that another name just wouldn’t sound right. The Washington Redskins are one of the best-known and storied franchises in all of professional sports. To call them anything else would seem blasphemous to many diehard fans. As a rabid fan of my favorite team, I can certainly relate to that fierce loyalty. You get sucked into the traditions and nostalgia and so even the slightest color change in an away uniform may get you all wound up. However, it would be hard for me to maintain these traditions if I knew that by doing so an entire race of people were being disgraced.

Therefore I’ve decided to take it upon myself to appease all the nay Sayers who are terrified of the phonetic implausibility of a new nickname, and have come up with a few dandies of my own. Now the name of a professional sports team should evoke fear and toughness, as well as be phonetically pleasing and geographically relevant. The Lions, and Tigers, and Bears are already taken, oh my! Therefore this is not as easy as dropping a chocolate bar into a jar of peanut butter people, so bear with me here people, I’m only trying to help.


#5 The Potato Skins

OK, I know what you are thinking, not exactly a ferocious name. The image of a giant bloodthirsty potato skin belly flopping into a vat of sour cream might make the opposing team hungry, but unless they ate a plate of them before bed the night before the game, it probably won’t give them nightmares. However, there are some other winning qualities to this popular artery clogger, so I couldn’t possibly leave it out.

First, the nickname “skins” gets to stay, which would be a Gandi-esque olive branch to extend to the Redskin Right. Giving up only half the name will only ruin half of their lives for all of eternity, which is a generous dab of Vaseline to coat the old proverbial thermometer with before the big plunge. But wait, there’s more than just a spoonful of jelly to make this medicine go down – the colors get to stay as well! Ah yes, the regal maroon and gold are a perfect match for the bacon crumbles and cheddar cheese congealed on top of this deep-fired delicacy. The hard-liners get to keep half the name AND the team colors – it’s like a Double Fantasy without Yoko singing. Just Imagine!


#4 The Capitalist Swine

This one is bound to be a sentimental favorite with the marshmallow-roasting separatists and anarchists hiding out in a neighborhood park near you. The pig on this helmet is no Babe or Wilbur by any stretch of a narrow mind. I’m envisioning a snarling, fire breathing hog with dollar signs in his seedy little eyes, YIKES!!! The owners of The Swine could implement Pentagon pricing, in typical professional sports tradition. Just think, a family of four could get game tickets, plastic Swine noses, a few “not so hot” dogs, and some watered down cokes to pour your liquor into, all for the low-low price of the little ones’ mythical social security checks. In the 4th quarter when the ref blows a call you can throw your empty wallet at him. Be sure to bring some pocket change for the bathroom tax or you’ll be a wiggly squirmy worm when your pal Jack Daniels tries to leave early at halftime. That’s enough to make anyone jump out of their seat and wave a half-burned flag!



#3 The Interns

You may be one of the many people who believe the Monica Lewinsky controversy was blown out of proportion, and let me just say you are right. However this is a great opportunity to bring some entertainment back to a country in dire need of some sex jokes to liven up the daily water cooler chats. Maintaining the respectable “tradition” of “honoring” hard-working people, this name would pay tribute to the little naked people behind the curtains and between the sheets in hotels everywhere that keep the lawmakers of our great land grinning like a pack of coyotes at a roadrunner buffet. I’ve even gone as far as to come up with a new cheer for this team, so grab your tape recorder Linda cause here it comes, everybody sing!

– READY, OK –

“Hail to the Interns,
Hail victory,
If our careers need advancement
We’ll drop down to our knees.”



#2 The Gun Lobbyists

Ask any political pundit who the most feared, powerful, savage, ruthless warriors are on Capitol Hill and they’ll tell you it’s the Gun Lobbyists. No group works harder at keeping a fresh supply of assault rifles, shotguns, and six-shooters available for the honor students in your hometown. No group works more rigorously at preserving the rights of the Elmer Fudds of the world who believe they need an AK-47 to mow down those meddlesome, wascadly wabbits. Defenders of our Constitutional right to kill people, these admirable freedom fighters are most deserving of an honorable tribute. When you go to a Gun Lobbyist game make sure you pack a tech-9 along with your noisemakers and seat cushions just in case you need to cap someone who takes your parking space or cuts in front of you in the hot wienie line.



#1 The REDRUM

There are plenty of reasons to load up the family truckster to visit grand ole D.C. There are more museums, monuments, and malls than you can shake a wet cigar at. You can pay a visit to your local senator if he’s not busy smoothing the sleep creases off his face or getting busy at a Motel 6 with the hired help. You can cuddle with your honey on the muddy polluted banks of the Potomac. You can even sit in on a session of Congress to see the wheels of government in slow motion.

But perhaps the biggest reason why our nation’s capital is the #1 attraction for vacation bible schools and 4H clubs everywhere is that it is the murder capital of the world. Sorry Dublin, tough luck Baghdad, maybe next year Beirut, when it comes to random acts of violence, DC has this one in the body bag. Where else can you see your city’s highest elected official on American’s Funniest Home Videos enjoying a satisfying smoke in his grape smugglers and bathrobe with a nice wholesome young woman in fuck-me pumps. There’s so much snow blowing into Washington these days I hear the name may be changed from the District of Columbia to Little Columbia.

It is with this geographical relevance, demographical data, and phonetic charm that I unveil my personal favorite new nickname for the Redskins – The Washington REDRUM. Dyslexics and movie buffs alike can appreciate the allegorical significance of this wonderful new identity. The name pays respects to the little dead people of the world; the overlooked and under-appreciated John Doe’s and Suzy-Q’s who tirelessly man the freezer at the city morgue. A victory for the REDRUM is a victory for CNN, Cops, and other shows that benefit from the sensationalism and free publicity of senseless yet undeniably entertaining real life violence. The stands will be filled with spirited fans dressed up as serial killers, gangbangers, postal workers, policemen, and other violent offenders. It’s the feel good name of the year and it fits the city like a jimmy hat.

Well kids, that’s the list I’ve sacrificed hours of Judge Judy episodes putting together. Get your votes in now because every vote counts. If you don’t like any of my selections then you can just SAY HELLO TO MY LITTLE FRIEND!!! Seriously though, you may feel like these names are insulting, ridiculous, humiliating, or even politically incorrect. If this sounds familiar it’s because that’s what Native Americans have been saying about the nickname “Redskins” for quite a while now. No one deserves to feel that way, and that is why it is time to rewrite the Redskin wrong.