SHORT STORY ABOUT TWO MEN IN A RED LOBSTER KITCHEN IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

I walk to the back of the kitchen wearing my apron and white t-shirt with cocktail sauce on it. It is a Tuesday, a slow Tuesday. Jeff stands in the back preparing shrimp to be sold. Jeff is like me, around 30. No wife, no kids, no mortgage. Both underachievers. On the weekends when there is nothing to do in the middle of the night we fish in the Mahoning River for catfish. We light a fire beside the river like the ancient Erie tribes of Northern Ohio.

I said to Jeff, "I'm 29, I've already fallen in love twice. They both ended. Here I go again."

Jeff responds, "Yeah, I've fallen in love several times myself. But I'm doing it again. She now sleeps over every second day."

"I mean, but we keep doing it to ourselves?" (As we speak we can see these past women walking around in our minds. We can see the beginning, when everything was sweet and nice and plentiful, we can see the middle when it took on a family atmosphere of playful joking and trying to get bills paid together, we can see the end-causes and effects, fates, and sitting alone with sorrow and Journey songs.)

"It is better than sleeping alone waiting for your dog to get hit by a car."

I walk back to the front of the kitchen to continue my labor. He goes back continuing his labor.

GREATEST MOMENTS FROM THE LAST DECADE

BEST SPORTS MOMENT



BEST LIT MOMENT



BEST POP MUSIC MOMENT



bEST POLITICAL MOMENT



THE ONLY GOOD THING ABOUT THE LAST DECADE THAT WILL MAKE IT INTO THE NEXT DECADE



AT 11:55 I'M GOING TO PUT THIS SONG ON AND LIGHT MYSELF ON FIRE AT MIDNIGHT REMEMBERING THOSE WONDERFUL YEARS WHEN EVEYONE HAD SUPPORT THE TROOPS STICKERS ON THEIR CARS, REMEMBERING THOSE TWO AWSOME WARS THAT MAY NEVER END, REMEMBERING KATRINA, REMEMBERING MY BROTHER'S TERRIFIC SUICIDE, ALL THOSE NIGHTS I DELIVERED PIZZA IN YOUNGSTOWN IN THE SNOW, ALL THOSE NICE STRIPPERS I MET ADDICTED TO COKE, ALL THOSE NICE COOKS I MET WHO CAME UP IN THE GHETTO WITHOUT FATHERS AND DRUG ADDICTED MOTHERS, REMEMBERING ALL THOSE MOMS WHO LOST THEIR KIDS, FLUFF THE CRACK HEAD WHO USED TO HANG OUT OUTSIDE PAPA JOHN'S PIZZA, ALL THOSE CRYING WOMEN AND DEFEATED MEN, GETTING TO HEAR STORIES FROM MEN AND WOMEN MY AGE WHO WENT TO WAR AND NOW TELL THEIR STORIES IN WAFFLE HOUSES, REMEMBERING HOW EVERYONE AT THE BEGINNGING OF THE DECADE WAS CONVINCED THEY COULD RESELL THEIR HOUSES FOR LIKE TWO HUNDRED MILLION DOLLARS, REMEMBERING HOW ALL THEIR HOUSES ARE WORTH 15 DOLLARS NOW, REMEMBERING ALL THOSE FRIENDS AND RELATIVES AND EVEN OURSELVES WHO LOST THEIR JOBS IN THE LAST TWO YEARS, REMEMBERING ALL THAT GREAT MEDIA COVERAGE OF 9-11, THE TWO WARS, KATRINA AND THE SWINE FLU VIRUS, WHO IS WITH ME

Sam Pink Christmas Post

I like this Sam Pink post

It's a Wonderful Life

It's a Wonderful Life is my favorite movie.

Every December I watch it and cry.

Every year that I watch, it seems like something new, I notice new things about it and feel differently about it.

That is probably because I've changed a little over the last year.

This year this is what I noticed.

George Bailey symbolizes Christ

Mr.Potter symbolizes Pontius Pilate or the Roman Empire or even the Devil.

And Father Bailey symbolizes God, the Father.

The Bailey Savings and Loan symbolizes God's goodness, or Light in the darkness.

At the end.

When the 8,000 is lost.

George Bailey goes to Mr. Potter and asks for money.

Mr. Potter tells him he is better off dead, because his life insurance is worth 15,000 which will save the Bailey Savings and Loan, which will save all the poor people from losing their houses and having to live in Potter's shacks.

Mr. Potter passes the verdict, George Bailey must die to save goodness.

George Bailey goes to the river and decides to kill himself, to sacrifice himself for the sake of the poor people and the dream of his Father.

George Bailey must save Bedford Falls (Israel or his people from the ethics and justice of the Roman Empire symbolized by Mr. Potter.)

George Bailey is willing to throw himself in the river, to kill himself. One could say that George Bailey is committing suicide, or that Jesus committed suicide, since they knew what was going to happen. But no, I think it was more of an act of war. The way a soldier dies in battle. Many soldiers that have died knew they were going to die if they ran up a certain hill or landed on a certain beach. But they knew, it had to be done, it was their duty because people were depending upon them to do it.

George Bailey wasn't going to commit suicide, he was going to sacrifice himself.

Before George Bailey goes to jump off the bridge, he faces a few small hardships, his car breaks, he is forced to walk. He goes into a bar and gets hit by a man. Resembling Christ being beat by the Roman soldiers.

George Bailey is ready to kill himself and Clarence shows up. Clarence shows George Bailey that he doesn't need to sacrifice himself. That Christ has already sacrificed himself. That no man needs to do so after he did. Clarence shows George Bailey what life would be like without him, that he needs to stay alive and keep being the George Bailey everyone loves. That he has even surpassed his Father in greatness. George Bailey's father never indirectly saved transports of men and built whole neighborhoods for the poor.

That George Bailey had surpassed the Father.

George Bailey realizes that he must take on the mode of Christ to survive, to never be afraid and to forgive. George Bailey runs up to Mr. Potter and even tells him Merry Christmas, George Bailey shows no fear of the bank examiner and possible jail time.

At the end George Bailey carries several of his children down the stairs and all the way into the living room. Which is such a powerful image. He realizes that one should not commit suicide because we are carrying each other.

Review of The Insurgent

A review on Descripted Lines.

I like this review.

It reads like a nice little essay.

The Insurgent will be out this winter or early spring.

Local News Coverage

Coverage

I sat at my kitchen table and stared at it on the front page, it was right under the Pavlik fight news.

It was strange, I've seen my writing translated and published in all kinds of random of places.

But seeing my name in the local paper I grew up with, the paper my dad read everyday after work, gave me a strange sense of satisfaction that I never had before.

The Filming is Almost Over

Here is some photos and news about the film.

The filming has been going for three weeks. The people making the film have been working 12 hour days to make this happen.

I've met a lot of cool people in the last few weeks.

I thank everyone involved in it.

Good Youngstown Music to Make you Feel Good

Winter Break Poems

Dots

After we got naked
we looked at each other
she said
these are my flea bites

I said
these are my dry skin dots
I get them in the winter

Santa Claus

I stood there
helping poor people
with their poor children
see Santa Claus

They were in a long line
But they were patient

Teeth were missing
some of the parents
smelled of beer

They looked like
the crowd
Jesus was speaking to
when he gave the
Sermon on the Mount Speech

Errands

She said we did
my errands together

I replied
Yeah
you don't do errands
with one night stands

Sufrimiento

I keep ending up
in situations
with 22 year olds
in their junior and senior
years of college

I tell them I'm 29
That I went back when
I was 27

While I state those facts
I think to myself
and not say outloud
what I did with
those lost years

I want to say
in the most polite
but terrifying voice
possible

"I have suffered"

Athesti Christmas, DUMBEST FUCKING ARTICLE EVER

Here is the article

I think I'm an atheist.

I mean

I know

And there is good evidence

That Noah Cicero never does anything for god. He never says, "Thank god." Or, "I'm doing this for God." "Noah Cicero never enters a church."

I don't.

It never occures me to do so.

Probably because I wans't raised with religion.

I guess that in terms of naming things, that makes me an atheist.

If I picked up the phone and someone was doing a survey on religion, I would answer no religion.

So I guess I'm an atheist.

I never tell anyone.

I don't care if someone believes in whatever they believe in.

It only becomes my problem when you want to influence public policy with your beliefs.

That's when I care.

But I would be happy to work with Christians on making a turkey dinner for poor people for Christmas. I would stand right next to them and make small talk. And if any of them asked me if I believed, I would shrug it off and change the subject. And most likely they wouldn't care. If a Christian, Buddhist, or Muslim organization wanted to hire me after college, if they seemed nice, I would probably do it.

I love Christmas.

I love Christmas movies, songs, lights, and today I bought a live tree.

I think celebrating Christmas or Saturnalia is a lot of fun.

I mean, Christmas is the birth of someone really nice.

Of someone who healed the blind, fed the poor, and gives hope to the fucked.

I don't think there is anything wrong with that at all.

I think if you say, "It is just Saturnalia."

That's cool with me too, because that links us to the history of civilization. That after thousands of year, a lot of humanity is still celebrating one day every december together.

And Saturnalia was pretty cool. On Saturnalia the slaves would switch roles with the masters. The masters had to be slaves for one day and the slaves got to be masters.

That's a pretty cool holiday in my opinion.

Afghanistan Troop Surge

So we all voted for Obama and he sends 31,000 to Afghanistan in LBJ style.

A lot of liberals are sad this week.

But we also know if McCain would have won it would have been 60,000 to Afghanistan and no possible exit for Iraq.

In 2001 Bush started a war with Afghanistan.

Bush decided to conquer a country with a around 24 percent literacy rate.

A country with no real infastructure.

A country of people that were basically volunteering for oppression.

Look at this way:

The men hated the women.

And the women endured being hated.

Think about the psychology of your fellow americans who have that worldview.

Think about that guy you know who beats his girlfriend and never listens to her. And think about his girlfriend who doesn't mind being beaten and who doesn't mind never being listened to.

Think about the mental decrepitude of those two people.

Imagine if a whole country was made up of those individuals.

Okay, now think like this:

We've all met illiterate adults.

They have like no reasoning skills.

Because reasoning requires language.

We can do things through habit like wash the dishes, cook, cut things, hunt.

We can do things with emotion like scream, yell, sing, fuck, love and protect each other.

But to reason.

To think things out to make them better, to use logic, one needs a good sense of language.

And only being literate, knowing how to read and reading things makes that happen.

America conquered a very sad country, a country where people are in mental prisons.

Iraq didn't have that.

77 percent of Iraq could read.

They had some infastracture, they are rich with oil.

So there was something to build from.

Afghanistan had drugs to sell.

So America conquers and takes over a small third world country where everyone was emotionally fucked.

I say they are emotionally fucked because the Taliban was all about emotion.

Religion is all about emotion.

Right wing behavior is all about emotion.

When someone rejects facts, statistics, and reason they are being emotional or basing their decisions on emotion.

Having all the women dressed up in burkas is emotional.

The men 'feel better' that they have so much control over another part of the population.

It is the same emotional theory white people had in the south when they forced black people to sit on certain parts of the bus, live in certain parts of town, and to work certain jobs.

The theory of racism, misogynism and class snobbery is that it 'makes them feel better' that someone is worse off than them.

It grants them 'a sense of power.'

When there is no money, barely any food, and no recreational activities than the feeling 'I'm better than you' feeling becomes a tool to make one's life livable. And for the women who endure it, they are kept ignorant, and they are probably so scared since they are born, that like most people when they are scared, they just want somebody to tell them what to do.

It doesn't happen all the time, but it has happened a million times in history and will probably continue to happen in different forms over and over again.

Think about like this:

The Age of Reason started in the 1600s with Descarte, it took hundreds of years for reason become part of everyday life in Europe and America. The people of afghanistan when Bush conquered them was emotionally and mentally trapped in 1350 Europe, everyone still obsessed with religion, no statistics, no facts, nobody knowing how to read, women trapped in hell, and animals still being used as traveling devices.

Imagine this:

Imagine if a modern developed country like France, Germany, Japan, and England took over the 1350 versions of themselves.

How would it turn out?

THE MOVIE

I'm eating a cheeseburger and they kept telling me to not look at the flash.

here are more pics

I went there yesterday and sat on a chair drinking coffee.

I was really amazed at everyone.

I talked with the script person named jackie.

Jackie and I talked about how they changed the script.

Because that is what writers really care about

"THEY CHANGED THE BOOK."

Here is the official opinion on that

You don't know how you will feel unless you are in that situation

You don't know how these things work

These is how it works.

There are script writers, directors, camera men, gaffs, grips, actors, sound people, all kinds of people are involved in this.

A lot of money is in this thing.

Everyone involved has been trained or got into it somehow.

Everyone involved has gotten involved because they love movies and they love being creative.

They want to be creative also.

They want to shine their little light on the universe too.

They take your book and they use it as an idea for something bigger.

They take and use it, as a platform for what needs to get done.

The script writers want to put their touches on it.

The directors want to put their touch on it.

The actors and camera people want to put their touch on it.

To use Locke, they want to imprint their essence on the product.

The writer of the book slowly realizes the truth of the situation.

That this isn't a movie of your book.

This is you politely handing your idea for a movie to other people, which gives them a chance to create.

To be themselves.

To imprint their essence, their being onto something.

From what I've seen Pirooz and Thomas are giving everyone a chance to be themselves, a chance to show what they got, what makes them human, what makes them strong, they have given everyone room for freedom.

The writer soon realizes that they are part of something bigger than them. That their book has actually given people jobs. That the money for the movie is being spent at local restaurants and stores. That young people at the local college are given jobs, they are doing for free, but will one day be able to put on their resume.

The writer soon realizes that the movie, even though it is based on their book, is just as important to the audio men, the actors, and the lighting people as it is to them.

Looking for Super Melodramatic Songs

I like when people give me songs to hear

when they say

here is a good song

I like melodramatic songs like:

This one given to me by Kendra Grant Malone

Here is another one this was given to me from the peace corps girl at work, she doesn't have a blog.

I like this song too, given by Brittany Wallace

So if you a song resembling these songs, comment their links.

Computer Lab Impressionism

I'm sitting here listening to regina spektor.

It doesn't seem very serious.

There is a hipster girl in here.

I don't know what she is doing in the political science lab.

This is a lab only for the most serious americans.

A girl is sitting near me. She keeps staring with her hand propping her head up. She isn't typing. She is emotionally preparing herself to check her facebook.

Now I'm listening to go Zee Avi. I met a girl the other day that seemed like a Zee Avi song. So I went on a date with her. It was true, she was like a Zee Avi song. I felt very good. We are still talking. Currently we are playing hard to get.

The hipster is text messaging someone, she wrote, "I'm thinking about becoming a nursing major and putting on twenty pounds."

There is a cute black girl in here. She looks really serious. When she gets drunk she turns into a slut.

Another girl is in here. She is wearing a blue top. I think I saw her naked in 2002.

I'm in the corner of the room drinking mexican organic coffee. I just keep staring around the room. Nobody seems concerned with me staring at them. They are all really busy thinking about their things. They have work to do. I have none. I did all my work because I'm old and responsible.

Another cute black girl just came in. She has a cute white coat. I like her coat.

I don't think any of these women are like Zee Avi songs.

A little white guy just came in wearing a pink shirt and he has his hat on backwards. I have no idea what could cause a person to put their hat on backwards. Do they put it on frontways first and then turn it backwards, or just put it on backwards to begin with.

This morning I was walking down the street. It was cold and I felt completely apathetic about the morning. It was happening, I was happening, the Mcdonalds was happening. It occured to me that my next autobiography should be called White Collar Man.

Last night I smoked a cigarette with three kids from Vassar College. They told me that Vassar has unisex bathrooms. I told the girl that I didn't like shitting with anyone in there. Bathrooms for one would be the best. She agreed. They told me somebody died naked on campus once. I wasn't paying attention hard enough to get all the facts. Just the good fact.

More young women came in the political science lab. They look like twins. I don't have my glasses. They are pretty far away. I don't know their names or where they live. I don't even know their majors. They are looking at the same page on the internet. The webpage is important to both of them.

The young women just left. They felt no need to be in the political science lab anymore. They are going to the mall to buy christmas presents.

Somebody at work the other day said, 'I hate the holidays.' I said, 'If you hate the holidays, you hate the J-MAN!' One of my managers, a male and Italian who likes to sing Metallica and Pearl Jam said, 'The J-MAN was born, then died, and was like born again.' Then I walked around yelling, 'The J-MAN don't like assholes.' My comments about The J-MAN not liking assholes made the guy who dislikes the holidays feel bad. He started acting nicer for the rest for the night. The man who dislikes the holidays is Irish Catholic, CCD came back, he felt the guilt, the J-MAN returns. The Irish Catholic drinks at least six beers a day and has a terrible complexion. He felt guilty because he didn't know that I was saying J-MAN but I was actually thinking about the Nightman from It's always Sunny.

Another cute black chick came in. All the white women in this room suck.

I've decided to judge everyone by their attractiveness level for the next 15 minutes. Everyone I know that does that are happier than me.

A white boy just came in, his hat is on frontways. It is a fucking Yankees hat. (Fuck the yankees and the lakers)

Now I'm listening to Nightman over and over again. It is making me a better person.

I just looked and realized that the white boy with his hat on backwards wearing a pink shirt, is wearing a net cap under under his hat.

A class is starting. I have to go.