I Ordered a Dictatorship from Overstock.com for $29.95

I want to rule the world. There, I finally said it. I’ve been holding that in for a long time. I know it may seem like a grandiose dream, but someone once told me to dream big. Or maybe it was to scream at pigs, I don’t remember. The point is I want to be the Monarch of Humanity. I will be crowned in a ceremony that will involve Emperor penguins, scads of bunting, snack trays of fine luncheon meats, a marching band playing accordions and Elle Macpherson. Afterward there will be many changes to make so here are the first 8 steps I will take. Why 8 you ask? Because you expected me to use 10, but that’s the kind of ruler I will be, unpredictable. I just decided to only give you my first 7 despotic ideas. Expect the unexpected.

1. I will explain to the German people using string theory and etch-a-sketches that David Hasselhoff is not a musical genius. He is a singer who can’t sing, an actor who can’t act and a talent show judge who has apparently never judged himself. Being enamored of his music is like being hungry for Chinese food and going to the supermarket to buy a box of their frozen store brand egg rolls to sate your hunger.

6. (you expected it to be #2 didn’t you? Suspect the unsuspected!)
No one named Kardashian will be allowed on TV, radio, in a magazine, newspaper or any other media outlet including internet sites be they news, gossip, porn or other. Further, no one named Kardashian will be allowed to breed so there will be no more of them to blight our intellectual landscape, warp the minds of the feeble or give Bruce Jenner and his tight-as-a-drumhead facelift a reason to be the left-of-center of attention.

4. (still looking for #2 aren’t you? Reject all notions of normalcy!)
Friday nights on my All-World TV Network will be Ludicrous Italian Movie Night. Each week my Minister of Entertainment Rowan Atkinson will host a ridiculous Italian-made movie such as Hercules Against the Moon Men, Secret Agent Superdragon or Colossus and the Headhunters. The movies will feature “actors” culled right from the ancient cobblestone streets of Rome, no direction whatsoever and a plot as confusing as the continued popularity of Julia Roberts. All local mini-marts will sell Movie Packs to help your celebration of Italian cinema. The packs include a bag of popcorn covered in marinara sauce, a pack of Hercules cards (collect them all, trade them with friends), a box of red wine and a novel to read during the boring parts of the movies which will begin just after the opening credits.

2. (Ha ha! Unexpect the expected!)
The Euro will be replaced with the English banger. Europe will be run on a sausage-based economy. The denominations and nicknames will be as follows:
1 sausage = Banger
5 sausages = Gang Banger
10 sausages = Chitty Chitty Bang Banger
20 sausages = The Bangers of Seville
50 sausages = Bangers! Pow! Boom!
100 sausages = The Big Banger

7. (don’t suspect what you think you expect or your expectations will be rejected, reflected and inspected (apologies to Arlo Guthrie))
Since Texas doesn’t have the stones to carry out their threat to secede from the United States, I’ll do it for them. All residents will be transported to various south-seas atolls to reside in the “Realm of Ignorance”. This way they aren’t near any intelligent people and can’t try to infect them with their narrow-minded dumbassery

5. (expect the blah blah blah)
The official song of my new monarchy will be Iron Butterfly’s In-a-Gadda-da-Vida and will be played before all sporting events, government meetings and each new school day. All citizens will be required to stand for the entire 17 minute duration on pain of torture, which will be watching the DVD commentary for the entire Rob Schneider filmography.

3. (yada yada yada)
The names people are giving their children are out of control. New babies are being named after cities, countries, and areas of conception. The spellings include apostrophes, dollar signs and cartoon characters. When I’m in command couples will be limited to choosing a name from the approved list which contains 5 names for boys and 5 for girls:

Boys
Braveheart
Lennon-McCartney
Tom Servo
Phil
Haystacks

Girls
Brandy (if it’s a fine girl)
Ginger
Maryanne
Argentina
Supermodel

Eventually I will make over 103 changes to the world as you know it when I’m in charge. I’ve given you a taste so you can prepare yourself. But hey, don’t warn Hasselhoff. I want to see the look on his face when he flies into Dusseldorf and no one cares.

Leaping the Hammerhead

I hate the term “Jump the Shark”. Don’t know why exactly but it’s always irritated me. What irritates me more is that so many people use the phrase. My recollection is that some random nobody created a web site where HE decided when a TV show had ceased to be a quality show. Taking a scene from Happy Days that Johnny Website didn’t like, he used it to create “jump the shark”. My real question is why did anyone care? How has this idiotic phrase become part of our lexicon and why are people taking his word for when a show has passed its sell-by date? Think for yourself people. Don’t let someone else tell you when a show isn’t any good anymore. Make up your own minds.

For example, I wouldn’t watch Grey’s Anatomy even if someone attached grappling hooks to my testicles and started climbing my leg like it was the Empire State Building. But if you like it, then watch it, tape it, Tivo it, discuss it with friends. It’s your business, not mine.

Also, why did Sharkboy pick that scene in Happy Days? There were other TV moments that you could use. Make up your own and bandy it around the water cooler at work.

How about when Mary went blind on Little House on the Prairie? You could use that as a starting point and say to Stan from accounting: Boy, Friends really “blinded Mary” when they had that one episode where Ross acted like a mealy-mouthed, spineless loser who still somehow got a woman who looks like Jennifer Aniston to sleep with him repeatedly.

Remember MASH? Of course you do. After several seasons Gary Burghoff who played Radar left the show and was replaced as company clerk by Klinger, played by the minimally talented, quickly annoying Jamie Farr. You could start a conversation with that cute girl in sales with: In my opinion, Lost really “replaced Radar” when it got as boring as CSPAN redistricting debates in season 3.

Frasier was on for 12 seasons. A pivotal moment occurred late in the series run when Niles finally consummated his lust by boning Daphne. So you’re sitting in the cafeteria and you want to divert the hairy IT guy from his usual Star Trek vs. Star Wars diatribe and you say: I think Home Improvement “boned Daphne” with that one episode when Tim grunted like a baboon, did something stupid and then his wife nagged him like a shrew the rest of the show until the last 5 minutes when he apologized for the 1,345th time even though deep down he still didn’t understand what he was apologizing for and just wanted her to shut up.

These are just some examples. Think about your favorite TV shows from the past and create your own, then use them in conversation and confuse the shit out of everyone. Oh, and stop saying “jump the shark”, it really bugs me.

Goodbye Rush

I read a headline recently that Rush Limbaugh said that if Healthcare Reform passes he will leave the country. I believe he later clarified that he would leave only for what he deems better healthcare, but I am choosing to ignore the clarification because I find it funnier to think of him having to leave the country. To that end I have written a short poem for the occasion:

Rush
please, please go,
leave, get out,
end your show.

No one will miss you
No one will care,
you're not special
you're not rare.

America doesn't need you
we'll be better off.
If you really love this country
you'll piss off.

Good riddance,
leave right now.
We'll help you pack,
Bang! Boom! Pow!

You made the statement
now live up to it,
don't be a prick
you racist piece of . . .

Why don't we end this
on a good note:
Good bye
get on the boat

I am an Idiot

I changed a tire yesterday, a very manly thing to do. Kneeling in the dirt, getting grease on my skin, muscles in my arms and shoulders rippling as I loosened the lug nuts, swearing like the spawn of a longshoreman and a character in a Martin Scorsese gangster movie when I realized I screwed up and have to start over.

It was a lovely spring-like day here in the northeast: About 60 degrees, sun shining, and neighborhood abuzz with activity. My brother had plugged my flat tire for me and it was time to take the donut spare off and put the repaired tire back on.

I started on the lugs. Apparently I didn’t realize my own Herculean strength when I had tightened them a few days earlier. I pulled, yanked, pushed, huffed, puffed, strained, growled and called them names, but they didn’t budge. I brought in Lou Ferrigno to help but the nuts just laughed at him. I set off C4 explosives but they absorbed the impact growing larger and stronger. Their cognitive functions grew exponentially. They developed communication, speaking to each other in a rudimentary romance language. At one point they bandied about ethnic slurs aimed at me (my background is German/Scotch-Irish so it was a lot of sausage sucking and sheep buggering).

Finally, I went Chuck Yeager on their ass. I ejected myself from an F-15 fighter jet wearing an old fashioned diving suit and helmet. Making a raptorial dive at the speed of sound, I crashed into the lug wrench with enough force to pry them off. The process was time consuming. An era of time passed that saw the squirrels in my tree evolve into a rodent/opera singer hybrid capable of hoarding nuts and hitting the high C in performance. I myself actually died after the third lug and was brought back to life by robot mechanics who wanted to see me finish the job.

With the lugs loose, I jacked the car up, took off the donut spare and put the regular tire on. Next came the fight with the wheel cover. The design of the cover is that it is held on by the lug nuts. You have to reach into 5 small holes to get the nuts started. Whoever designed this should be forced to sit under Rush Limbaugh’s chair while he farts his way through his 4 hour radio show.

Since I have the manual dexterity of Larry Fine, it was drudgery trying to hold the tire still, hold the wheel cover in place and get the lug nuts threaded through the small circular openings in the cover. Each probe into one of the openings resulted in another cut or scratch and more loss of blood. After a field transfusion by a WWI nurse conjured up by my weakened and delusional mind, I perked up, lowered the car, tightened the nuts and inspected my work.

Now we get to the title of this piece. I forgot about the valve stem. When I put the wheel cover on, I didn’t place it so the valve stem would stick out through the provided slot. I rushed it, slapping the cover on and tightening the lugs like an inmate’s sphincter in the prison shower. The valve stem was buried behind the cover. And since the cover is held on by the lug nuts . . . I had to change the tire all over again. I had to loosen the lugs, jack the car up, take the lugs off, reposition the wheel cover, hold the tire still while holding the cover in place and hand tightening the lugs through the tiny holes, lowering the car, and tighten the lugs with the wrench.

I took a 20 minute job and turned it into a 45 minute fiasco, much like I took a 30 second story and turned it into the 675 word tome you’re reading now. Take a good look. Gaze upon me in all my glory, for I . . . am an idiot.

Filibuster This!

Coming this week from Miramax its Kentucky Senator Jim Bunning starring as "Captain Asshole" in Filibuster This! Also starring the United States senate as "the Hostages" and millions of unemployed workers as "the Screwed and Pissed-Off Masses".

Directed by Harry Reid and produced by Barack Obama, part of the same team that brought you Healthcare Blanket Bingo, Filibuster This! is a tour de force performance by Senator Bunning as the world’s largest asshole. Sweaty, hairy and covered in pimples, Bunning runs amok in the senate throwing out his patented catch phrase “Tough Shit” to every one he meets while single-handedly screwing every unemployed American citizen at the same time. With his own party against him, he goes it alone on his ignorant and pointless quest, fervently working at not making a sliver of positive difference in the lives of those he represents.

Also opening this Friday in limited release, its Mitt Romney starring in a short film by Fox News called “I’m Going to Gainsay Everything the President and Democrats Say in Hopes of Convincing the Republican Base That I’m a Viable Presidential Candidate Even Though I’ve Never Done Anything Helpful and Don’t Have an Original Thought or Idea to Fix Any of This Country’s Problems and Only Want to be President Because I’m Rich and White and That’s My Birthright”.

The film is preceded by a new cartoon starring Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd entitled, “You’re Not Safe in Pubwic Parks Anymore Wabbit Because Now I Can Cawwy Firearms Thanks to Some Incwedibly Stupid and Short-Sighted Powiticians”.