World of Shit (The Promised Land)

It has been a long time since I have written anything but I made a vow to myself that I would only write this thing when I am inspired to do so. I know some people I know will not agree or like what I have to say in this post but you know what, I don't care. I really don't. All I ask for is for you to try and be objective and look at from both sides. I know that people are going to read this and tell me I am wrong and all this other shit but I think it's to be expected.

Today, I came across an article that stated that the recently sworn in new Premier of British Columbia, Christy Clark, is pressing our Prime Minister Stephen Harper to approve the opening of the already denied "Prosperity Mine" which is located west of my hometown of Williams Lake.

Newsflash for her and all the people who have their collective heads in the clouds and think this ridiculous mine are going to save families and give everyone jobs...IT ISN'T GOING TO DO SHIT!

First things first, if you look at the unemployment rate of Williams Lake, it is said to be around 8-9% which works out to about 900 people of the entire community. Now this environmental disaster waiting to happen is supposedly going to give something like 300-350 jobs total, but don't quote me. That's hardly fixing all the employment issues in the community and while it is 300 new jobs that's only for 20-25 years tops. So after that everything goes back to where we are now? Who says that every person that is unemployed can or will be able to work at the mine as well? Do you really think they are going to hire ALL local and train everyone beforehand or is much more likely that they will get people to come in and get the mine fired up as soon as possible so THEY can get the money rolling faster? Then they will give locals menial jobs and pay them high so the worker thinks hey this is pretty good and meanwhile they are raking in the lion's share of minerals and cash that isn't theirs.

This also brings up the bigger conundrum of Aboriginal Land Titles. This mine is on the land that natives were segregated to and is supposedly theirs to do what they want with. So if that's the case, then shouldn't they honor the segregation they imposed on them? How is it that can just pick and choose what treaties and laws and other bullshit to abide by or do they loophole their way through everything?

Look at it this way, if the local Indian bands came and just started to dig up shit like the mining companies that came out west and did that on your property or your summer home, you'd hear about it for weeks on end in the newspapers and on the news and there would have been arrests and all kinds of other bullshit.

Like I said earlier, how is 20-25 years of employment going to solve everything? Instant gratification is the name of the game I figure. People just hear one thing and like the band-aid solutions. Because you personally now, as a resident of Williams Lake, will have a job for awhile, it justifies ruining a large section of the country just so you can go out and get stoned and drunk on the weekend more? People's shortsightedness is sickening to me and when you make the argument that we're going to screw future generations out of work you show that you don't see that by the time some of your kids and grand kids can work there, the mine could already be closed or they would be employed for 3-5 years. It's not a renewable resource. Hell, I am more for logging then this mine and I don't even agree with most of the logging policies!

Here is another point I would like to make. How is it that a environment destroying mega project such as this mine can seemingly get carte blanche yet when the Tsawassen First Nation has been approached by companies to introduce waste to energy incinerators through proper channels, it was met with such fervent opposition? These incinerators are very clean and would help reduce the use of giant landfills such as the one in Cache Creek where most of the Lower Mainland's garbage goes now.

The answer of course is the typical politicians on all levels PANDERING to the not in my back yard yokels that are the only dildos who are going to these town meetings and sadly are the people who still go out and vote. They say the smoke will be coming into Delta and the Fraser Valley and ruining air quality...I got news for ya assholes, as soon as you leave the lower mainland and go up north anywhere, you'll see that you have shit air quality as it is.

Here's an interesting little piece of information about said incinerators from Tsawassen Chief Kim Baird: (From the Abbotsford News, December 9th 2009)"The science speaks pretty clearly about that particular issue,"she said. "It's pretty compelling when a fireworks display lets out more emissions in 15 minutes than a waste-to-energy plant does in a year."

Now I am sure some will say, "oh yeah she's just drinking the Kool-Aid, she stands to get money so of course she is all for this." Well here's something for you chuckleheads that think that way. France has a giant trash to energy incinerator right in downtown Paris. In fact, it is not that far from the Eiffel Tower! The new plants such as this have many ways to get rid of odors and emissions.

Here is a review from this environmental website: Of course, modern plant is not like that; it is virtually non-polluting and certainly not smelling. A couple of years ago, I visited a plant in Lausanne, Switzerland and was impressed at just how odourless and clean it was.

With the Lower Mainland's dump in Cache Creek quickly approaching capacity along with most of our other options for trash disposal being the same state, why wouldn't this be streamlined in to action? Because our favorite pals in government can use to their advantage with the addle minded, NIMBY fucks that are going to vote for them and they can in turn push their parties agendas.

When you realize that none of the malformed inhuman mutants who inhabit the government don't care about you AT ALL and that they only want to push what they think is right, the sooner you'll realize that nothing you do or say really matters. It basically boils down to that you have to vote for the party that is least screwing you in the butthole with no lube...

Facebook...

With the new movie The Social Network coming out about the creator of Facebook (starring that kid that owes his whole career to Michael Cera turning roles down) what better time to write about that thing on the internet that we all can't live without?

Ever notice most people overstate the obvious on Facebook? Do you really have to click on CLICK LIKE IF YOU HATE KID TOUCHERS! to prove your against pedophiles?

But if I don't click like people will think I am for kid touching!

Isn't it the general consensus that you should be against that? Do you really need to broadcast that on Facebook?

Then people get on there and say they love their kids. No shit eh? Aren't you supposed to? I'd like it just one time if I seen someone say they hate their kids and wish they hadn't had that one drunken night at the Taco Time Drive Thru...

Of course there are people who have to state they like things that are so common that there is no way in the world nobody hasn't done them.

Joe Blow likes breathing, Joe Blow likes the sun, Joe Blow likes orgasms. WHO DOESN'T LIKE ORGASMS JOE !?!

Of course there are the things like:

Sally Dumb Ass likes: When random words are spelled in Alphabet soup!

Joe Blow likes: When you yawn and make your cat yawn too!

Joe Blow likes: When Blankets are warm out of the dryer!

NOBODY CARES!

It all amounts to wasting time when you are reduced to clicking like on such obvious things.

Then there are the things that are overtly weird to click like on. The things that other people see and think you are funny for clicking like on even though you didn't have the thought that thing is about. Stuff like:

Joe Blow likes: When homeless men get killed by dragons, building functioning sex toys out of Lego, that monkey that sniffs its own butt and falls out of a tree, snorting pixie sticks, drawing nude pictures of Gandhi, when your crap piles up an inch above the water in the toilet, click like if you hate it when your suit of armor chafes your groin, after sneezing you look in the kleenex there are spiders in it, when your nipple clamps seize up, giving hand jobs to get free bus rides, squirrel enemas, ordering pizzas with koalas on it, finding out your real dad's identity on Maury Povich, smelling Wayne Cox's shoes, Barbicide, Godzilla's taint, writing your name in the snow with your pee even though you're a woman, when you were young and your parents got murdered on Xmas morning, giving foreigners the wrong directions just for fun, doing bong hits with a horse, not aging gracefully, calling Dial-A-Prayer and trying to have phone sex, fingering an owl, reenacting the debut of the Shockmaster at my family reunion, that weird smell when they clean the Slurpee machine at 7-11, writing a novel after huffing paint, carving Smurfs, writing erotic braille, rubbing those tree air fresheners on your nuts when you have to go somewhere after going to the gym because you can't get to a shower, calling a vagina a lunch box, putting a sock on a cat's head and watching it walk backwards, deep throating a slinky, getting into a duel at a senior citizen's home, etc etc etc...

CLICKING LIKE! I AM ACTUALLY TALKING ABOUT CLICKING LIKE ON SOMETHING!!! Damn that kid that invented Facebook! What the shit is going on anymore? I click like on shit all the time to tell everyone shit I like! I have an urge to let people know hey look at this stuff I think is cool so in turn maybe you'll think I am cool!


PS

Please click like on this when I post this on Facebook, it makes me feel like I am important...

Headline News

Does anyone watch this channel? It makes me sick anytime I watch it. It's not because of the depressing news they report but HOW they report it. Let's not forget the shameless pandering towards old white trash dummies during and between news briefs. They must have done a demographic search and seen that's the only people watching it because it's channels like this that are the reason no young people watch the news.

Let's start with the advertisements on there first:All the ads on this channel are marketed towards the god fearing, All American, apple pie eating, old , white people. Every person in this commercial for some weight loss program was either A.) A tv star from 35 or more years ago or B.)some football player or coach from 35 or more years ago.

Do they think people are really that stupid? Maybe they are! Maybe there really is some big fat guy in his 50's going, "Well if two time Superbowl winning Coach DON SHULA can lose weight from Nutrisystem, SO CAN I!" Is there really an older woman out there in the viewing audience, who, because of Marie Osmond losing 50 pounds, will join right up because they go hey I remember her!

I tell you one thing right now, when I am older and they are trying to market ads towards my generation, I am not going to be getting on Nutrisystem because that girl from Blossom ballooned up in true Sally Struthers type fashion and needs some money.

Then comes in the life insurance commercial because if old white people aren't fat, they are probably still dying or going to die soon anyways. Let's scare up some business with our scary facts and figures. I guess when you get right down to it, it's a good business model. The companies probably see what demographic is watching and go, "Yep, all the addle minded 45-65 people with no pot to piss in in the first place are watching this channel, may as well scare what life is left in them into buying some life insurance!"

Then they dance around nude (in all likelihood) in some bizarre rich ad-executive manner that we don't know about. I figure most people in high places of authority or power do weird stuff because they have everything so they start having to engage in strange activities just to level off the high of being above the peons they rob.

Bill Gates probably has to get his head pushed under water with one of those electric bug zappers that look like a tennis racket while his wife sticks him with ears of corn just to bust a nut. I hear Steve Jobs pees on Bill Gates just because he can. He actually goes to his house and urinates on him. Then he gives him the Apple Shareholder's report (which is just a picture of Steve Jobs recreating Uncle Scrooge swimming in money and gold from the opening of Ducktales) that has a secret camera in it to catch Gates' reaction as he begins to get angry and cry and Steve Jobs masturbates to it in his jet propelled limousine that runs on Courvoisier and left over Microsoft Zunes.

Anyways, I digress...So after that comes one of those ridiculous ads for a quarter made out of part the World Trade Center. Who would buy coins anymore? Even older people that's who! No kid would get them on their own volition. Someone's grandpappy out there would go, "Oh Jesus H. Christ Mary, get the checkbook, little Jeremy would love a 9/11 coin! We can't have him forget about 9/11 now can we?" All kids use coins for is candy and pop machines or to flick and slingshot with a rubber band at the kids who are:
A.) Fat
B.) Skinny
C.) Nerds
D.) Visible minorities
E.) Physically/mentally handicapped
F.) Female
G.) Has like a weird arm or some other defect that kids laugh at
H.) Any combination of the above

The only other people I could see getting one would be those guys who have American flag boxers and subscribe and get erections to Guns and Ammo and have a bunker and a plan for when "the towelheads and other mud people try to 9/11 us agin..."

Now on to the actual programming...

NEWS NOW with the one and only:

Mike Galanos...
Mike Galanos (left) in his favorite concerned look pose, mourning the loss of Gary Coleman...


If you have never seen this dope, don't bother watching him, I'll save you the pain. So say there is a story about a kid getting their arms ripped off by an elevator in a scene oddly reminiscent of when Michael Ironside gets his arms ripped off in a scene from Total Recall. Michael Ironside actually has nothing to do with this, I just watched Total Recall recently...

Now this Mike Galanos creep will get on there and tell you the story like he's some 1950's journalist with his sleeves rolled up, no jacket and one hand on his chin and tell you:

Mike Galanos: "Tragic tale out of Raleigh, North Carolina yesterday where uhhh a 4 year old girl had her arms ripped off in an elevator accident. Now I must warn you this is graphic... (Now good ol' Mike changes from his concerned everyman who just happens to be a news reporter voice into the non umm uhhhh standard news anchor vocal delivery) Witnesses at the scene say 4 year old Kailey May Dobbins was playing in a grain elevator near her house when suddenly it turned on accidentally while she was playing with a friend. The little girl was holding her friends hands and the elevator shot up unexpectedly, causing the little girl to lose her arms as she was wedged between the door and the wall.

(Of course his visibly upset face is interspersed with horrific images of the girl going to the hospital, lying in bed with no arms, smiling still somehow just to mess with your emotions, and finally coming out of the hospital with stumps...)

Now back to the shtick voice of concern:

I mean really, here this little girl has no arms uhhh now. I mean as a parent myself, I don't know how I could deal with my own child...you know, getting her arms ripped off ummm much like Michael Ironside in that Total Recall film, which I wouldn't let my kids watch by the way. Now let's go to the phones, here's Scooter, who uhh is actually from Raleigh, North Carolina, yes Scooter..."

Scooter: "Yeah hey there Mike, I just got to say I live right near that there elevator and I think it's terrible that lil' girl got her arms ripped off like Michael Ironside in Total Recall but at least she didn't have a psychic mutant growing out of her guts like that there one freak on that movie."

Mike Galanos: "Uhh yeah I think we can all agree on that Scooter and thanks for your call, I mean really to have such a tragedy befall a girl with so much of her life left a head of her. What are the odds of getting your arms ripped off in a elevator like Michael Ironside in Total Recall? Now let's get to your calls, this is Melinda from Jacksonville Florida, yes Melinda?"

Melinda: Hey, I jus' want ta send my prayers out to that girl what got her arms ripped off. Do you uhh know uhh whether or not she could blowed people's heads up like Michael Ironside in that there movie Scanners Mike?"

Mike Galanos: "Uhh I can't confirm that she has telepathic abilities like Michael Ironside in Scanners. Now lets check what everyone is saying from e-mail, Jdog1984 writes: My uncle lives in Raleigh and he said that elevator had killed some people before and figured that girl was lucky that was all that happened. Also, remember Michael Ironside was Jester in Top Gun? If that's the case ,and I want to stress (right now Galanos switches things up by taking his hand off his chin and almost doing a slow chopping motion at the camera while looking right into it) that this alleged at this point, but if that elevator had killed before, why wasn't it taken down? Let's go to Rudy from Atlanta on the phones, and yes also, to answer the other part of your email, I remember Michael Ironside was in 1986's Top Gun. Hello Rudy?"

Rudy: "Hey Mike, I know it's a tragic accident, what with going through what Michael Ironside went through in that elevator scene in Total Recall and not be the evil henchmen but instead a little 4 year old girl in real life and all but...I can't help but wonder where there the parents were in all of this?"

Mike Galanos: "Yes, that is a good point Rudy, ummm, yes, one must wonder what were the parents were, I mean I know myself, as a a a parent, that I would never let my children get disfigured in a accident reminiscent of Michael Ironside in Total Recall. Let's go to Michael from...uhhhh Toronto. Michael?"

Michael: "Hey, this is Michael Ironside, I just wanted to say I don't condone elevator accidents. Also I was in Highlander II."

Mike Galanos: "Now, and thanks for calling in Michael, I just want to say, nobody said you do condone elevator accidents that are eerily similar to that particular scene in Total Recall...

Now Michael Ironside references aside, Mike Galanos' segments are exactly how I described. He gets all fake worked up and says the most obvious things like he doesn't think teenagers should be having unprotected sex or rape is wrong or it's terrible when people lose stuff or their lives in natural disasters. It's such an obvious act that it's not even funny. Then he just turns it off and goes:

Mike Galanos: "Hey! Susan apparently there is a retard walrus that likes to wear hats and looks like Susan Boyle at the zoo up in New York!?"

Susan: "There sure is Mike and we have video up next!"

It's the typical newscast format of tragedy, tragedy, fluff piece, in general but somehow it's worse with this Mike Galanos character. He just makes me want to puke anytime I see him. Now you may ask why I even watch this horrendous news program in the first place, it's because I like to read the news scroll. I would mute it but I like to flip out for no apparent reason sometimes. Well actually, most of the time.

I would cover the most terrible thing on Headline News, which is of course Nancy Grace, but I think she is deserving of an entire blog post just on her and her unbelievably mind numbing and offensive show...

Toilet musings...

I admit it. I read while on the toilet so don't ever ask to borrow my books if that bothers you. I swear I don't re touch the books until after I wash my hands but some people get bent out of shape over that sort of thing.

Anyways...

Almost all of the following was thought of while on the toilet. Al Bundy, this blog is dedicated to you. Oddly enough, some of the things relate to using the toilet in some strange way.

Have you ever read or seen something that you previously thought you had only thought of or experienced only to find that somebody already beat you to it? It's a strange kind of defeat in a way isn't it?

Here are two examples of this situation that have happened to me:

1.) I used to play a game in which I would start to urinate at the exact same time I would flush the toilet and then try to finish urinating before the clean water came back up. I would almost never win but for whatever reason, I would always do this. Then I was reading (on the toilet of course) an issue of National Lampoon from the 70's and it mentioned this exact game!

2.) I couldn't find the exact quote but George Carlin mentions sitting on the toilet until your legs fall asleep. I have done this sadly. I did this today while reading an old issue of Wizard Magazine no less.

ITEM NUMBER TWO (hahaha number 2 get it?!)

I was reading the Georgia Straight (guess where? If you get it right, you go to the head of the class!) and two things made me want to wipe my ace with that rag.

1.) Some trout sniffer, to quote Buzz from Home Alone 2:Lost in New York, re-envisioned Robin Hood for the modern era and naturally Robin Hood is some street thug with a crossbow and he of course is stealing from the corporate rich (naturally represented as pigs and some other Wickerman-esque masks) and giving back to the streets yo, helping shed light with eerie parallels to today's modern society and such.

If I knew it was that easy to write a play and get it to the stage in Vancouver I would have shopped around my play based on The Three Little Pigs where the the first little pig is on WELFARE and the second little pig is on DOPE and the third little pig is a PHILANTHROPIST who builds homes for HABITAT FOR HUMANITY and when he sees that the the other pigs are living in squalor, he sets out to help them only to have his efforts SQUASHED by THE WOLF CORPORATION who is going to BULLDOZE their neighborhood in the NAME OF PROGRESS! But the WOLF CORPORATION didn't realize they'd have to reckon with the NEVER SAY DIE HARDWORKING BLUE COLLAR THIRD LITTLE PIG!

2.) Some high end sofa company (what other kind of sofa company would advertise in the last bastion of taste that is the Georgia Straight?) had an ad in which they were saying that if you purchase their hide away sofa bed, you will be a gorgeous,in shape, white couple having wine and popcorn(!) and your gorgeous in shape white couple friends will have the time of your life ON A GODDAMN HIDEAWAY BED! Are you kidding me? The last thing I want to be doing on a hideaway bed is sitting with people trying to lousy double date. If they want people to buy it they should say GUARANTEED ORGY WITH ATTRACTIVE MODELS WITH NO STRINGS ATTACHED!

These ads are no better than the beer ads that are exaggerated male fantasies, filled with sexist imagery that is supposed to work men into an alcohol fueled lather (which by the way, I fully condone. I want to live to see the day where beer ads have full frontal nudity.) Well hey guess what schmoes that buy over priced sofas that look like a Picasso painting reject...these ads are the same principle as the neanderthal beer ads that are so low brow.

Here are some random thoughts while on the throne of knowledge:

If I had a laptop I would write this blog on the toilet.

I think I decided that I would write this blog while on the toilet.

Who was the first person to write obscene things in a public bathroom?

This is what my blog has come to...stuff I thought while on the toilet...

Caught up in a whirlwind...

I know it has been some time since I wrote anything in this here blog deal, but I have good reason. I decided to go up country to my old stomping grounds as it were and well, in all honestly, put my liver through it paces. According to A.A. I am what the "moral majority" and the so-called "medical community" would deem to be an "alcoholic".

Where do they get off on judging me? I don't go to their meetings and bother them about cleaning their lives up and getting on the "right track" and being a "positive role model" for people in the community do I? (Oh wait there was that one time I got really drunk and did do that.)

Anyways, after another night of drinking and meeting Hulk Hogan of all people, I was very hungover and wondering what kind of life I was leading. As I sat there in the hell that is public transit, this rather odd young man in full on suit and tie sat beside me and started up a conversation. He was probably 18 years old at the most and looked like Mad Magazine mascot Alfred E. Neuman in that attire with the red hair teeth to match. I honestly tried not to laugh at him as laughing would hurt my alcohol addled brain.

Alfred E. Neuman

He started off this rambling conversation with the standard template of complaining about the weather and as with most people these days, had no qualms with swearing like he was at a knife fight in Puerto Rico at 3 in the morning.

He said to me, "It's pretty fuckin' hot out there, fuck I hate this weather sometimes." I turned my attention to him as I realized he was talking to me. "Well dressed like that you're probably dying in this heat." He smirked a bit and said, "Yeah fuck man, I had a fuckin' job interview, well two job interviews, fuck I just want to get home and get out of this suit. This kind of weather ya gotta shower two three times a day." I just nodded and said, "It can be brutal."

"I hope fuckin' get the fuckin' job. I had to get all dressed up. Fuck." I somehow think he didn't get the job at either place. If he talked anything like he was now he probably only succeeded in either A.) Pissing off the employer or B.)Making them secretly laugh.

I hoped for his sake that he didn't have what appeared to be part of a carrot stuck to his teeth during the interview like he did now but for the comedy show in my mind it would be more humorous if he did.

He then started to talk about various heat related ailments and somehow he started in on how the weather is worse in the States. He said, "I fuckin' hate how my step-dad keeps the house so fuckin' cold with the fucking air conditioning on all the time down there." I added to this brainiac convention's plethora of musings such astute observations as, "Americans perception of temperature is different than ours. What they consider cold in some places is t-shirt weather to us. They go to the beach and where jogging pants and a hoodie." Naturally our young, job seeking, future of our country replied, "Yeah what the fuck huh, go to the beach in fuckin' jogging pants and get wet. Be fucking hard to walk around I bet."

I was kind of wondering what kind of nutcase am I dealing with here now, that was kind of a bizarre response but I'll keep this going.

"Yeah they fuckin' talk weird down there too. They go OOOOOOHHH AAHHHHHH in the way the talk. Like they talk like, you know, the fuckin' Crocodile Hunter." Now he was speaking in a Australian accent. "Oi am from Lou-weez-e-anna! Or Texas, yeah they talk funny like that too. I can't fuckin' stand it."

"Well we don't really have to deal with them that much," I said, "you may not realize it but we have an accent too, I phoned into a radio show and taped myself and listened back and I sounded like Bob and Doug McKenzie." He just kind of laughed and said,"Oh yeah eh!" I don't think he was old enough to understand who those Hosers were but in an odd way, he channeled them.

Then I said they pronounce words differently too, like how in some parts of the States they say door stoop instead of step or r-uh-f instead of r-oo-f or R-ut beer instead of R-oo-tbeer. He again just sort of laughed and thought about it for awhile.

"Yep, they sure are fuckin' weird down there. I'd like to go to like to go to fuckin' Paris or something you know. I wonder what kind of food they eat there?" I said to him, "Probably French food I would figure. Fancy stuff."

"Probably real fuckin' fancy." Such clarity of thought this young gentleman has! Naturally there is an older gentleman who gets on the bus and sits across from me because I was sitting up at the front because I think I would have fell over if I tried to walk to the back. I could tell he didn't much care for the language this kid was using. I noticed it but kept the conversation going because I like it when people are uncomfortable. He probably also wasn't impressed with me as I look like a biker that just got out of the all you can eat at this point in the day. Alfred E. Neuman keeps on with his F-bomb laced rambling and we are officially getting glares of contempt from Pops who just sat down.

Not too much later, the bus pulls up to a stop and this Indo-Canadian couple gets on the bus. The woman was wearing her hair up in a ponytail and had these really nice bracelets with diamonds (well they at least looked like them, for all I know it could be some cubic zirconium deals) and she had those henna tattoos all over her arms and hands and on her feet. Needless to say, she looked very elegant. Too elegant to be on the bus with such creeps as myself and Alfred here. Her boyfriend or whatever he was, was just in regular clothes and had a big beard and glasses, nothing too out of the ordinary.

Now our new friend waits until they sit down before he says to me the following gem of political correctness, "That east-indian lady was fuckin' hot! Smells funny but..." and smiles. I don't really know what to say at this point so I just shrug my shoulders and agree.

Then he gets back on to how he wants to go to Venice and go tubing in the "fuckin' canals." I told him they probably wouldn't let you do that but he had came to the same realization.

"They'd probably fuckin' stop you and ticket or fine you or some fuckin' thing." he noted, "be fuckin' weird, all the streets are like water and shit."

As we neared the bus stop, he wanted very badly to: "Get off this fuckin' bus and fuckin' drink a beer, fuck drink anything, fuckin' smoke some weed!" He was almost getting mad that he was on the bus and not loaded. I on the other hand was starting to finally kind of feel better than I was, wishing to never drink again.

"Well, finally off of this fuckin' bus." he proclaimed. I didn't really say anything but he turned to me again and said, "See ya man...trippy fuckin' shirt."

All that giant conversation was because he was intrigued by my Bubba Army t-shirt. What a pointless ending to a pointless story!

An exercise in frivolity

Nothing is more infuriating than hearing about the continuous barrage of frivolous lawsuits that are cooked up and taken to court on what seems to be a daily basis. We've all heard about the case where McDonald's was sued for "gross negligence" for selling coffee that was "unreasonably dangerous" and "defectively manufactured."

Now how did this case even get to trial? Logic would demand that the pouring (accidental or otherwise) is probably not a good thing to do. Do people really need to have all these warnings in life?Do they really need to be told that? Was the 79-year old woman who was severely burned when the lid came off her McDonald's coffee cup that stupid that she didn't realize hot coffee would burn her? The answer is no. The real person to blame here is the lawyer who cooked up the idea of the lawsuit in the first place.

First things first, the original settlement offer made by Stella Liebeck (the 79 year old woman who was burned) was that she wanted $20,000 to cover her medical expenses which were $11,000. McDonald's, being the caring company that they are, offered her $800.

Naturally she lawyered-up for lack of a better term, and retained the services of Texas attorney Reed Morgan. Mr.Morgan, in true evil genius type fashion, came up with what would be one of the most controversial lawsuits in American court history. It is also one of the most referenced lawsuits in recent history, it was even parodied in an episode of Seinfeld. (The episode "The Maestro" to be precise.) The mere fact that Mrs. Liebeck was awarded the astronomical amount of 2.9 million dollars in the outcome of trial naturally caused a myriad of copycat lawsuits across the United States and elsewhere in this money hungry world.

In fact I would go so far as to say that case is the reason there are so many of these maniacal suits because let's face it, most people are looking for a payday and an easy one at that. I don't think Mrs. Liebeck was looking for that payday though, I think Mr.Reed Morgan found an angle that turned out to be a gold mine. He certainly did strike gold as he still takes similar coffee burn cases to this day. Not to single him out but he certainly set a precedent for future lawsuits of this nature. Hundreds of thousands of lawyers all took a similar approach and seen too take any case that they think will get a similar payout and more importantly the notoriety which will help these scum bags continue to make the giant amounts of money.

Coming up with these ridiculous lawsuits is now a full on business and I was made aware of this by a great site called overlawyered.com that I found in my research on the McDonald's Coffee Case. Through that site I found that there are even lobbyists for what is being called the trial-lawyer industry. It all finally makes sense to me now to as why there are all these unbelievably idiotic cases even making it to trial in the first place. It's all a WORK!

The main culprits in this mess are a group which call themselves The American Association for Justice. They lobby for their cause and donate millions of dollars on state levels to get what they want out of the state governments so in turn they can get whatever laws changed that are in their way. The politicians then can get their precious money to campaign and do whatever other ridiculous things with said millions. They are just one of many lobby groups that plague the US Government system, but I could spend the rest of my life going on about all the b.s. lobby groups are responsible for so I will gravitate away from that subject.

To get back to my main focus here, the trial lawyer industry needed to get some political muscle in order to keep soaking more and more of that CASH MONEY they want to with minimal impedance caused by such insignificant things like laws and legislature. With laws bent to help them they can then proceed to bring cases to trial that are so, in the words of Mike Tyson, ludicrous.

That's why you will continue to see lawsuits such as this:

From the Associated Press:

Woman sues Google over Utah walking directions

By PAUL FOY (AP) – Jun 1, 2010

SALT LAKE CITY — A pedestrian injured by a motorist while following an online route has filed a lawsuit claiming Google Inc. supplied unsafe directions.

Lauren Rosenberg filed a lawsuit on Thursday seeking more than $100,000 in U.S. District Court in Utah. It also named a motorist she says hit her.

Rosenberg used her phone in January to download directions from one end of Park City to the other.

Google Maps led her to a four-lane boulevard without sidewalks that was "not reasonably safe for pedestrians," according to the lawsuit filed by the Northridge, Calif., resident.

Are you kidding me!? You can't figure out that a road with no sidewalks is probably not a good place to walk on!?! You're such an idiot that you would continue to walk in traffic? It is so obvious that this is another cooked up lawsuit to get a massive payout from a huge corporation. If this person suing is really that stupid they should probably not be allowed to walk the streets alone in the first goddamn place!

These cases are why Redbull has to put a disclaimer that their product will not actually give you wings! Good thing they put that warning on there or else I was going to get a case of Redbull and fly to the strip club tomorrow. I guarantee you if some kid has drank some Redbull and jumped off a roof and said that's why he did it, some trial lawyer would be sporting half a boner just hearing about the case and if he thought he had a chance to get a big settlement and make a name for himself, you know he would take it.

The other problem is that people are stupid and will try things from cartoons/wrestling/Jackass and get hurt or killed and rather than own up to being idiot most people will look to blame someone else almost right away. You never hear the person go, "I am so stupid that I tried to jump a shopping cart over twelve beds of nails while on fire with my ass filled with gun powder and oh yeah also with a cactus in my mouth and naturally I got hurt." If Jackass didn't have that warning before their show, MTV would be having to lawyer up and more than likely make that big settlement just to get the moron to go away.

And that you honor, is why I am going to throw up. Then I will sue myself after slipping in my own puke...well if that was the case though I would have to sue myself about six times.

Public transit...

Being as I am a giant loser who has no prospects for the foreseeable future, yes, I ride public transit. Now I have been riding the appropriately named "Loser Cruiser" for many years now and the following is a small list of the things that really, really piss me right off when on the bus or Skytrain.

1.Too much information syndrome:
People just don't seem to care what they say on public transit and they just blurt out anything and go along like nothing is wrong with what they are saying. In the course of six minutes at the most, I shouldn't know how you: "totally want to get some roids and bulk up", how you smashed a cake on a tree when you were drunk, how your friend likes to bake cakes when she's drunk and manages to not smash them and how her dad totally loves those Snuggie things and how she got two of them for his birthday.

I was recently reminded of an incident that made me think of all this in the first place. While riding on the Skytrain, my friends and I should not be made aware of how your mom got piles during her pregnancy with you and what's even worse is the pile suffering mother herself told everyone on the Skytrain this fact!

2.Various sexual acts:
Now you might wonder how I would put this aggravation as less irritating than people running their yaps and here's why, it's a great story to tell of course. I one time saw late 40's to early 50's woman in a black tied off no sleeve work shirt and jean shorts basically molesting a not all there Asian man of about the same age who was dressed like Urkel with a bowler hat on the bench at the bus stop.

The bus driver said to them, " Are you getting on the bus or not?" and no kidding the woman said, "No, but we'll be getting off!"and began laughing hysterically and kissing the Asian gentleman while he just fidgeted and smiled uncomfortably. He looked as if he was going along with it but at the same time he had an air of nervousness about him that indicated he didn't seem know how to deal with what was going on. Nothing like seeing two people you wouldn't want to see holding hands let alone start to have sex in public!

3.Listening to music:
Hey asshole, I don't care if you like hip hop, but do you have to crank it so those of us that aren't forcing our shitty music taste on everyone are forced to hear the hi hats tss tss tss tss'ing the whole bus ride? Even worse is when people aren't singing along out loud to their music but rather they are mouthing the words and getting right into it. I mean I love music but I am not going to pseudo rap along silently and do borderline choreographed hand movements and gestures!

4.Gadget hypnosis:
Most people get hypnotized by whatever their latest gadget is and they seem to have to go out of their way to go, "hey look at me, I have an iPad/iPod/smartphone, I am cool and I need to show you that I am part of the cool part of society." Guess what nerd, any chump can get these products you wiener, that's why you have one. The problem is that people seem to think it matters to have the latest trendy thing that is being pushed on us. It's such an epidemic that I have seen people get white headphones just to make it look like they have an iPod.

5.Perfume/Axe overdose:
How can you seriously get up in the morning and go, "Yeah, I should probably empty the entire contents of this perfume/Axe body spray on myself. That is a good idea." You do not smell good sir or madam. You smell like you were in the perfume or cologne aisle and it blew up and you thought this overbearing scent from hell is for me. I can't stand it when the scent lingers like a potpourri skunk or all the Tapout shirts in Surrey all piled up on the bus.

These are just some of things that are the fun to deal with on the bus or Skytrain, don't get me started on the service...

That will be in part 2...