Lord, Bless This Bounty For Which We Are About To Conceive

In case you haven't heard, a set of octuplets was born in California last week. All eight babies are said to be doing well, as it their mother. As usual when a woman gives birth to a litter of Frankenstein children, the media is going gaga apeshit over this news. Personally, I find it highly disturbing. Highly.

We don't know much about the mother, because she and her doctors are in some sort of weird media blackout, only occasionally updating us on the status of these freak kids. But we can surely conclude that mother used fertility drugs and that she's a paranoid narcissist.

Because, seriously. How fuckin' full of your own infertile shit do you have to be to think you deserve to have six plus children at once? Only in America is this type of behavior celebrated and encouraged. Remember the McCaughey septuplets, the world's first surviving set of seven babies, born in Iowa in 1997? I do. They were on Oprah the following year, paraded out by their Christian nutbag parents in front of the bright lights and television audience of millions, all in an attempt to prove what a "normal" family they are. A "normal" family that gets a pre- babyproofed mansion as a gift from Oprah.

Now, of course, we have "Jon and Kate Plus 8," a TLC reality show dedicated to this couple with a set of twins and a set of sextuplets. We learn that they are also Christians and full of their own infertile shit. I love how these families are always religious, as if subverting god's own will is going to get you into the express lane to heaven. There's a reason he made you infertile, asshole! Fuck, they're not blessings, they're science experiments. Allah forbid you just adopt a kid or two and leave it at that.

I was watching "Jon and Kate Plus 8" a few weeks ago and Kate was talking about how she gets the kids to line up for shit. She says something like, "I just say, 'Birth order,' and they just know. They know that their birth order was chosen by god." No, not so much. Their birth order was chosen by which fetus was closest to the hole they cut in your overstuffed uterus. And the neonatologists did that, not god. Or Jesus.

There is nothing at all normal or healthy about a woman carrying more than, like, three babies in her at once. And even triplets is a stretch, both morally and anatomically. I can't believe any insurance company in this country would be willing to cover the delivery of eight premature babies at once and the subsequent ten years in the NICU they'll require. But then again, I guess that's what Oprah's for.

Schadenfreude Is Where It's At

I hate to break it to y'all, but I'm still ridin' a slight Obamahigh. Ye olde rage well is runnin' a touch dry and whatnot. I am a bit miffed that he's yet to get a stimulus package through Congress (I seem to recall he told us he wanted to sign said lauded stimulus package into action on Day One) but I understand he's up against a mighty bureaucracy and there's still tons of pork shit to be hammered out, so I'm still willing to cut him some slack. At least until Black History Month. Then it's gonna be on like white on rice. I'm also officially going to hold Obama accountable if I don't get this government job I got lined up. So be prepared for a wall of bitchy shit to come down if I'm still unemployed this time next month.

But leave it to the bitter, insane right wing whiney assholes to jump all over Obama like a Kleenex at a snot party mere hours after he stumbled through the oath. Rush Limbaugh said, on inauguration day, "I hope he fails."

I hope you're happy with that quote. I had to travel to Rush Limbaugh's website to retrieve it and now I feel filthier than a Vegas whore. Clearly, this is the most outrageously unpatriotic thing any whiney little asshole could say, even one as whiney as Limbaugh. When you say you want the president to fail, you're saying you want this country to fail. Wanting America to fail = John Walker Lindh territory. God, it felt way too good to compare Rush Limbaugh to a member of the Taliban. But it's true. Look, if any person said those exact four words about George Bush this month six years ago- in the lead up to the Iraq invasion- Rush would have had no problem throwin' around the "you're a terrorist and want bin Laden's America-hatin' babies" routine. So consider it a dose of your own McCarthyite Oxycotin-laden medicine, Rush. You whiney little bitch.

But honestly, that statement didn't and doesn't really bother me. That's because for the past week, I've felt like Cartman at the end of that South Park episode where he makes that kid Scott Tenorman eat his parents (Cartman grinds his parents into a chili; it's actually really funny). When the kid realizes that he's just eaten his parents, Cartman says, "Oh, god, I love your tears, Scott. Please, let me taste your tears."

That's how I feel and it's great. Picture Scott Tenorman as Rush Limbaugh and me as Cartman and you've approximated my almost orgasmic ebullience over the past week at the Fox New brigade's hate-flavored tears. It's a blast to finally be able to throw their own shit right back in their faces. Don't support Bush Obama? Then you might as well be pissin' all over the hole in the ground at Ground Zero, hippie. Then you want the terrorists to win, commie. You're either with us or against us, Frenchie.

This is America. Love it or leave it, bitches.

Fear and Loathing in Bumfuck

"Z is for Zillah, who drank too much gin." - Edward Gorey.

Preface: I'm bored and uninspired at the moment. I was tempted to do a drunk post as an homage to woozie's awesomeness but opted against it for a variety of reasons (re: I fell asleep). Anyway, I woke up with the gin eyes and there's nothing new on the politics front for me to whine about so enjoy the following sober analysis:

You Know You're A (Drunk) Redneck When...

-a trip to Wal-Mart qualifies as Friday night entertainment.

I Know I'm Drunk When...

-I start seriously contemplating Britney Spears' life and career. Like why anyone would allow her to name her album Circus but then feeling sexist for thinking someone else named her album but then considering the notion that Britney Spears understands irony makes me shiver.

-The dimly-lit, maudlin ambiance of a local honky tonk stops bothering me.

-The Taylor Swift emanating from the jukebox stops offending my senses. In fact, it makes me down right giddy to the point I want to dance. And I don't dance.

-I can feel my pulse in my face.

-I lose my "Mid-Atlantic" accent completely in a Larry the Cable Guy-inspired, ear-raping Deep South burr.

I Know It's Time To Leave When...

-I start contemplating my life and career to the point of inebriated psychosis.

-I start theorizing with a complete stranger about the "significance" of the fact I was born on the thirtieth anniversary of James Dean's death and also share a birthday with Truman Capote ("Do you think I'm, like, imbued with cool?").

-The absurdity of the situation comes barreling down on me with the force of Fat Man / I start feeling like I'm in some awful b-movie from the 70s and the credits are about to roll.

-Even though I'm sipping a rum and coke, I can't stop fantasizing about the gallon jug of Club 400 gin my daddy has in the cubbard at home.

-I start yelling non-sequitirs from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas just to weird people out. "You dirty little faggot! Call the manager! I'm sick of listening to this dogshit!" and "Still humping the American Dream, I see..." and "As your attorney, I advise you to slow down..."

-Every sentence begins with "yeah" and a giggle.

"To alcohol: The cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems."- Homer J. Simpson

E Pluribus Dumb

I have a hate/hate relationship with my fellow Americans. They're wrong on every single crucial issue: George Bush, Republicans, gay marriage, Jesus, evolution, climate change, international relations (*cough* Israel *cough*), guns, drugs, and Sanjaya Malakar. Just when I was ready to take up and move to China, they elect Obama and a Democratic Congress and I rethink my utter antipathy toward them. On November 4th and 5th, I really felt like we were the movie monster who redeemed himself at the end of the movie when we decided to quit cracking skulls and use our powers for good. As I was celebrating Obama's victory with a trip to a classy titty bar in Asscrack, West Virginia (not to be confused with Bumfuck, Maryland, where I live) the weekend after, I drunkenly declared, "We're back, bitches!" I was so happy, and not just because it was midget stripper night.

Invariably, my hopes and happiness get dashed quicker than Jamaican gold medalist Usain Bolt (man, I gotta quit with these shitty analogies). Barely a week after Obama's election, there were stories of crosses being burned into the lawns of black Obama supporters in Georgia, nooses being hanged, Hitler-worshipping white supremacists being arrested for saying they were going to go on a cross country black killing spree that would end with the coup de grace- a dead Obama, and my personal favorite, "second graders on a bus in Idaho chanting, 'Assassinate Obama'." And this is just after the election; all year, we had to deal with charges that Obama was Muslim, Arab, a Black Panther, a communist, has terrorist buddies, and, of course, that he's the anti-Christ. Even John McCain himself had to talk down a racist asshole when she said something like, "I don't want Obama to be president because he's an Arab."

Today, my beef is a little less serious but illustrates why I have to hang my head and sigh when admitting my nationality. The second most popular story on MSN, after an article on tonight's full moon, is "Makeover! From frumpy to foxy!" This story is more popular than the escalating shitfight in Gaza, the 7.2% unemployment rate, the 2.8 million jobs lost in 2008, Bush's request for more bailout money, the disastrous week on Wall Street, and our general slide into hell and chaos. "Makeover! From frumpy to foxy!" I can't think of anything more critical to our survival. I'm surprised Oprah's admission that she was depressed last year didn't crack the top five.

It reminds me of something Jon Stewart said in '04 about the coverage of the Iraq war. "As CNN was showing the rotting corpses of Uday and Qusay Hussein, the news ticker across the bottom said, 'Beyonce doesn't like the word bootylicious.'" But then again, Stewart and I are pretentious liberals who denigrate the "average Joe the plumber" with our "intellectual pride" (what's that about?) and holier than thou humor. Oh Sarah. Thank Jebus you haven't gone away. The idiots need you.

Drugs Vs. Drugs

I take Lorazepam, known colloquially as Ativan. I take it because I suffer from anxiety and insomnia and Lorazepam, working as a depressant, calms my happy ass down. I feel groggy and indifferent after a dose and I suppose those reactions make taking the drug a success. I have a prescription for it, therefore it's an "OK" drug.

Anyway, I was inspired to write something on the topic of prescription drugs after hearing the dearly departed Heath Ledger got nominated for a Golden Globe for his kickass performance in "The Dark Knight." Ledger, of course, died in January from a prescription drug overdose. Among the panoply of drugs found in the 28-year-old's system was our good friend Lorazepam. Just for the hell of it, I googled Anna Nicole Smith's death and what do ya know? Lorazepam was also found in her body.

Of course, Heath Ledger and Anna Nicole Smith died from a combination of drugs (and a lot of them), not just from one anti-anxiety pill. But the bigger point here is where do we draw the line between an "OK" drug, like Lorazepam, and a "bad" drug like, oh, heroin? Drug overdose is now the second leading cause of accidental deaths among U.S. adults and obviously, that doesn't just include crack and other "street" drugs.

I'm certainly not implying that we should ban prescription drugs- I, for one, need my Lorazepam and I know others who need their pills, too. I'm actually one of those crazy liberals who say the war on drugs is a joke. I guess the problem I have is with perception. It's like prescription drugs are the "white collar" drugs (re: not that bad) and crack and smack are "inner city" drugs (re: the real problem). It's almost analogous to the dual bailouts: Wall Street/white collar America gets theirs without question while the car companies/blue collar America just gets their asses spanked.

culture

Get Your Fat Ass Outta My Face

The other day, I found myself in a similar argument with a friend over my smoking:

Friend: But why do you do it?

Me: Because I enjoy it and everyone hates it. You know I'm a contrarian prick.

Friend: But it's disgusting and it kills you.

Me: What doesn't kill you these days?

Then I proceeded to launch into my typical defense of smokers, which invariable involves comparing smoking to eating shit. To wit, there are roughly 400,000 Americans who die of cancer each year and not every single one of them was a smoker. In fact, most of them were probably fatasses who lived off sugar, uncaffeinated coffee, and high fructose corn syrup who passed anti-smoking laws because they worried about the effect of second-hand smoking on their treasured health. Let me repeat that fact: 400,000 Americans die every year of cancer and most of them were not smokers.

Secondly, what pisses me off as a smoker is that we as a society placate, coddle, and pity the fatties. "Oh, wah. I'm 600 pounds and I don't know why God did me like this!" God didn't shove mountains of shit down your throat. God did not invent the Oreo pizza or the deep fryer. And God probably doesn't consider being fat a "curse." Dude used to make shit rain frogs and killed tons of people just to prove a point about his severe jealously. You know, we shouldn't make excuses for these people. Just like me, they have a vice that should be frowned upon. But unlike me, they get Oprah specials and a bizarre outpouring of sympathy. Just because everyone is fat doesn't make it right, mmmkay? Besides, it's funny as hell to watch fat people fall down.

This brings me to the state of Maryland's decision to ban smoking in bars and restaurants a few years ago. OK, right. Because people go to bars and get shitfaced out of concern for their health. People waddle into restaurants to stuff themselves numb at the buffet (with room for desert!) out of concern for their health. If you're going to make it difficult for me to light up without being cited, then you better make it hard for fatties to access their drugs. Ban fatties from fast food joints! Make McDonald's, Burger King, and Little Debbie shell out big like the tobacco companies did in the 90s! Jesus! The hypocrisy here is really astounding.

Anyway, after I went through all that, my friend had to admit I had a point. Fuck yeah I do.