I have been meaning to carry a pen and paper with me at all times so in the event that I am struck with an idea of pure brilliance (nude laudramats) or even semi-brilliance (Nantucket: A novel based on the Limerick) or even non-brilliance (we are almost out of Jell-O) I would have some sort of written reminder. Of course, this will never happen. The problem with this idea is that I cannot make that watershed note to myself that reminds me to purchase a pen and pocket-sized notepad because I am constantly without these materials. And the scratches I make on the inside of my forearm with my fingernail are worthless; the writing sloppy, the flesh far too moist for any lasting inscription.

But now I have a notepad. Actually, it not a notepad so much as it is 17 ATM receipts held together by a roofer's nail, but it serves the same purpose. I use it. I create. I review. I share. All brilliant thinking, however, came to a screeching halt the minute I pieced this thing together.

To wit:

Put an ad in the newspaper saying you have found a portal into Helen Keller's brain and that, in exchange for $200, readers of this ad can enter this portal and have control of Helen Keller's mind for fifteen minutes. Get the money, lock them in a closet and, for fifteen minutes, keep the noise level down. Retire when wealthy.

Find out if there is a band called The Rhythm Method. If not, start one. Perform every day except for the six days immediately preceding and immediately following ovulation.

Even the smallest tattoo parlor has room for a spelling dictionary.

Hillary Swank is The Devil.

Buy Jell-O.


It's basically 17 pages of that. The funniest part, of course, doesn't happen until page nine. That's the page where it says my checking account balance is exactly nine cents, but I can only take partial credit for that one. I still have checks outstanding, you understand.

A while ago I shared an elevator with a fellow writer person who had a digital recorder on a key chain that was designed for this very sort of thing, recording fleeting moments of brilliance/humor/irony for later transcription.

"How do you like that thing," I asked.

"It's okay," he said. "But ever since I bought it, I haven't had any good ideas."

"But isn't that Ironic in itself?" I countered. "Isn't there value in irony? Maybe you've stumbled on something that no one has thought of, that the only certainty of portable, convenient and infallible record keeping is terminal vapidness. Maybe you should make a note of that."

He furroughed his brow for a moment in consideration.

"I think you're right," he said. Then, to his digital keychain: "from now on we're taking the stairs."

Irony, you see, has always been a touchy subject among writers. If find this very, um, forget it.

Friends, life is precious and when it's not precious it's laughably pathetic and when it's not laughably pathetic it's preciously tragic and when it's all three at once then it's ironic. Sometimes the turtle wins, sometimes the rabbit dies, but, in the end, they both pretty much taste like chicken. And if I had anything left in my checking account, I'd write that one down.
posted by 123454321 at 2:33 PM

Send in the Owls

Despite what I may have written both on this website and, more recently, in tattoo form, I really don’t hate George Bush all that much. I really don’t hate anyone all that much, at least not enough to actually kill anyone. I think the act of killing people in any context whether it is in war or in the name of God or even as a form of revenge is perverse and wrong-headed on every level. Blowing up a subway full of strangers because you have different beliefs is the most cowardly expression of a hopelessly flawed argument. People should not kill other people. Period.

That being said, I think we should turn the holy city of Mecca into a Hooter’s. Okay, not now, not today, but I think in the fight against terrorism, we should leave everything on the table. There’s room for two large breasts and a Hooter’s menu somewhere on that table. Sure, it’s unholy and surely it would be offensive and surely it would fail to make a profit in the first few years, but no one gets killed.

Ridiculous? On one hand you have draft beer and baby back ribs served by bejugged and possibly menstruating waitresses in the geographical epicenter of the Muslim faith. On the other you have a subway commuters being blown to pieces on the way to work. I’ll take option A any day of the week and twice on Two-fer Tuesdays. The idea of a billion Muslims in prostrate position offering prayer towards a pair of rotund chesticles hovering seductively over a tray of chili-cheese freedom-fries is blasphemous, but no one has ever lost a father to blasphemy. I’ve never seen anyone lose 80 percent of their skin after exposure to blasphemy. Chili cheese freedom-fries, as if I should even have to mention this at all, are delicious.

The peaceful Muslim community won’t stand for it.

Probably not. But when the world trade center came down on 9/11, I thought the same thing. When Muslim jihadists bombed those trains in Madrid and that nightclub in Bali and the S.S. Cole and the busses and subways in London, I always thought to myself that the peaceful Muslim community must be embarrassed and outraged by senseless killing, just like I’m embarrassed about the war in Iraq and the ether-sniffing rodeo clown we have in the White House. But terrorism is the biggest threat to human existence and it’s being done in the name of a god worshiped by nearly a billion people across the globe. Surely, there would at least some sort of organized effort to distance themselves from these people. There hasn’t been one. Wait, there was a march in Washington in May made by peaceful Muslims. 50 of them showed up. Thanks, peaceful Muslims. Try our Pigs in a Blanket a la Allah, they’re unholy.


You couldn’t sell beer. There’s zoning ordinances. The western cheeseburgers wouldn’t move during the Haaj. I have to pee, but I’m taking a shower, etc.

D-bag: No one is going to build a Hooter’s in Mecca. It will never happen. A Hooter’s in Mecca would be the forbearer of global collapse. That being said, the threat of a Hooter’s in Mecca might be the thing we’re looking for. It would get the attention of the jihadists and entire Muslim Community and maybe let the world know that not only do we have the bombs, we have the boobs and when provoked we will use them in ways never imagined. We would go on Al Jazeera and make it clear that if a jihadist so much as breaks wind on a subway, we send in the owls. No dogs, no water and discharge torture, no bookmarking chapters of the Koran by folding in the corners, just a lot of friendly, would-be junior-college graduates and their two giant pieces of flair that make them such an important part of the Hooter’s experience.
posted by 123454321 at 12:28 PM