Twitter 101: An Experience

My dear friends. I have been terribly occupied the past several weeks. Where does the time go? I'll let you know when I find out.

It brings me great joy to be able to sit down in front of the typing machine and share the thrilling adventure I have undertaken between now and my previous posting here. A local community college offers a four-week night class that gives you all the tools you need to be a better Twitter writer. Tweeter. Tweet maker. All of the above.

And because I like all of you so much, I'm going to give away some of these tips and tricks to my precious readership. The only cost of admission is a few minutes of your time, and the patience to stay focused -- my writing can get a little off-topic from time to time!

Tip #1: HASHTAGS AND WHEN TO USE THEM

Hashtags are like bacon smothered in honey. I can't get enough of them. The more you use, the more likely it is that someone else will #search and #find your #tweet.

My goal is to have 10,000 followers (at least), and I am absolutely certain that the more hashtags I can jam into my tweets, the more followers I will obtain.

Because people search for words and letters using the hashtag, it's imperative that every tweet contain at LEAST one hashtag. I'm going to make it a personal goal to use at least eight per tweet.

BONUS TIP: Use hashtags to spruce up and add a little color to what some might perceive as an otherwise mundane collection of words.

Morning treat to myself. Triple espresso. #OnTheTiredSideToday
— Vincent Fortenberry (@TheRealVinceF) December 30, 2014

I can't think of a more fun and cute way to tell everyone you're a little sleepy today.

DOUBLE BONUS TIP: Use hashtags to comment on your tweet -- in the same tweet!

Watching my neighbor pick up some litter on my front sidewalk. #ALittleHelpFromMyFriends
— Vincent Fortenberry (@TheRealVinceF) December 30, 2014

Astute readers may think these bonus tips are mere copies of each other. Please re-read the bonus tips repeatedly until you see the difference. Do not move to the next section until you've reached that conclusion. I'm watching you.

Tip #2: A LITTLE TRICK TO MAKE YOUR TWEETS INTERESTING

I cannot believe I didn't think of this myself, but there is a very subtle way to make your tweets more interesting and catchy than the usual boring business that you see out there from a lot of common folk.

The trick here is to use hyperbole as often as possible:

Absolutely nothing better than #thumbing through the #library #card #catalog drawers and getting what I #want on the first #try.
— Vincent Fortenberry (@TheRealVinceF) December 30, 2014

Obviously, there are some things that are better than getting the card you want on your first thumb into the library card drawers, but on Twitter, you're in it to win it (my high school track coach once told me that). Everything is the best thing ever, at least at that moment.

Tip #3: RETWEETS AND FAVORITES

Retweets are easy. Just hit the button that looks like a square-shaped recycle bin symbol.

But you can do better than that! Thanks to TweetDeck (a handy Twitter client), you can do more than just retweet something.

When hitting the retweet button in TweetDeck, you are presented with the option to "Edit & RT." Do not pass up this option to edit, and insert in some fun commentary:

Poopsanto RT @GMWatch: Bill Maher slams 'evil ruthless Monsanto: the Scientologists of the corporate world http://t.co/vOttTfVBJ0 #gmo
— Vincent Fortenberry (@TheRealVinceF) December 30, 2014

And then there's the favorite button. I don't like this part of Twitter. I'm either in love with it, or I don't care. Using the favorite button is somewhere in a grey area between those two places, and I'm not interested in visiting.

Here's a great example on why you should avoid the favorite button. Let's take a look at the Miami Herald reporting an incident in Tampa today:

#BREAKING: Multiple news outlets reporting people fleeing, screaming as shots are fired at a large mall in Tampa. Police are on the scene.
— Miami Herald (@MiamiHerald) December 30, 2014

Why are people (39 as I post this) calling this a favorite of theirs? I will block these users when I figure out how to do that.

Anyways. My Twitter usage is going to see a real spike over the next few weeks. I will come back sometime in January with a report on how many Twitter followers I have gained since today. Right now I only have one. Look out, guys!

Fuck You, Giving Tuesday

So hey, let's talk about something that sucks.

CHARITY.

Charity at its purest core is fine. It's typically even great! You're giving something of yourself to help someone else. That's all well and good.

But CHARITY in the context of the way its bandied about in the modern world is pretty much the worst thing ever. If you donate your time to a cause, you might not be a jackass. But if you donate money to an organization, the odds are extremely high that you are an asshole.

And so we come to the reason for this post. There is now apparently a bullshit movement known as GIVING TUESDAY. Here's what it's about:

WHAT IS #GIVINGTUESDAY? 

We have a day for giving thanks. We have two for getting deals. Now, we have #GivingTuesday, a global day dedicated to giving back. On Tuesday, December 2, 2014, charities, families, businesses, community centers, and students around the world will come together for one common purpose: to celebrate generosity and to give. 

It’s a simple idea. Just find a way for your family, your community, your company or your organization to come together to give something more. Then tell everyone you can about how you are giving. Join us and be a part of a global celebration of a new tradition of generosity.

I'm sorry (HINT: I'M NOT SORRY), but fuck that shit right in the ass. Let's break it down:

We have a day for giving thanks. We have two for getting deals. Now, we have #GivingTuesday, a global day dedicated to giving back.

Hey, guess what? We didn't need a global day dedicated to giving back because the entire concept of "giving back" is primarily driven by what most people would refer to as "white guilt" (regardless of whether the person is actually white or not). "Giving back" is a construct that people create to avoid thinking critically about the things they do the rest of the year — "DURRRR, I might have not hired any minority candidates and I got the city to approve my plan to displace 30 poor families and I voted for a politician who wants to deport everyone, but I'm donating $10,000 to this scholarship fund so HURRY SOMEONE COME SUCK MY DICK" — and the people they marginalize.

On Tuesday, December 2, 2014, charities, families, businesses, community centers, and students around the world will come together for one common purpose: to celebrate generosity and to give. 

LET'S CELEBRATE GENEROSITY. Are you fucking kidding me? Because we're not celebrating generosity here. You're asking us to celebrate people who give, sure. But the people that deserve celebration for giving are not the ones you're asking us to celebrate. Let's continue.

It’s a simple idea. Just find a way for your family, your community, your company or your organization to come together to give something more.

Translation: Pick a cause that you like, then guilt people you know into donating to it.

Then tell everyone you can about how you are giving. Join us and be a part of a global celebration of a new tradition of generosity.

GOD DAMNIT THIS IS THE WORST THING EVER. "Then tell everyone you can about how you are giving." I mean, I just ... I can't. I can not ... go ... on.

Listen, we all have different motivations in life. Charity to make yourself feel better about the way you act the rest of the year is awful by itself, but when this whole CHARITY concept gets really fucked is when people go running around talking about it. If you are the type of person who goes on a social media site and posts about supporting a cause, GO FUCK YOURSELF.

But hey, that's 20 fucking 14 for you. We have a fucking DAY dedicated to shitheads telling everyone about how they're donating to charity. #GIVINGTUESDAY actually makes the retail thievery that the big box stores perpetuate each year look like Mother Teresa handing out bread crumbs to starving Turkish peasants.

Fuck Giving Tuesday.

Thank you for your service?

Ah, Veterans Day. The national holiday when we salute the mercenaries who police the world!

Veterans Day is a farce.

There's nothing worse than being reminded by holier-than-thou types that we should tell veterans how much we appreciate their service today. "It means so much to the veterans," these people will tell you, and most others will listen, because, man, we owe veterans a serious debt! THEY PROTECT OUR COUNTRY WHILE PUTTING THEIR LIVES ON THE LINE!

Once upon a time, fawning over veterans probably made sense. If your father fought in the Civil War, for instance, that guy saw some fucked up shit and was in a war that truly CHANGED things (kind of). That guy deserved at least one holiday per year, and yet men in those days were true men — they didn't want a goddamn holiday for doing what was right.

These days, going into the military is supporting the massive military-industrial complex in America, signing up to kill brown people in the Middle East, and, more than anything, a calculated decision that you can put up with some shit from the military in order to get your education paid for and some nice benefits on the way and down the road.

There is nothing noble about being in today's military. If you enter the military, you are one of three things:

1. A mercenary.
2. An idiot who had no other options.
3. A sorely misguided young person with nationalistic ideals and dreams of waving the American flag on a mountaintop after you killed the entirety of ISIS with your bare hands.

And yet, we are subjected to this kind of awful thinking when it comes to saluting veterans: 5 ways to honor veterans beyond Veterans Day.

I mean, COME ON. If you are a veteran, you signed up to be in the military. You were not forced into it. I will not honor veterans anymore than I expect anyone to honor me for having a white collar job. We all have jobs, and we all make choices based on what's best for us. Joining the military is not a selfless act. Joining the military in 2014 is accepting a job. You weigh the pros and cons and you either do it, or you don't.

The worst part of all of it, of course, is that you don't dare say anything bad about the idea of honoring veterans, because otherwise you are an asshole in the eyes of 99 percent of the country. Even bleeding heart liberals would be appalled at the very notion someone would say FUCK VETERANS DAY.

But, seriously: FUCK VETERANS DAY.

Dinosauria

Good Evening Reader:


Sometimes when I have a spare moment I like to grab a cup of organic black root tea from Bogota and read the latest academic findings of Dr. Jack Horner, who I consider to be an amazing mind and also one of the most evil men to ever grace this planet.  His greatest sin is the perpetuation of the lie that Tyrannosaurus Rex was a scavenger and not the uber-predatory hunter we know that he in fact was.

I've never shared this before, but I've traveled to an alternative universe nearly identical to our own thanks to the wonders of quantum physics.  I landed in this nearly identical universe in a time approximately 70 million years before the arrival of the Great Bane of the Earth - Humans.  We really are the worst.  I saw a guy throw a cigarette butt out of a speeding 1989 Volkswagon Rabbit and it killed a sun-bathing armadillo, or something.  The. Worst. 

Where was I?  Oh, right, multiverse travel (TIME travel is not possible, and please don't say it is).  I happened upon what is present day North America just in time to see a female Tyrannosaur in action, at the peak of her powers, and she just downright took out 20 full grown hadrosaurs in the span of 30 minutes.  I swear I am not making this up.  I clocked her at 30 miles per hour in peak stride.

Which leads me back to "Doctor" Jack Horner.  How in God's Good Green Earth* can you posit that the Tyrannosaur was a scavenger?  I saw all of this with my own eyes, those animals hunted.  They ran.  They stalked.  I'd tell you how I got to the multiverse, but frankly, I don't think you have the mental capacity to take it in and I actually don't really remember.



Yours In Fury,


Rupert Chang










*prior to arrival of man, now it's vaguely gray in color

Why all HR representatives should be work-hot.

HUMAN RESOURCES.

Every office has a human resources department, except when it doesn't. But let's focus on the offices with HR departments and primarily let's focus on why only work-hot people should be HR representatives.

HR is primarily about maintaining good employee relations and, in larger offices, attracting new employee talent. That's their only fucking job. Everything HR does should be geared toward those two purposes, with the huge emphasis on the first.

Most HR departments, of course, think they run the fucking joint because they know how much money people make and because they can "term" (that's the cutesy industry term) anyone they see fit.

HR people are awful in general.

The only acceptable HR people I've ever been involved with are work-hot. They can be male or female, but HR people should be attractive.

Ugly HR people are the fucking worst.

You know the type: the overweight lady with the frumpy clothes who got picked on in high school and has a bone to pick with everyone because Johnny called her fat in seventh grade. The dorky looking guy who walks like Frankenstein, probably jerks off while listening to Beethoven, and who you wouldn't trust within forty feet of your children.

These people are bad HR representatives because they are not attractive. Unattractive people make bad people in general.

Listen, I'm not going to make this about looks here. It's just that, when you come right down to it, you know if you're ugly, and if you're ugly, you're going to take it out on others when you have the opportunity.

Attractive people can be awful, of course, but despite their often arrogant, vapid personalities, they're at least bringing something to the table: their good looks. Anyone that would discount that is 98% guaranteed to be ugly both inside and out.

And here's the real kicker: The bar is low at the office. You don't have to be hot outside of the office. You just have to be work-hot. If you're a guy and your BMI is below 35, you can get a decent haircut and wear decent clothes and probably be work-hot. If you're a woman and you wear decent clothes and your BMI is below 50, you can probably be work-hot (at least as a hateful rape fantasy).

That's all the rest of the world is asking for. Don't be a bad person. Aspire to be work-hot.

But I hear you now: BUT ETHAN, NOT EVERYONE IS GOING TO BE ATTRACTIVE. WHAT ARE THESE PEOPLE SUPPOSED TO DO?

It's simple, actually: DON'T WORK IN HR.

HR is for failed beauty queens without personality. HR is for the high school jock who's a fucking m moron but who everyone likes anyway.

HR is not for fat people. It is not for ugly people.

Nobody likes those people, so don't hire them to be part of your HR department.

Uncle Barry

I was fortunate being born into a large extended family. My father has 10 siblings, giving me more than my fair share of uncles, aunts and cousins.

Among that clan of indefatigable folks was my Uncle Barry. He’s long since passed on to his next life, but during his time on this planet as Uncle Barry, he was the best damn uncle one could ever hope to have.

Where to start?

Uncle Barry was a blue-collar hero, working almost religiously at the local candy factory for thirty-plus years until his unfortunate death in a car accident in the late 1990s. I do not recall the exact year, given my tendency to consume more alcohol than I’d like to admit during that decade. Perhaps another blog article will reveal more of those days’ details.

His working-class roots didn’t stop him from enlisting himself into the public sector. I was truly in awe of his work on the township’s Conservation Commission. Here he was able to put his forward-thinking environmentalist hat on and wear it with pride.

While he oversaw many honorable projects during his time on the Commission, I cannot be more thankful for his dedication to wetland preservation. Given my intense interest and research experience in that realm, he was always keen to consult me for advice on wetland issues. You’d be surprised how many there were!

But my favorite memories of ol’ Uncle Barry are rooted our irregularly timed family gatherings. Whether it was an impromptu picnic at Barnard Park during a muggy August afternoon, or ringing in the New Year at grandma-ma’s hillside estate, Uncle Barry was always the figure that I gravitated toward. His sublime joke-telling and improv magic tricks? I could never understand why he wasn’t a professional entertainer in a glamorous show town. I’m thinking somewhere in the Ozarks of Missouri.

Getting Ready for Halloween

Subject: Getting Ready for Halloween

 

Dear Reader:

 

This post continues on our journey through the glorious fall season.  I’m excited to say that my second favorite holiday is coming up – Halloween!  I’d tell you my favorite holiday, but frankly it’s none of your business, and I really wish you’d stop asking.

 

Let’s take a moment to talk about costumes.  I feel very strongly about this.  If you’re not getting your kids’ costumes from Pottery Barn Kids, then I think there are probably grounds for you to be reported to the Department of Children and Families.   If you’re an adult, nothing less than a fully authentic costume will do.  Don’t go out there with a $20 plastic Darth Vader costume, or I will find you and throat punch you to oblivion.  If you’re going as the Dark Lord of the Sith, you must have a fully accurate, form fitting suit, with a fully functioning light saber.  The latter is crucial for the overall ambience, and for slaying neighbors attempting to hand out health food to trick or treaters.  Halloween is for lifelike costumes and tooth rot, everyone agrees on this, so don’t be an asshole.

 

Please join me in my next post as I wade you through the “Dos” and “Donts” of watching football, another great fall activity.  Here’s a sneak peak – you should never cheer for the Kansas City Chiefs for any reason whatsoever, as I have a lifelong blood feud with Andy Reid.

 

 

Cheers!

 

 

Rupert Chang

Welcome Shep!

Dear Shep,

Your drunken tales have piqued my erstwhile dormant curiosity and I look forward to your contributions to this site.  Perhaps we can get together for a craft brew and discuss Southern Rock? I have some theories on Lynard Skynard in particular (I don't want to give anything away, but I'm pretty sure their plane was bombed by the malevolent spirit of Adlai Ewing Stevenson II) and you seem like a man that enjoys intelligent discourse.

Please reply via reply on this website or fax.  Never, ever call me.

Yours sincerely,

Rupert Chang

Bourbon! Tornado! Fight! Prose!

Salutations

My composition professors always told me to pander to my audience, but since no one ever reads my writing, I usually end up composing to the nervous pre-teen construct that managed to lodge himself in my hippocampus after unsuccessfully kick-flipping off my corpus callosum in 7th grade.  Anyhoo...I've been drinking.

So I've been compelled under duress, threat, and coercion to put words to paper.  I've been given no specific guidance as to what would be pleasing, or at very least, what would be inoffensive to the listening audience.  So with that, let me tell you the tale of how I came to possess the power of drunken composition, or, at the very least, careful drunken editing.

Ol' Shep lives in Wisconsin.  Stereotypes would most likely lead you to believe that at least the drunken half of my powers originated here; and you would not be wrong in that assumption.  However, my tale begins in the Ted Nugent fever dream known as North Florida.  I lived in Gainesville for half a decade in my later 20's/early 30's while my bride learned her p's and q's at UF.  I worked in the school district of Suwannee County.  For those of you who are unfamiliar with the geography of North Florida, Suwannee County is approximately equidistant from Gainesville and Tallahassee.  This relationship is represented below:

Fig 1:  Book Learnin'

 Fig 2:  GER GERTERS!

Now that you're aware of the situation within which this Yank found himself, you will be happy to know that the locals took to me fondly, and christened me with endearing southern nicknames.  My favorite of which came from the Elementary School principal.  A former Gator linebacker who was some sort of blend between Conway Twitty and the least murdery parts of The Bible.  After learning that I was a Wisconsin man, he took to calling me PSYCHOBADGER SHEP!  Every day I would hear him call me down to the office (there aren't phones in North Florida) by hollering "PSYCHOBADGER SHEP!  YIPSHAWWWWW!"  which I think was his way of offering me his daughter's hand in southern matrimony (there aren't any phones in southern matrimony).

I came to be friends with some of the local boys, who had inexplicably left this blighted 30 mile scar in the landscape to go to college, only to return and challenge the local notion that the earth was only 400 years old and perched  on the mustache of Stonewall Jackson.  We would gather together on Friday nights and consume copious amounts of bourbon while I was given a crash course on the subtle romanticism of southern rock.  On one of these occasions after consuming a particularly strong bottle of Buffalo Trace (the finest), we were visited by the ghost of Charles Bukowski, who rode, what must have been at least an F4 twister.  After knocking down the tobacco shed, Mr. Bukowski stumbled off his steed and made his way to our humble fire, where he intended to relieve us of whatever bourbon we had on our persons.  Well, dead alcoholic anti-hero warrior poet or no, our ragtag crew was not going to give up our stash so easily.  Charles was quite clearly still drunk, which is quite a thing, considering he's been dead for some time now.  He lurched toward us but lost his footing and found himself sprawled in that sharp-ass grass that only grows in the worst parts of the south.  It was at that point that my friend Wade, in a giggling fit, relieved Mr. Bukowski of his faithful twister steed and rode off in the direction of the nearest boiled peanut stand.  In a fit of rage, Charles stumbled after him, hollering unintelligible curses as he followed.

Hmm...I just realized that this doesn't have anything to do with being able to write drunk.  Heh.  Made me laugh to beat the band, though.  Parts anyway.  

The issues with the Ray Rice narrative

First, let me be very clear: What Ray Rice did to his then-fiancee Janay in that elevator on that fateful February night was wrong.

Whatever led up to it, it was wrong. Whoever started the clearly ongoing fight, whoever threw the “first” punch … it was wrong.

And yet.

The 1997 movie Good Will Hunting featured one particular quote that I've always enjoyed. After Matt Damon's character does an impromptu psychological evaluation of Robin Williams's character based on a painting in his office, Robin kicks him out. They meet again a few days later in a park and have a conversation about it. Robin tells Matt (real names are just easier, you guys) that, for instance, while he can regurgitate anything he's read in a book, he doesn't really *know* anything. Matt might know everything about Michelangelo — his life's work, his political aspirations, etc. — but he doesn't know the beauty of the Sistine Chapel because he's never seen it with his own eyes.

And as Robin continues talking, he says this:

"No one could possibly understand the depths of you. But you presume to know everything about me because you saw a painting of mine, and you ripped my fucking life apart. You're an orphan right? You think I know the first thing about how hard your life has been, how you feel, who you are, because I read Oliver Twist? Does that encapsulate you?"

It's the ultimate caution to judging people and situations without knowing the full story. And with that as the framing for this discussion, allow me to stop to plainly state the points of my argument here:

1. Ray was wrong to hit his now-wife — physical violence of any sort is unacceptable in our society and he should be punished.
2. Without knowing everything that occurred that evening between the two parties, Ray’s action may be more defensible than it is based solely on the video evidence.
3. The immediate reaction by the rest of society to paint Ray as one of the worst people in the world — and Janay as an ongoing victim/idiot — is a glaring example of the worst kind of mob mentality the public at-large assumes in cases like this.

Let’s walk through these points one at a time:

1. Ray was wrong to hit his now-wife — physical violence of any sort is unacceptable in our society and he should be punished.

• No matter what Janay did to him earlier in the night (we’ll explore this below), the best solution for Ray was obviously to walk away. And, frankly, as much as some of the crazy PRO-MEN lobbies would disagree — EQUALITY FOR ALL, etc. — it simply is different when a man hits a woman than when a woman hits a man, and especially when the man is a pro football player. There are shades of gray in everything, and this shade of gray reflects very poorly on Ray. I won’t bother opining on what the correct punishment for Ray should be other than to note, as everyone else has, that the NFL’s bungling of the entire situation has been nothing short of damnable. Besides, the correct level of punishment is based upon another shade of gray, which is related to …

2. Without knowing everything that occurred that evening between the two parties, Ray’s action may be more defensible than it is based solely on the video evidence.

• Here’s what I see in the video: Ray and Janay are arguing in the hallway. She takes some sort of swat at him. They go into the elevator. He’s in her face and takes a swat of some sort at her. She, understandably, is pissed and comes at him, at which point he hits her with a left hook that sends her into the railing and ultimately to the floor unconscious.  Again: BAD MOVE, Ray. But here’s where the video doesn’t show everything. You kind of get the impression from the actions of both (swatting at each other before the punch heard round the world, her charging at him) that there have been some physical altercations between them in the past. And we obviously don’t know the nature of those altercations. Maybe Ray is just a lowdown dude who beats women and this was the first time she stood up for herself in any way. Maybe it has been physical both ways in the past and it just never got to *this* level. Or, just maybe, Janay has been the primary abuser in the past — maybe she even punched him repeatedly in their hotel room before they went out — and Ray just snapped in the heat of this particular moment.  Does that change the fact that knocking her out was wrong? No. Again, it was wrong. But it’s less wrong, right? Killing someone is wrong, but if you’re defending yourself from that person, it’s less wrong and in the most severe cases even justified, right? Imagine, for just a second, if the tables were turned here. What if Ray was on the receiving end of that punch and it was instead him who was knocked out? What if we then found out that Ray had abused her earlier that night and she finally stood up for herself? She would be hailed by men and women alike around the world, right? The point is that it matters what the involved parties have to say about the situation, and whether you want to believe her or instead speculate about her internal justifications for doing so, Janay has taken some of the responsibility for what happened that night. There was more going on than meets the eye here. Which brings us to …

3. The immediate reaction by the rest of society to paint Ray as one of the worst people in the world — and Janay as an ongoing victim/idiot — is a glaring example of the worst kind of mob mentality the public at-large assumes in cases like this.

• The overwhelming reaction to this case has been along the following lines: 1. They should burn Ray at the stake - and/or - 2. Janay is only staying with him for the money/she thinks love will conquer all but she WILL be abused again Any reaction to the contrary is immediately panned. In fact, in conversations with other members of this very site, I have been painted as a guy looking for an excuse to beat women! Here’s where a sort of societal sexual stigma comes into play. Even if the facts of the entire case were that Janay had regularly abused Ray and this was the first time he struck her, they could never in a million years come out and say that and have it stick as the truth. People would immediately jump down both of their throats, call them liars, and so on.  And this is where another dirty little fact that nobody wants to talk about creeps into play: A national survey by the Centers for Disease Control and Department of Justice found that more than 40 percent of the severe physical violence cases were directed at men.  If a man hits a woman, the public says that man is despicable and that the woman should leave immediately,regardless of what may have precipitated it. If a woman hits a man, he is most often depicted as “deserving it.” I probably shouldn’t be surprised, I guess, but I am always disappointed with the mob rush to judgment in cases like these. The public happily takes one two-minute altercation in a couple’s life and defines them by it. You now have professors like Ramani Durvasula opining that “Many times a victim becomes so dependent on her partner for everything that she can’t even entertain a reality without him in it. I don’t know that any of us would have been strong, brave or courageous enough to push back on a billion-dollar organization and a man that she loves.” Sigh. What it ultimately comes down to is that the public mob is doing Janay a disservice and paying her the ultimate disrespect by ignoring what she has to say and projecting its own thoughts and opinions onto her. All of these people telling her she suffers from abused spouse syndrome or the like. All of these people creating such an uproar that they have now removed her from a revenue stream that her family depended on. You have all painted Janay as weak and helpless in this situation. And that’s the last thing that needs to happen here, whatever the real story of their relationship and that night is.  Let Janay be strong. Let her handle her situation. Don’t project your own misguided thoughts and fears onto someone else. Of course, it’s too late for that now. Not only was her personal life rocked by a violent assault, the outsized reaction by a mindless public has forced her to relive the event and embarrassment of it all. Janay called it a nightmare. And it is. Our reactionary mob society is a fucking nightmare.

Fall

Fall is right around the corner and I wanted to share some tips and tricks for sliding comfortably in this new season.  First, make sure you stock up on pumpkins from your local Fresh Market or Whole Foods (your local grocer will do in a pinch, but this is not recommended).  I personally enjoy spending Saturday afternoons baking pumpkin seeds and checking out how my alma mater's football team is doing - go Huskers!

Second, check out your J.Crew catalog and buy a few scarves.  If you do not read J.Crew, please move to the Ukraine* and never read my missives again, because I hate you.  

Third, make candied apples. TONS of them.  I enjoy inviting kids over every Friday night during the fall to eat apples and really get ready for Halloween.  Parents will generally be ok with this if you tell them you are doing BIble study, or whatever.

Hip Hip Hurray for Fall!

-  Rupert

*Yes, you are required to use "the" before Ukraine.  Have some culture

Overheard in the baking aisle

Today while shopping for tubs of vegetable shortening, I was distracted by a male and female about two shelve lengths away. Both appeared Asian and spoke in a language I didn't understand.

The following is my interpretation of their conversation.

MALE: (Making gestures with hands, clearly short on patience) Why can't we go the movies tonight?

FEMALE: (Ignoring question, continuing to shop for flour) Not sure I want to go out tonight.

MALE: Really? It's been a month since we've been out of the house on a date!

FEMALE: I like staying in.

MALE: (Sighs)

FEMALE: I don't like the way guys look at me. I feel they are always staring at me.

MALE: Well, I don't blame anyone for that...

FEMALE: Fuck you.

MALE: Seriously!

FEMALE: I'm making you watch a girlie on-demand chick-flick tonight!

Timbuktu

Devoted Readers,

I urge you to travel to Timbuktu as soon as possible. If you are able, try the local wine (1980 or earlier vintage only, mind you!). But for God's sake, do NOT eat the pickled wolverine feet. They give you horrific diarrhea. 

Yours in pain,

Rupert

Window or Aisle? The devil is in the details

It's one of life's fundamental questions, along with "Should I brush my teeth tonight?" and "Escalator or elevator?" The question I'm referring to? First, reader, you need to learn how to god damn read, it's in the post title. That question, again for those of you who are mental midgets, is "Do I take the window or aisle?"  This is mostly geared towards airplanes, as train travel is for the communist and pro-Chive crowd. Also, I hate traveling on ground whenever possible, so whatever. 

Where was I? Oh, right, aisle vs window. The window I feel provides more privacy as you are now only potentially losing one arm rest to a mouth breathing Neanderthal, while having sweet nothingness (read: uncomfortably curved inside of plane) to rest your head on. Aisles also get at least one arm rest, but nothing to put your head on (although I've rested my head on one or three bosoms after getting sufficiently snookered on red eyes from Paris to Newark and subsequently charming my seat mate, most of whom were female). 

But to me, dear reader, the aisle seaters get the best perk of all: sweet, blessed aisle space to stretch your legs. God gave you those legs to extend, not to bunch up like a horrible arachnid. I've found myself most refreshed after being able to stretch out (and of course after the bosom resting, if you can get it). So next time, opt for the aisle. 

Voluntarily choosing the middle for the increased socialization opportunities makes you the worst person ever created and thus my mortal enemy. 

Happy travels,

Rupert Chang

PEDs and The Cookie Monster

Performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) are everywhere these days.

Whatever the industry, PEDs are a factor. Whether we're talking about professional football players or IT dipshits in Denver, everyone is on PEDs.

I don't give a shit, frankly. When you think about it, every substance you put into your body is either going to enhance or diminish performance. I've heard salmon is pretty good for you, but nobody's going around calling that a performance enhancing drug.

Lance Armstrong got busted for blood doping. Lance Armstrong is an asshole and the noose finally tightening around his enhanced neck was one of the greatest days of my life, but let's be real here: if everyone on the Tour was doing it, don't you think ... eh, fuck it. Fuck Lance Armstrong.

If we really want a level playing field, maybe we should require all human beings to eat and drink the same things every day. My fat coworker must think I'm a performance-enhancing cheat because I eat salads for lunch instead of a bucket of cream. And he's not wrong, you guys. He's not wrong at all.

I just injected 4 CC's of heroin into my thigh.

Love,

Ethan

Summer

I write today of summer. Remember when we were children and summer was a magical time of frivolity, late nights, attempting to fornicate, and losing money at poker? Do you remember, friend, when it meant vacations and living life with an extra sense of carpe diem? Do you recall those trips to the lake and almost drowning after having 3 Smirnoff Ice (r) malted beverages and jumping off a speeding boat?

Now, as adults, we trudge through summer like every other miserable season. Fall brings football, winter brings mulled cider, spring brings bird watching, but what does summer now bring? Regret. And a reminder that you have herpes after all the previous summers of fornicating. That reminds me, I have to schedule another appointment with Dr. Rosenfeld's office.

Yours in regret,

Rupert Chang