Embers

Through windows burning eyes
see smoke rise from remnants
of tattered wings
Those of once beautiful things
The echoes of hymns now growing thin in the minds of the victorious ones
Eternal slaves of once virtuous things
The cries of Godless men
Seconds and years now washed
clear in the gaps of time, infinity
The time of tears now disappear
into the ether
the existence of everything
Rattling cages in ash stained spaces
no more the Phoenix to rise
Cackling sages and mystics of ages
preach of the gods we despise
If this is the end of all that has been
let nothing stop it now
Now by my hands
the towers of man will fall
Cinders in rememberance of thee
Descending embers all in rememberance
of the end of hypocricy
Lights in the sky a prayer from the dying
all in rememberance of thee.

Just Ask.

When I was 22, I conned a very rich alcoholic redneck landlord out of $400.00.
Not my landlord, by the way. A very good female friends' landlord. Anyway...
She, he, and I were very drunk; however I am a sort of 'professional' drunk (I have the t-shirt!), whereas the landlord (who I'll refer to as Dan) was a lush - mind you a very wealthy lush. Dan's only apparent love in life was impressing others with his money, house, land, and guns.
Yes, guns. This man had his own arsenal.
Wasted, we all shot round after round from automatic and semi-automatic weapons into a tree-line behind his house,
but that's a different story...

At around 2 am, for some God-known reason, Dan decided to brag. Brag about drinking, money, war, guns, chicks, how badass he was, how he could do ANYTHING he wants because of his cash-flow, et cetera.
I was in an extreme "Fight Club" fix at the time, so I decided to do just what the story said: just ask.
I asked him point blank that, since he was so rich and could do anything he wants, why not give me $400.00?
Hey, I said, you can do anything you want, right? What's $400.00?
Challenge a rich redneck landlord in front of a hot blonde tenant, and you've got the dealer in your pocket.
So he left,
and returned with a check made out to cash in the amount of $400.00. That fucking easy. On the memo line, it read, "For Joker." Could've been because of the malignant rictus that had taken over my face from the sheer delight this was actually working.
I set my alarm for 8:00am so I could get to the bank and cash the check before Danny-boy changed his mind.
The teller gave me $400.00 cash. In fucking hand.
I felt like Tom Sizemore in "Heat."
I parked in the mall parking lot and waited the 2 hours until it opened, walked directly to the sport store, and bought a $130.00 skateboard.
I'd never skateboarded in my life, mind you; just thought a Bob Burnquist model was a nifty fucking idea.
He had, after all, just won X-Games' skateboarding competition. Hell, I'd watched it on my own T.V. not 2 weeks before. Who wouldn't think, "Wow. What an excellent purchase. Clearly the item to buy first thing off the bat."
I used the board once. One damn time, as a kind of bobsled to fly at mach 2 into a muddy rain gutter.
I have no idea where the other $270.00 went. No clue...
unless you count the beer.

Table 61, part one.

Table 61 was missing.
This was when we all came home for 2 weeks in the summer, and decided that we should not fight, but embrace our shared "problem" with alcohol. If the first step of recovery is to admit you have a problem, we were definitely not ready for recovery.
Fuck AA.
It was 4:30pm, far too late to begin anything that resembled a productive day. Sleeping to 3:00pm kinda does that to you. Everyone always complains about my sleeping patterns, saying the real world is awake by 7:00am and ready to begin their day. They ask, how can I expect to make something of myself if I don't wake up early and accomplish everything I need before noon?
I say, why don't you just fuck off? God doesn't even wake up by 7. Anyway, can't you do the same things after noon that you can before?
Not that I wake up anywhere near noon, but still.

Melanie lit here cigarette before she even sat down, glaring at the group of apparent non-smokers at the table to our left.
"I swear to God, I'm not afraid to burn out her cornea. Fucking rude-ass fascists."
She was definitely not the kind of girl you take to church to meet your mother.

Table 61 was gone, and there was something not right about that. We should've just taken that as a sign and walked away from each other and never spoken again.
We should've, but we didn't.
This whole thing could be because of that one moment. The moment we realized there was no more table 61.

We settle for table 58, and all crowd in together. The Flies are singing "Got You Where I Want You", and Evan says, "You remember these guys? God, what was that, '95?"
Ninety-seven, I say. We were seniors.
"Yeah, that's right. God, that was ages ago."
I have a knack for relating shitty music with time. Like my internal clock ticks in time with the music of goddamn Duran Duran.
Haley Chase asks if any of us have ever hit a dog. Evan says, "I don't hit anything, Haley. What kind of question is that?"
I think she means with a car, I say. Yeah, I've hit a dog.
Haley says, "There was this dog who used to chase me, everyday, used to chase me in my car until it would run out of breath and go back home...
to wait.
This lasted for a very long time. This dog was vicious. If my window was down, he would've dragged me out of my car and fucking eaten me. Flossed his teeth with my bones, like a fucking Tom and Jerry cartoon. Do you know that dog? One like it? Anyway, one day that dog had a plan. He was waiting. He had to have been, because every other day he would chase me.
This day he was in front of me."

The waitress asks what we would like to drink, and Melanie say, "Beer. Four pitchers of whatever is the farthest right tap." That's Melanie in a box.

Haley smiles at the waitress, then says, "I saw it in it's eyes. This thing didn't give a shit. It was going to sit there, or attack, but it wasn't going to move out of the damn way.
So I hit it. Hard.
I felt it roll under the car, and heard the sound of a melon being crushed by a Gallagher-sized sledgehammer. I started to laugh. I felt amazing, until I saw it in the rearview mirror quivering, doing the whole death-shudder thing.
I was laughing until I saw the little boy on the side of the road run up and wrap his arms around the dog. Its smashed skull and its intestines and bile cuddled in the little boy's arms. He watched me kill his dog."

Haley opens a pack of sugar and pours it down her throat.

"Now, everytime I drive by, this little boy chases me down the street. Chases me and chases me until he runs out of breath and goes back home.
I wonder how long it will be until he gets his own plan."
The waitress drops off the pitchers, and we distribute. One of us wants to say thank you, but none of us can pick our jaws from the floor.
Haley say, "Yeah, could I get the nachos? Extra guacamole."

And Evan vomits. Just a little, but some of it gets in his pitcher. I think we all wonder if he's still going to drink it.
He excuses himself, leaving us all to his bubbling bile-beer. Melanie grinds out her cigarette, and asks the waitress to please bring us another pitcher, and please take this one the hell away.
I say to try and keep from smelling it, and to please bring us all a shot.
"What kind?"
Mind-erasers.
Please bring us some goddamn Mind-erasers.

To Clarify.

There have been some questions (good ones) raised about my last post. Maybe I was running off emotion (I don't believe so), maybe not. Either way, here is part 2 of FEAR.

The first point that I would like to raise is that there is no proof as of yet that these terror assholes actually even had explosive materials. That being said...
The Scotland Yard officer that made the announcement of the foiled plot said "...mass murder on an unimaginable scale." Because of 9/11 and my love of the horror genre, I can imagine a lot.

I have one problem with the whole 'take away all liquids' idea at security. This plot was reportedly more complicated by far than a shoe-bomb. As far as I know, we are still allowed to wear shoes on an airplane, even though some crazy-ass tried to use his as a bomb. Hmm.
Allow me to clarify further. I have no problem with taking away sodas or drink containers. They do it everyday at ballgames and movie theaters. My problem is with the timing.
See, it is now known that the White House knew about this planned attack as early as Sunday, yet made no mention of it until today. This bothers me for two reasons. 1) The White House press team made a litany of statements about how Ned Lamont and the entire Democratic party was weak on terrorism. This was Monday and early Tuesday... mid-term election day in Connecticut. Could this have been a politically motivated decision to keep knowledge of said plan submersed until today? 2) We and the Brits still allowed drinks and hair gels on board every single flight up untill today, even while having prior knowledge of said plot.
Just think. Use your grey matter. That's all I'm asking.

So one question I have is: do we ground everyone and every flight everytime a lunatic (or group of lunatics) threatens violence? If so, why wasn't this carried out on Sunday?
And remember, we still have our shoes. Everyone, everyday, on planes, trains, buses, subways, and PRT's.

A quick story.
When I was younger, and my little sister was much younger, my family took a trip to California to visit relatives. My sister was a toddler at the time, so my mother took with her crackers, peanut butter, and a butter knife (with which to spread the peanut butter onto the crakers - duh, right?). My mother was held in security after not passing the safety check due to the butter knife. For a long-ass time. Long enough for me to remember at a young age that my parents were extremely perterbed by this. C'mon, it's pretty evident that the crackers and peanut butter were the reason for the butter knife, right? Apparently not.
Imagine how perturbed they would have been if my mom had been forced to DRINK HER OWN BREAST MILK (yeah, I'm not letting that one go).
P.I.S.S.E.D.
This fear is the reason people like my mom are stopped, and political correctness is the reason the 9/11 hijackers were not.
That is seriously fucked.
The point of my post "FEAR" was just that: fear.
AS of today, you are not allowed to carry toothpaste, contact solution, hair-gel, or anything else that could contain bomb-making shit in it onto an airplane. You can still wear your shoes, but no damn toothpaste.
Why no I-pods? Why no Gameboys? The 'explosive materials' needed a detonator, right? Last time I checked, those were electronic. Hmmm.

Again, do not get me wrong. I understand fully that there are people "over there" that want to Annihilate us. I'm simply saying that there are people in your own hometown, on your own street that are just as dangerous, just as threatening to your security. People just as evil and fucked-up as "those guys".
Fear of terrorists on airplanes should be at least a distant second to the meth-heads and child molesters in your own town.
I also just want to ask that you not allow your own government to politicize this. Especially considering how close we are to an election.
"The only thing to use is fear itself." - some witty dude.

Sleep well. I mean it. Everyone everywhere is going to die. This includes you. Fear is not going to change this fact. So embrace life. Do not give these asshole terror-fucks the victory - the power - to take one more minute of your precious life. Live. Love life. And for God's sake, don't be afraid.
2 Timothy 1:7

Fear.


Today I realized how scared shitless we are.
The U.K. foiled a terror plot consisting of at least 21 people with some liquid in seperate containers that - when mixed - would have blown up the airplanes they were on.
It was foiled, and not a single one of these played out.
Not one airplane was blown out of the sky, not one person injured.
Not fucking one.
Yet, all around, people have been given to a heart-stopping fear of these crazy asses.
I for one am not fucking falling for it.
Today I actually heard from the mouths of two people I love and respect that they would gladly give up a little freedom in exchange for security. It went more like this:
"You mean you wouldn't give up your personal rights if it meant I wouldn't die on that plane?"
You weren't on or even near a plane.
"Well I could've been!"
You weren't.
"They could take all my rights if it meant they'd stop these [people] from doing this!"
They didn't do it.
"They could've! What says they aren't trying again?!"
There are insane people who try insane things everyday on this planet. These people were not in Princeton, and they were not even in our States. There is, however, a few strung out junkies on Union Street just dying for a fix, as well as a couple Rebel flag waving racists in pick-up trucks driving around your very town who make it known they would gladly harm a black person if they had the opportunity. They even have guns. Lots of 'em. Big ones.
You don't seem too worried about them...
"They aren't trying to blow up planes!"

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Heritage not hate, right? I get it.... good ol' country boys.
Fuckers.

Look. 9/11 happened. It did. I know that. I watched it live - as it happened - and I cried and reeled and rallied behind our country and our President. I did.
We gave up alot of our freedoms then. A lot. We gave them up so that we could be protected - secure - so we could sleep in our nice comfy sheets and not worry about those darkies with pilot licenses anymore. We let them take some of our most precious rights. All because of fear.
We don't seem to be getting those back,
and it's 5 years later.

We are piss-pants-petrified. This whole damn country. We lock ourselves up tight - believe me, I'm the world's worst - and we give ourselves over to our government to protect us and keep us safe and keep the bad guys away, when the majority of said bad guys are in our own House of Representatives. They are already in our White House and our Senate. They are our Governers and our Mayors. Our police - oh, God. Don't even get me started on the f'n police.

We've given up our rights and are willing to do so EVEN MORE for the word of these criminals that we will be safe.

When the news reported women in the U.K. having to TASTE THEIR OWN BREAST MILK to prove it was really breast milk, this person said, "well good! They could hide it in anything!"
Not knowing what "it" was...
Mothers drinking their own breast milk? This is a sick fucking world if this is considered a safety measure. A sick fucking world. This, I feel, doesn't even need me explaining. If you would like one, e-mail me and let me know who you are so I can stay the FUCK away from you when it all does go down.

Stop living in fear. STOP LIVING IN FEAR. Stop buying into it and letting these people in your own government take away what you are born into. Your inaliable rights.

If we don't, we'll soon have to drink our own piss just to go to the mall.

My confession.

You know you watch too much cable news when your dreams for three nights in a row all contain a nuclear explosion.
The world just needs to take a blue Xanax, a Flexeril, maybe a shot or two, and CHILL THE FUCK OUT. Calm down, calm down. Everybody.
The news doesn't help. It's my belief that the news is only there to make it worse. It makes it worse because it has to - it feeds off of it. Don't bite the hand that feeds, right?
Anderson Cooper and Brian Williams with their perfectly coifed hair and make-up reporting to us live from the disaster zone with level 5 body armor (more than most soldiers are lucky enough to get, eh?) while women pick up the remaining peices of their kids - is it me or is there something wrong with that? The news is our infotainment now. We're numb to carnage, to death. We're numb because we've seen it all day everyday since 9/11. We're bombarded with its actions over and over until we just don't see it anymore. 9/11 and internet porn; they've both callused us to blood and rape and death and violence and real human atrocity. They've made the horror genre obsolete; can't top what you see everynight on the news. Red food coloring and corn syrup don't really hold up against the shattered limbs and bled out bodies on Special Report with Brit Hume (who, by the way, says "fuck the body armor, I'm staying in New York." Like nothing bad ever happens there...).

It's too bad that this is probably, at least partially, my fault. Yep, me.
See, I spent the first 25 years of my life fighting for the Republican ideal. By fighting I mean talking and arguing, trying to convert every person I saw to the side of right. Of goodness and descency. Of moral clarity.
By 26 however, I decided being a neo-fascist was probably not the best way to spend my energy.
I fought and fought for Bush Jr. for both elections. It was like a sporting event to me; see how many people I could convert or piss off right up to the moment I could gloat because I won... whatever the hell it was I won.
I lost a very serious girlfriend in '04 because of this.
Being a Republican or a Democrat, it doesn't matter, you're not fighting for change. You're fighting for redundancy. You're fighting for the status quo.
Don't believe the Third party, either. When John McCain and Joe Lieberman are Third party, we're all doomed.

So warm up your Banquet TV dinner, sit on your favorite comfy spot, and watch the carnage on your 50 inch widescreen high definition television. War looks really cool in HD.
Just remember to blame me when it all goes wrong.

Today.
Have you ever wondered where you would be if you hadn't said yes? To anything - you know, the one thing you said yes to even though you weren't so sure, that ended up impacting your life in ways you thought you were prepared for? Ways you thought you could live with?
Then you find out that the rest of your life could be a very fucking long time.
You should make decisions based on emotions. Screw the people who say otherwise. Without emotion, you pragmatically make decisions based on what makes the most sense - not what makes you happy.
Life after this decision can change you, ruin you. It can destroy the path you were on that was actually working. Don't ever make a decision while you are on a world-record drunken bender. You have a false sense of security that it won't matter. That you can live the rest of your fucking long life with the consequences. That it's the only option left, so why the hell not take it?
Then
Tomorrow.
You find yourself regretting, worrying, ripping your chest apart trying to figure out how to turn time back. You find out that fuckin' time's a stubborn bastard. You can't change this. It is far to late for that, drunk boy. Resort to your dreams, your stories, your imagination all you want, but they'll never be real. No, that proverbial ship has sailed. You may still see it, thinking you can get it back somehow, reach it, wish it back, but you aren't a fucking Jedi or a very good swimmer. The bridges smolder, ashes fall around like snow, and you are stuck.
Tomorrow.
You find the path again, but you can't cross the void to get to it. You can't find the road back home.
You numb yourself. You try to figure out new ways to accept. You pretend dreams and wishes are enough to get you through; to take you somewhere a bit more cozy, a bit less mired.
They won't, and where you are is not where you should be - where you used to be; before you were "cured", before you were "found". The place you know you should be. The path you were on when you were still lost, feeling your way through the dark. The time before the light, eh?
Just give up. It's over now. You can't change. You can't go back. You chose the right-hand path, and now it won't let you go.
Tomorrow.
Maybe it will all just come down. Crashing down, all around you. Then you will cry and scream and pray and repent and make promises and deals with God via his secretary, forgetting where you just were. Forgetting you were praying for this - this key. This way back. This opportunity.
Tomorrow you lose what you were wishing for. Tomorrow you forget what you dreamed.