June 28, 2010

Proper Collective Terminology for Things Which Could Possibly End the World

A plague of locusts does not equal a plague of zombies, because there is no such thing as a plague of zombies. Yes, I understand: You are under attack. Okay.

So, the world is being besieged by a massive amount, number, grouping of some thing, do we just forget proper speech? No! We do not. The first rule in defeating your enemy is knowing how to address your foe correctly.

What follows is a list of the proper collective terms for just some of those groups which mean us a coda of destruction.



1. An Evisceration of Emus
2. A Shard of Deconstructionists
3. A Perturbance of Toddlers
4. A Clot of Nitwits
5. A Something of Nothingness
6. A Madness of Reefer
7. A Disconcerto of Ennui
8. A Grape-Juicing of Stains
9. A Creep of Mildew
10. An Empty of Pessimism
11. A Colloquy of Colicry
12. A Totally of Insincerity
13. An Oklahoma of Musicals
14. A Braining of Zombies
15. An Ainting of Poor Grammar
16. A Mis of Understanding
17. A Jack of Jills
18. A Lesser-Greater of Bad Math
19. A Covering of Boobies
20. A Bubbling of Goo
21. An Ending of Infinities

June 23, 2010

More Appropriate Names for the Artist Who Should Be Formerly Known As Sting

At some point in the late 1980s or early 1990s, the musician who, at the time, went by the one-word moniker of Sting, started estrogen supplement therapy or a testosterone removal regimen, and decided that his next career would be as far removed from being awesome as he could get.
The Man Who Still Retained The Increasingly-Deceptive Name of Sting decided he would spend most of his time demonstrating that he was serious and intelligent and caring and serene and Zen and could, if asked, menstruate rainbows for you on cue. In other words, he became self-important and emotionally bombastic in exactly inverse correlation to his music's importance and rocking bombast.
What could we expect? He was Important and Smart and Meaningful, dammit!
Rock and Roll and its audience of rowdy ruffians now safely beneath him, The Artist Who No Longer Could Artistically Claim To Be Anything Like A Sting proceeded to soften His sound to the extent that His last three albums have consisted entirely of something sounding similar to the sensuous and self-serious susurrations of a monk in a library, like Yanni or Zamfir without all that messy dynamism.
So, I salute your complete "transformation," Mr. Gordon Sumner, but only in the sense that a transformation often takes the form of a fundamental breakdown. You have dulled your edges and softened your points and hacked away at a musical style which challenged listeners to find meaning and replaced it with a pompous meaning which challenges listeners to find music.
Therefore, you no longer get to be called Sting.
I am suggesting the following substitutions that better fit the pandering "man" you have become.


1) Stung
2) Mystical Enchanter of Song
3) Ingstay
4) Renfestus
5) Gordon M. Pussington, Esq.
6) Middle-of-the-Road Artist #793511
7) That One Guy, You Know...
8) Grandfather
9) Middle-Aged-Lady Whisperer
10) His Grandiloquence
11) Stinq

June 4, 2010

Everything I would like to put in a taco, but the authorities will not let me

Turns out, even tacos have The Man looking out for them and stifling culinary creativity! Here's how they have stomped on my attempts at rescuing the taco from gustatory conventionality.


1) 3-4 ounces of despair, fresh-picked from my Garden of Dreams I Am Now Too Old To Accomplish - like ever running a sub-5 minute mile again.

2) A squirt of luscious droopiness, for my eyelids.

3) One piece of genetic therapy, just in case regular therapy doesn't work, and I want to go all biological and stuff.

4) At least 7 songs by Yo La Tengo... I shall start with "Blue Line Swinger", "Barnaby, Hardly Working", and "Autumn Sweater" and from there it's a stage dive into so much other awesomeness that it probably doesn't matter. Someone will have to hold my taco while I stage dive, though.

5) A secondary taco - not a taco layered inside of the first taco, but an entirely self-contained, autonomous second taco unit that will step in for the first taco in the unlikely and unfortunate event that the first taco is unable to perform its taco duties.

6) Tits. I'm a healthy, heterosexual American male. I feel my taco should have breasts. Is that so wrong?

7) A spicy, but understanding, salsa which will make even my post-taco burps diplomatic and caring.

8) The internet. I feel it shouldn't take much to make my tacos wireless. I don't know why they should be; they just ... Should. Okay?

9) Half a slice of Ambiguity. Which half a slice? Hard to say, but that's the beauty of this ingredient. In the end, will you even know if you have eaten the taco? No, you won't, and the question might haunt you for weeks, making it the most satisfying taco ever. Much more so than those simple declarative tacos that leave no doubt and insult your intelligence / stomach.