On a wave of anger, I return.

I am angry tonight.  I don’t do angry very often, but I’m certainly doing it right now.  Why am I angry, that’s the question that I can almost painfully hear absolutely no one on the internet asking?  That’s easy.  My friend died this morning.

Let me say that again really quickly – my friend died this morning.  He was a good guy.  He was silly when it was required and grave when needed.  He could laugh with you, cry with you, and encourage you to drunkenly teabag a mutual friend when all three of you were blitzed during a hurricane party.  That last one, no matter what Ladytoa might tell you, is an important skill to have and a valuable trait in any human being (or dog.  Not cats, though.  Never trust a cat with testicles) that you might have the privilege of calling a friend.

How, exactly, did my friend die?  I’m not sure yet – it was fairly sudden and more information will come out when the medical examiner does his/her thing.  At that time, I suspect that we’ll find out that he got himself sick; while he was a great person he wasn’t always very good at taking care of himself.  I suspect we’ll find out that he had pneumonia and decided it was just a cold or that he had a heart attack a few days ago and was too stubborn to admit that he needed help.

There are a lot of questions that I don’t have an answer to quite yet and a lot of things that will be in flux probably for weeks into the future.  You know what I do know, though?  I know who I’m mad at and I know why.

Who am I mad at?  Damned near everyone, thank you for asking. 

I’m mad at my friend.  He was intelligent, he was wise – he was far too worldly to take as bad care of himself as he did.  While I’m not going to stand here on my invisible internet soapbox and blame a dead man, I will tell say that, Buddy, you didn’t do yourself any favors.  The last time I saw him face to face was just a little bit before he moved halfway across the country from me.  I was genuinely afraid that our friendship was about to end because I took him out for coffee (people like me do that sometimes.  We have coffee.  We go out in public where no one feels threatened and then we hash some shit out).  I bought him a ridiculously priced drink at our local Starbucks and I said to my very good friend, “Friend – I am concerned about you.  I love you and you don’t treat yourself, physically or mentally, as well as you deserve and someday soon you won’t bounce back from that.”

On April the 11^th, 2013 the world proved that it had a harder surface than my friend and his journey came to a stop.  I spoke to him yesterday – we BSed a little bit about video games and then said our good-byes.  I expected to talk to him again on Saturday.  He didn’t say anything about serious illness or hospital time.  He didn’t say anything about anything serious.  Just video games for 5 minutes and then he was gone.  I didn’t get to say a proper good bye.

On whom else does my ire fall?  Well, I’m glad you’re curious because I’ve got a million of them.  But there’s two, in particular that I’d like to hit on now.  Don’t worry, gentle reader, I’m not going to rail against the cosmic injustice of it all and beat my breast to blame Deity in any form or random cosmological events.  Those are beyond the scope of this blog, and quite frankly, I don’t get angry at entropy or Deity.  If one or both of those things was involved, well, there’s either a bigger picture that I’m not really qualified to speak to or it was all completely unrelated to any causal instance and so there is nothing to be upset over.  There – no being mad at God.  You religious types can file that away in the great tallying book as a plus sign in the 

Markatoa chapter.  One of the few, but it’s there.

I’m mad – furious, even.  Possibly blood boilingly bellicose (I warned you of my love of alliteration.  I’ll make it fit even when it doesn’t want to.  With enough patience and lubricant any sentence can be made to have alliterative elements) when it comes to his Wife.  I know how awful that makes me sound.  It’s ok, you don’t have to tell me.  And you know what?  I don’t care because it’s true.  There’s a reason when your buddy starts dating a new girl, or your sister finds herself a mate that you say to them “you take care of him/her/it.” And the reason isn’t because you like hearing yourself talk – usually- it’s because once two people get together like that they become, in many respects, each other’s responsibility.  Not solely, of course, but it happens.  I expect that if I’m acting like a moron that Ladytoa will remind me of it (and she does.  It’s her job, after all).  When Ladytoa says things like “I don’t want to take my medication today because I’m a willful bitch” I’m there to put her in line. (Note: Ladytoa does not refuse to take medication.  She is sometimes a willful bitch, but I dig that about her) 

In fact,  to even further digress, not too long ago when Ladytoa and I were putting together our move I was being a stubborn manshaped lump.  I had been sick for a couple of days and said “Meh- it’s just a cold, I’ll kick it soon.”  My loving wife gave it two days; when I still had a fever that she could feel from the other side of the bed (apparently not a hyperbole) she trickily drove me to a walk-in medical clinic and made me see someone.  Four prescriptions later it turns out I had the flu, and a respiratory infection and it could have gotten much worse if I let it go longer.  I was ready to let it happen, I thought I’d be fine.  But Ladytoa essentially gave me the “if you won’t  do it for yourself, do it for me” moment and it ended up having a vastly positive effect. 

And, sometimes, that’s what you gorram do.  You remind your spouse/significant other that there are other people than themselves to consider and that they owe it to themselves and their families to be as well as it’s possible for them to be.

Before I go completely off track, let me wander through the tulips back to being mad at the FriendWife.  She failed at the above duty.  The one of keeping people grounded and connected to the world.  The one of making sure that they take care of themselves.  She was never great about it – my friend and his wife in many ways enabled in each other their worst impulses and character traits.  I saw it and had spoken with both of them individually about it.  They made excuses for their own failures and each other’s.  It’s something I’m intimately familiar with as my own ex-wife and I had the same tendency.  Nothing was our fault – it was the world, it was that company or this other in-law.  Never us.  What we were doing was fine.  Of course we weren’t fine, but we couldn’t see that; neither of us would allow the other to see it until we split up.  It’s an amazingly hard thing to realize and because of that it was one of the things I mentioned to my friend when he moved away not too long ago.  I wanted to help him and get them the perspective to make a change because it was so obvious that they loved each other deeply.  It was a thing he said he realized and that they were working on together.

I’ll never know for sure, but a bitter little part of my soul expects that they didn’t work on it as hard as they could have.  And though I love her for being a part of my friend’s life - though I will always love and cherish the memory of my friend, for that fact, I think I could hate them both.  At least a little bit.  I’ll help her however I can from this day until the end of days because that’s what my friend would want and what his memory deserves.  I will never, ever mention this out loud, not even in a whisper, for fear that it will open the flood gates and start a real fight – the kind that you never make up from until someone else is on their deathbed.  But that doesn’t change a thing.  I am so mad at her for not doing her job.  She had two jobs.  Take care of him and take care of their children.  She’s failed the one and I hate her for it.

I hate her.

There.  It’s said, and now it can go away.

Who’s last, but hopefully not least?  Well, if you stayed this long you deserve to find out.  It won’t come as a surprise, of course, because so few things do in these days of investigative journalism and mindreading.  Ever since that damned Ambassador G’Kar brought dust onto my station.

Anyway, Babylon 5 reference aside, I’m mad at myself.  There, I told you it wouldn’t come as a surprise.  It’s probably even one of the stages of grief or some other hippy-dippy New Age crap.  I’m mad because my friend moved away and even though I tried to keep in touch via text and email and the occasional phone call it wasn’t enough.  I never really let myself work up the courage to ask my friend how things were going in the “taking better care of yourself” department.  It was such a hard moment to get myself to even bring it up the first time that I assumed, or hoped, or whatever, that he was obviously getting better.

I’m mad at myself because it was incumbent upon me, as a friend, to really do more to reach out and see how he was doing.  What his situation was like – if he was happy and healthy or if he just even needed to talk.  Sure, I said some things to that effect.  I went through the motions, but I don’t think anything will convince me that I ever went quite far enough.  I let trivialities of conversation and acquaintance lull me into thinking I was doing my job.

Nothing will ever be able to make up for that fact.  Nothing I do for my friend’s family and nothing that I do for those of our friends who are left behind will change the fact that I could have done more.  And not in that idle way that everyone could have done more.  I could have, and I knew that I should have, and I let myself be convinced not to.

Good bye, Friend.  I’ll miss you forever and that’s really the only thing that needed to be said.  I'm glad I got the rest off my chest, though, too.

The Whole Damned System's Out of Order!

...now, I know what you're thinking.  How?  That's easy (and would already be answered for you if you've read some of my earlier ramblings.  God, Anderson.  Do your research!) - I can read your brain like a finely peeled orange.  I can't really effectively use simile nor metaphor as the above sentence clearly shows, but I can pierce your mind's armor and enjoy the squishy bits inside.  And brothers and sisters, your brains are some messed up places.  After all, why else would your brain armor look like this?

 Because...we...think with our stomachs?

Anyway - that all said, I know what you're thinking.  The answer is "no"  Which means that you're in luck because this will not be devolving into some passionate yet ill-informed rant about something involving the American Justice System.  Although if it was that I could set it to a hard rock sound track and call it the Injustice System.  (Bam! Protest.).  Really the title and the preceding paragraphs are brought to you by the fact that the original title and subsequent jokes were way too involved and would have required a deep study of Markatoan philosophy and social customs to get through.  None of us want you to understand me that well.  Especially you.  Thank Ladytoa for her patience and dedication to the sacred duty of not letting my ideas spread too far outside of my own home.  (Little does she know that the internet lets me channel these things to innocent minds everywhere.)

The problem with all that build up is that now what could have been considered the point has gotten old in my brain and died a natural death.  Don't be sad, the idea is much happier now and in a better place.  At least in a place where it doesn't have catheters "gumming up the works" as it were (the works are its privates).  

Since I've driven my stake deep (hey-oooo!) into this particular bit of the Googloid Empire(tm) I think that it's only fitting that I address a great injustice in the world.  Or at least the world of people watching American Football (that world limited mostly, one would imagine, to the United States.  Possibly some areas in Western Canada.) - the Super Bowl.

Who got to name that one, huh guys?  While it might be accurately described as "The Championship Bowl" or the "Overhyped and Prone to Hyperbole Bowl" is there really anything "Super" about it?  I've yet to see an army of Moloids break through at the line of scrimmage (for our foreign readers the Line of Scrimmage is a lot like the Maginot Line, but more effective) and start taking hostages while demanding reparations from "Evil, Short-Sighted Topsiders"

I've never seen the game played while surrounded by skyscrapers so that Spider-Man could swing on through and amaze everyone with his witty banter, aerial maneuvers and tragically complicated personal life.

"The one thing I could never punch - Old Age" 

Now, really - there are zero super powered athletes involved in any of the sporting that happens beforehand, and I can understand that.  Those games are even referred to as the Regular Season.  One has to imagine because it involves Regular Athletes.  Therefore it only makes sense for the Super bowl to involve at least one Superperson per team.  Maybe hold a draft of them shortly before the game.  And then have the Commissioner rearrange the fields so that the powers and weaknesses of the Supers involved can be exploited for the entertainment of the crowds.

Like one side gets Superman and the other side gets Martian Manhunter?  Make it so that each team has randomly assigned Kryptonite equipment and maybe the endzones and yardlines have pyrotechnics built in to them to shoot gouts of flame.  Again, at random so that he couldn't mind read people and prepare for it.

Yeah...I'd watch the heck out of that game.  I'd watch the heck out of it so hard it would need to call its sponsor and admit a relapse.

II'm sure that there are those amongst the internet that will stridently disagree with me.  That's fine.  They're allowed to be wrong.  Or to convince me of the awesomtude of Sports!  Until then, enjoy your "Entirely Normal, But Still Final Game of the Season; Determining Who Gets Awarded a Trophy and Nebulous Recognition Bowl."  Yeah.  Enjoy that.

Today We Feast on Victory Chili!

-PEOPLE OF THE WORLD - 

There.  Now that I have your attention, I need to make a disclaimer.  It is Holy Hell Balls Cold out where I live right now.  Like, so cold that Jack Frost took a quick jaunt into our neck of the woods and said "Eff this business, brah.  Too cold."  He then proceeded to hie himself to Hawai'i.  Because, really, screw the Pacific Islands.  Also because it's the only place he can get away with saying "Brah" in a non-ironic fashion.  It is so cold, in fact, that words and thoughts have literally frozen in place in my brain and are having a hard time getting out in a coherent fashion.  (Yes, this is in fact a difference from the normal lack of cohesion we've all come to know and love from your friend, Markatoa)

I'm dying, Brah.  But it hurts so good.

Possibly because of this brain-freezing deathfield that's hovering over my portion of the United States that I came to a decision today.  And that decision is that whomsoever created the QWERTY keyboard layout (Originally Christopher Latham Sholes in 1867, for the curious) did so solely to get people in trouble when they're typing in a hurry.

Yes, I know taking typing classes and not being in a hurry or just plain paying somewhat more attention when you're typing can solve any of the problems the layout possesses.  And  yes, I'm aware that once you in fact get used to it that it is efficient enough to solve all your needs.  But...it doesn't stop me from accidentally writing "busty" sometimes.

Instead of "busy".  Because the "t" and the "y" are right next to each other?  You see what I mean - it's right there in the name of the layout.  QWERTY.  I mean, say you're typing off a quick IM/email to someone about their day.  You're at work, there's monkeys screaming and toddlers on fire in the background (I don't know what your office is like.  Mine is legit, though).  Maybe you don't have time to do a proof read and spell check doesn't say anything when you accidentally ask your mother in law is everything is "busty over there?"  Then maybe your father in law sends you a FedEx Priority package with a couple of bullets in it and a family picture with your face crossed out in red ink.  Then you live your last few minutes in pants wetting terror before it ends mercifully.  All because Stupid Christopher Stupid Latham Stupid Sholes thought putting those letters near each other was a good idea.  He's trying to jack your stuff up from beyond the grave.

Don't get me wrong - I mean, there's a lot of times when I'm saying "busty" and talking about boobies.  They're fun to talk about and generally to interact with.  Not that I'm playing with just the general mass of boobs in the world.  No, sirs and lady sirs, I am a one-woman, two-booby man.  I can appreciate the existence of other breasts, but only in an academic sort of way.

Also...artistically?  Thanks, comic books.

To me, I haven't had any other issues while typing that you can accidentally write a real word that totally changes the meaning of your sentence with a single keystroke.  Most of the other ways you can do that would be noticed.  Sure, if you missed an "i" you could end up with different words.  But I think you would notice that.  Or at least someone would just assume you messed up the "I".  Although, now in the future I might just ask a friend "what are you dong tonight?" just to see what happens.

Keyboards, man.  Always trying to get me in trouble.

All twisted up in AmazonTown

...I realized that there are two, possibly more, ways I could go after I sculpted that laser-etched, surgically sharp title of mine.  And by "ways" I mean things far more arcane than leftwise and righticle.  Perhaps even more confusing than upsides and southdown.  Yes - there are concepts more esoteric and unknowable even than those.  We're talking full-on Lovecraftian geometry up in here.  The two things that I was mostly thinking about are however, somewhat related and so with that in mind (and also the fact that literally no one can stop me from writing whatever I damned well please) it has come into my brainsauce that I shall cover both topics.

They have to do with content.  Media, even.  The consumption and reportage of the same and the various interpretations of classics that modern audiences find themselves exposed to.  See that?  If you didn't know any better you'd almost think that sentence made sense.  You'd be hooked - wondering what it is that this obvious savant has to say relative to the 21st Century Media Culture that saturates our lives.  Well, lords and ladies (and, I suppose, poo-covered peasants), let's get right down to it, shall we?

First, Smallville was a pretty popular show.  Say what you want about it, but it's a thing that did well for DC Comics try to keep the worst superhero in the universe relevant.  It cemented ratings for the fledgling WB network (and then the CW) and gave the world Kristen Kruek - or however the heck it is she spells her name.  These are pretty decent accomplishments.  Things to be proud of.  They even almost made people so interested in DC properties that there was an Aquaman live action series of the same vein.

Aquaman, for the love of all that is holy.  Now, it would have been called Mercy Reef and if there's any justice in the world would have been more of a sequel to Baywatch Nights and less about Aquaman but unfortunately that didn't happen.  What happened instead?  Arrow.  It's about a guy who shoots arrows at stuff.  For justice?  Well, for some damned reason anyway.  It's marginally fun to watch and marginally successful in ratings and (I imagine) advertisers.

Naturally, of course, that leads us to the newest project in that vein that's been announced.  Amazon.  (See - it's starting to tie back in to my topic.  It took us a while, but we got there.  It's like Oregon that way.  But with less dysentery and oxen.  At least I hope less of those things.)  Amazon will tell us a modern, up to date, edgy version of everyone's favorite woman named Dianna Prince ever - Wonder Woman

Lynda Carter remains skeptical.

The thing that confuses me about this is the basics of Wonder Woman's origins.  And no, I don't mean the bondage fantasies of her creator - although an episode in which she loses her powers because "her hands were bound by a man" would be hilarious and I would watch the heck out of it.  Not in a creepy way, because the girl in question would be over 18.  I mean, in a way that I wouldn't necessarily want Ladytoa to be in the room with me while I was watching it, but not a super creepy way.  Maybe like 45% creepy.  It's not even a plurality of creep.  STOP JUDGING ME, SWAN!

What I mean is simply this - Wonder Woman's life before she started flying invisible jets and pulling crazy dominatrix stunts on the criminals of the world was boring.  She was either A) created out of nothing but clay when someone got lonely and lived as the only child in a realm of immortal, intelligent, perfect, peaceful, wise women (yeah, alliteration!) or, B) really, some variation thereof.  I mean, she comes from a place literally called Paradise Island for the gods' sake.  I don't think you can reinvent that too much.  Unless you're calling "Paradise Island" a housing project deep in the worst bowels of New Detroit something that has a name like that would not give itself over readily to a lot of seedy crime, nor have much of a driving need to combat the same.  Wonder Woman only works when she's left her origin behind and is out busting heads and stopping Nazis from stealing our milk (True story - and one of the greatest comic book villain plans ever).  She's out to understand Man's World and teach her super-intelligent, immortal sisters about what the world has been like in the 2000 years since they've been hidden away in a perfectly protected, completely benevolent society.

I think a well-done WW series could be awesome for the geeks of the world.  Try to show people out there that not everyone who enjoys comics only cares about the ladies for what they can get out of them (yes, yes, we would sort of need to remove the crazy bondage overtones, but luckily those have been mostly out of the comics since, like, the 80s).  I just don't know that a stripped-down origin story works as well for this character as well as it did for some others.  There's not really "Wonder Girl" stories (yes, Donna Troy.  Yes, Cassie Sandsmark. No, let's not get into that right now) that matter at all.  It wouldn't be interesting to watch Dianna discover her powers because she was trained in how to use them pretty much since birth.  Watching her hang out and receive a Classical Greek education just doesn't sound like riveting TV to me.  That said, I'm going to watch at least the Pilot Episode when it makes it to the air.  Hopefully I'm wrong.  Maybe it will start In Media Res.  Maybe, like Namor, she'll wake up with amnesia and need to relearn about herself? I don't know.

Going Leftwise from there - Amazon.  The company (AMZN) that is.  Specifically, Amazon Prime.  That stuff is legit and it blows my mind in a way that for some reason Netflix never really did.  Maybe it's because you get the shipping upgrade for their physical stuff in addition to their streaming options.  Maybe it's because their Prime-eligible free streaming is pretty robust for something that they're not charging you for.

Or maybe, and this is probably the most likely, it amazes me because I'm an old man.  Not quite tottering around in diapers old, but the transition away from physical media and into a streaming consumption model really hit me when I saw the way Amazon was handling this.  Sure, Netflix had streaming but it was originally an add-on that sort of became more convenient.  Hulu has streaming, but Hulu sucks unless you pay for Hulu Plus.  Amazon is just like, hey, you paid me for this one, completely unrelated service, would you like some free access to stuff along with that?

And the answer is yes.  Without a doubt yes.  I will continue to purchase and collect physical media for as long as that's a thing that exists (I like to *own* things, not just the right to watch those things) but it no longer bothers me as much as it used to to see it go away.

I think I'm done with my rambling for now.

Hell comes to Suburbia

Ahhh, Internet.  I see you there.  See you there seeing me.  What with your creepy, soulless eyes and your CCTV cameras.  Yeah, I see you.  Anyway, Internet, if you and your denizens are anything like the rest of the universe, you will have in no way, shape or form have noticed my absence over the course of the last few weeks.  Had you noticed, I'm sure that your life will have been made better for the lack of listening to my words as they radiate from my keyboard and out into the vast, unknowable AetherSpace in which you find yourself entangled.

That all said, I apologize.  Not for being away, because quite frankly, you were all happier to see me be gone than any of us are comfortable mentioning in polite company.

Or, realistically, any company

I apologize for being back.  But now that we've made our peace with the fact of my continued, fetid existence let's just all put our heads down and power through, shall we?  There are a few reasons why I haven't been around.  One horrible, national tragedy that struck far too close to home (as every tragic moment does for those who find themselves afflicted with them) about which there shall be precisely zero jokes out of me.  Ever.  Also, due to the more sudden than expected moving on from our hilarious cast of housemates Ladytoa and I had to go find ourselves a landing pad and, well, land there.  Moving takes time and energy.

Also, and here's the one I can really mock - my coworker was recently banished from the Northeastern United States and shunted off to where all of the worst people in the universe are trapped.  A place they struggle both against the harsh, poisonous environments and also their own base, depraved natures.  A place of fire and brimstone and Foster's. (Which is Australian for Beer.  Alright, I admit it.  he was in Australia.)  In case you're wondering, I did some very solid research about Australia before he went away.  That way, I would be prepared for whatever desert madness he brought with him.  It turns out that literally everything in Australia is poisonous and has unexpectedly large teeth.  Even the vaginas. 

 Especially the vaginas.

Because of this, native Australians are actually not able to eat anything at all from their own continent and so have an entire culture built on piracy, both internet and otherwise.  They sail from their ports with their flags inverted only to ravage the countryside of New Zealand and Tasmania (sometimes ranging as far asea as Japan), taking what they can, burning what they can't and then retreating back to their coastal hovels to jealously hoard their ill gotten gains and attempt to protect (via knifings and football riots) the small bit of normalcy they buy themselves with the pain of others.  You think I'm making this up, but I'm not.  My coworker came back missing an eye but with peg leg and a propensity to cheer for Arsenal.  True story.

His trip created a situation in which I was doing literally two people's work for the last six weeks and just haven't had time to find inappropriate photos of carny-freaks to show people who have nothing better to do. Now he's back and that problem, at least, is solved.

But what does the future hold?  More posts about absolutely nothing?  Probably.  More jokes about my own lack of worth in this whole internet game, as it were?  Almost certainly.  Anyone who blunders into my path wondering aloud who this person is who uses phrases like "this whole internet game" and lamenting their loss of time while they read through the above paragraph?  Yes.  Check and mate, planet Earth.  I just won.

For really, though - my life is about to be a whirlwind of change.  Within the next six months (at the outside) or as few as three (at the earliest) I will be moving along with Ladytoa to the mythical land of Tejas.  Ladytoa will be blazing a trail for us first, and also starting a job to ensure no gap in health insurance coverage (yay! adulthood!).  I will be following when said things are all in place and all of our stuff (or at least the majority of it) has been put to bed up here.  Once we get down there and settled, our next real challenge begins.  It has to do with Apache Chief.  He just loves to bogart the whiskey.  (No?  Too Soon?  Not soon enough?  I mocked both the late-70s classic Challenge of the Superfriends and also Native Americans' unfortunate propensity for alcoholism.  In case you missed what I did there.  Now you know.  The real challenge, by the way is learning to live in the South.  Or even Tejas.  Which is like so South that the South thinks you're southern.  Also buying a house.)

While things remain in flux, chances are high that I will continue to post my random thoughts about the goings on of the day.  I may eventually settle down and write a more coherent blog with an actual overriding theme (shudder) - whether that replaces or supplements this, however, only time will tell.