Let’s Break Down the Phases of this Girl Peeing Herself on Live TV

In a video that began circulating the internet on April 22, 2015 I truly believe that YouTube jumped the shark.  I know this is a bold statement to make, but it’s one that I feel I can back up with hard video evidence.  Here, submitted for your viewing pleasure, is a girl peeing herself while being interviewed about a guy being shot.  Take your time and enjoy.  Analysis will follow.

I’m usually pretty skeptical about this kind of thing.  Many times I’m the first cynic to shout out: “That shit is staged!” But, I have to admit, this video clip certainly seems pretty legit.  So let’s break down the different phases of this interview.

Phase 1) Before you even starte the video, note the girls’ stance.  It’s classic about-to-open-the-urine-floodgates posture.  I thought people doing the news were supposed to be astute observers of the human condition.

Phase 2) The girl first mentions she needs to pee.  She’s not subtle.  She just tags that part on in mid-interview.

Phase 3) The reporter assumes the dude that got shot had to go pee.  “Oh, that’s what he said?” She says, not understanding that her cross-legged homegirl here appears to have been crushing 64-ounce slushies over at the gas station all day.  Classic mistake.  The reporter has clearly seen Forrest Gump too many times.

Phase 4) “I got to pee. I’m peeing myself.” At this point, the reporter doesn’t back down or even attempt to shut things down.  She’s really going for that local Emmy, damnit, and some girl who is now visibly grabbing herself in an effort to HOLD IN HER BODILY FUNCTIONS isn’t going to stop her.

Phase 5)  She now whispers the words “I got to pee” to someone off camera.  This stage is when you know shit just got real.  Think about it.  Whenever someone whispers something in a movie, that means it’s more important.

If you whisper something to me when I’m reporting it, it’s getting my attention.  Because it’s either a confession, a declaration of some heinous crime you’re planning to commit, or it’s because you’re about to urinate down your leg in HD.  The reporter is unphased by this silently mouthed revelation.

Phase 6) “I just peed myself.”

Phase 7) The reporter attempts to show a little human compassion and touch our pants-wetting friend on the shoulder with faux-concern.  The girl wobbles as she loses control.  Yup.  She’s just peed herself on live TV.

Phase 8) The girl’s pants begin to show the end result of her lack of bladder control.  And, of course, she’s wearing khakis.  Because, if you were going to manage to pee yourself in front of a large TV audience the last pair of pants you’d want to wear would be tight, pee-showing khakis.

Phase 9)  Give the girl credit, here.  She’s still trying to finish the damn interview.  That’s heart.  That’s character.  She wants to help out the people of Greenville, Mississippi so they know what’s going on.  The fact that she’s now being forced to hide her pee-stains isn’t going to deter her from doing her civic duty.

Phase 10) This face:

Phase 11) Only now, after the reporter realizes she’s crossed the threshold of human decency and created an R. Kelly snuff film, does she attempt to end the interview.  My favorite part: the guys who uploaded this video to YouTube absolutely lose it here.

Phase 12) Someone get this girl an Emmy.  And some clean pants.

FIN

Surge is Giving Away Behind-the-Scenes Passes to their Factory: What Will it Be Like?

As I was doing my super-stereotypical Twitter scrolling this morning, I came across a Tweet that piqued my interest.  In fact, it grabbed my interest and pulled it into a nostalgic black hole so gravitationally intense that I was pretty sure I might need the homey Bill Nye to emerge and explain this wormhole rip in my psychic space-time continuum so I could get back to work.

That’s right.  Not only do we live in the gilded age of 21-35 year old nostalgic cash-grabs (*Author’s note: see: live action, “grittier” reboots of all our childhood movies and ’90s music making a suddenly ’80s like resurgence.) but we live in a time when Surge is willing to pull back the curtain and show us all where the magic happens.

This is an amazing moment.  Let’s drink it in.  Along with 42 grams of sugar and yellow 5, yellow 6, and whatever the hell carob bean gum is.

But this immediately got me to wondering: what exactly would it look like if you were to get one of these ethereal green tickets?  Where do they even make Surge at these days?

Google Maps was confused by my query.  I’m guessing that this random technology company in Australia is not what I was looking for.  And, in fact, I found myself comforted by the fact that I didn’t know where Surge was made.  (*Author’s note: yeah, smartasses, I know it’s made by Coca Cola.  Suck it, the internet.)

Appetite for dumb questions satiated, I proceeded to continue further down my rabbit hole of self-proclaimed deep thought.  What would a tour of the Surge factory be like?  Let’s work this out. . .

Instead of Willy Wonka, The Factory Is Probably Run By a Coke-bendering Charlie Sheen

Because Surge isn’t about rainbows and lollipops.  It’s hardcore, son.  It’s insane.  It’s a neon green sulfuric acid-wash for your mouth that gets little kids more jacked up than a Mountain Dew and Red Bull beer bong moments before they head to Chuck E. Cheese for a 10th birthday party.  So who do we know that can harness that kind of power?  Turn something that could destroy so many people, wield it, and emerge unscathed?  Chuck Sheen, that’s who.  You think those white eyebrows on his slave-labor Oompa Loompa’s is paint or genetic mutation?  Nope.  That’s straight up rails of blow that got caught in their eyebrows while they’re were banging down rails with Sheen.

---

At Least One Section of the Factory Will Devoted to Serge Ibaka’s Free Throw Form Being Snottily Critiqued by Serge from Beverly Hills Cop

Because: puns.  Also, who wouldn’t want to see more of Serge– the snooty art critic from one of the best ’80s movie franchises — haughtily sniffing each time Serge Ibaka — one of the most fascinating players in one of the weirder 2010s franchises — chucked up a free throw that wasn’t auteur enough for his liking?  This part of the tour would be phenomenal.  And you know Ibaka’s people have been contemplating the promotional tie-in appeal, spelling be damned.

---

A Behind the Scenes Look at the Secret Ingredients That Make Surge So Damn Delicious

We know what the FDA says is in Surge.  But that’s all bull.  There’s no way that something as highly addictive and mind-bendingly toxic as Surge really just had a few simple chemicals mixed together.  This tour would hopefully shed some light into what really goes into surge.  My best guesses?  Lean, Blue from Breaking Bad, and Crunk Juice poured directly from the cup of Surge brewmaster, Lil Jon.  Drink up, kids.  You need something to keep you up all night.  That Nintendo 64 isn’t going to play itself until 4 AM at your friends slumber party.

---

The Tour Would Culminate in a Sensory Overload Chamber

You may be thinking to yourself: Surge is the ultimate in ’90s.  It’s the peak of 1990’s stuff.  And that may be so, but why not let the dude in JNCO’s and Airwalk shoes show you around the ’90s lounge where you can watch Power Rangers: The Movie, play NFL Blitz, call yourself from a real-live landline, and send/receive pages about your buddies getting a new AOL Free Trial floppy disk in the mail!

If this isn’t what a tour of the Surge factory looks like, then I’m not sure I even wanna go.

FIN

The Power Rangers Deboot is Here. It’s Bleak and terrifying and perfect.

Last night, Joseph Kahn dropped a ’90s themed atom bomb on my consciousness.  He released what he called a “De-Boot” of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers.  If you haven’t seen it: here’s the video.

It’s got James Van Der Beek playing Rocky DeSantos, or as I called him while stuffing my mouth full of knock-off, store-brand Lucky Charms on Saturday morning: The Red Ranger.  Katee Sackhoff stars as Kimberly the Pink Ranger, or as I called her while I was still cramming that cereal into my mouth: “The One I was Madly in love with”

Kahn is mainly known for his work on music videos but also has directed one of my all-time favorite movies, the thoroughly weird, completely insane, and pop-culture packed Detention.  

Image courtesy of: IMDB.com

If you haven’t had a chance to watch Detention yet (*Author’s note: and literally no one I know has) you need to make sure that you check it out.  It defies description in such a perfectly absurd way that I won’t even waste any further text on it, nor distract from the task at hand: namely, praising this intensely badass 15-minute movie.

Kahn’s take on The Power Rangers is bleak, kind of terrifying, and packs in so much fascinating backstory that I found myself re-watching it almost immediately.

Highlights include:

— A trailerparked up Bulk and Skully selling out Kimberly, and her freshly-married Green Ranger lover, Tommy, and the two once-comic foils watching as both rangers get mowed down in a hail of gun fire a la Kill Bill Volume II.  (*Author’s note: Bulk and Skully later OD in their trailer park.  I’m a sick man, for enjoying this so much, aren’t I?)

— The always-racist Black Ranger doing blow and killing a room full of North Koreans

— Incredible special effects that look like they were hijacked off the CGI-studio for (______Insert Michael Bay Movie Here).

— The reappearance of Rita the Space-Witch, replete with her insane head gear and the laugh that used to haunt my Saturday morning day-mares.

Unfortunately, Kahn issues a disclaimer in the print underneath this short-film masterpiece essentially making it well known to all of us that this isn’t an attempt to make this into a feature length film.  He doesn’t want our money (*Author’s note: which is weird and cool) and he isn’t looking to stretch this out.  He’s, apparently, just like the rest of us and has always wanted to see The Might Morphin Power Rangers kick more ass and take more names as grown ups.

Anyway, I’m done writing.  I’ve got to go re-watch the Black Ranger shoot some guys in the head after having a three-way with two chicks.

FIN

“A Dad’s Take: Anecdotes, Joy, and Poop Jokes from 14 Months of Fatherhood” is Available Now on Amazon

This will be the last of my social-media blitzkrieg-ing for a while, I swear.

When my son Emmett was born on June 27, 2012 everything changed for me.  I immediately began taking notes on all the milestones, mayhem, and unadulterated love that occurred from the first month of his life until 14 months in.

Featured on the blog for a time, now you have an opportunity to get all of the insane parental-head-shaking stories and thoughts that run through the mind of a sleep-deprived writer during his warm-up laps of fatherhood.

If you’re a parent, a soon-to-be parent, or just someone who likes to laugh about how smelly a diaper from a 10 pound baby can be: this is a book for you.

Here’s the link to A Dad’s Take: Anecdotes, Joy, and Poop Jokes from 14 Months of Fatherhood: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00SHKV112

 

Thanks again for reading, everyone.

Chris

This Christmas, Give Ja Rule the Gift of a Cookbook Publishing Deal

About halfway through November, my buddy Joel sent me a link to an AV Club article  that looked like this:

I then put the link into my “drafts” section and stared at it for about a month.  I was waiting for the right time to write on such a momentous idea.  I needed to collect my thoughts.  I needed to try to stop laughing hysterically.  I needed to figure out what I could do to help Ja get the job done.  I needed Christmas.

This wasn’t from the Onion.  Or some kind of elaborate, months-late April Fool’s Day joke.  Ashton Kutcher or whatever-lame-ass-psuedo-celeb-is-hosting-Punk’d-these-days wasn’t waiting to jump out of the bushes and pull a Goosebumps book “GOTCHA!”  This was real.  This is our life now, America.

Ja Rule wants to put out a cookbook.

Not only that, but the cookbook would be full of all of his microwave recipes.  From prison.

The Ja Rule As a Continuously Funny Punchline Club has existed since the early 2000’s and, as its de facto President, I couldn’t believe my luck.  Here was Ja, suddenly catapulting back into the news.  Of course it was for the wrong reasons.  Of course it had to do with his prison stint for tax evasion and of course he wanted to make a cookbook featuring all-microwaved meals from his time spent in the clink.

And of course this incredible news story broke in tandem with the fact that he would be starring in the hideously unintentionally-funny I Fell In Love With a Church Girl movie that came out around the same time.  He followed that up immediately by having to deal with rumors that he was leaving his wife for a gay lover that he met while in prison (*Author’s note: see, I guess his microwaving really is that good.) with a late-arriving nominee for Tweet of the Year:

Sorry to disappoint all the haters who want the rumors to be true so bad lol.Merry Xmas stupid love Mick&Mal.Lmao pic.twitter.com/vilo4R2juY

— Ja Rule (@jarule) December 5, 2013

The reason I’m writing about this now, dear readers, is that I firmly believe that getting the funding to get this book made would make the ideal Christmas present for the world.  Forget peace on earth and goodwill towards men.  Forget children of the world joining hands and singing Christmas carols in a universally peaceful movement to aid humanity.

We need Ja’s cookbook.

And we need it now.

Someone please start a Kickstarter campaign to get this bad boy rolling.  Start a petition to Random House or send a letter to the Food Network.

I’ve already got some good ideas to help things out, so now it’s up to you guys to do the legwork for me.  We can do this, people.  Christmas is the time of miracles.

The forward needs to be by Sisqo.

Can he read?  Can he write?  Is he even still alive?  I’m not sure.  But one thing’s for sure, these two will always be inexorably linked in the psyches of my generation.  Ja and Sisqo were two of our guiltiest pleasures, fueled more than their fair share of awkward grind and bumping (*Author’s note: we were probably doing it backwards) at Park Middle School, and have since turned into the solar energy of internet hilarity: completely renewable resources.

The cover image needs to be that exact image that was used in that AV Club article.

Ja’s grill, screwed up into his patented stank face, as though he’s just pulled out his chicken gnocchi veronese from the prison microwave and can’t resist shouting “It’s Murd-ahhh!” as he takes his first sip of the delightful concoction.

Former co-star Steven Seagal needs to have a guest chapter in the book where he can impart his ancient, masterful, culinary advice.

Seagal and Ja starred in Half Past Dead together back in ’02 which was, ironically, set in a prison.  It was directed by Don Michael Paul (*Author’s note: who sounds like three dudes but is actually just one guy), the same visionary who brought us Who’s Your Caddy and I feel certain that these two guys shared a special bond on set.  Besides, if you listen to Steven Seagal tell it, what isn’t Steven Seagal good at?

Come on, guys.  You know you have a couple extra bucks lying around.  It’s not like the economy is in the tank or anything.  So let’s all pitch in this Holiday season and do something meaningful for society.  Let’s help Ja get his own microwave-prison-food cookbook.

FIN

Burnpoetry Presents: A Horrortweet and a Selfie of Doom

If social media were a character in a 1980s horror movie it would play the chaste, teenage heroine who only sees the good in people and is dedicated to 2 things: 1) Maniacally cluthcing to her V-Card harder than Tim Tebow at a Roman orgy and 2) Saving the life of (_____ Insert the name of a chronically frightened little kid whose name ends in “Y”, i.e. Timmy, Tommy, or Tammy, here____) who has the misfortune of being babysat by a girl walking around with a gigantic red “X” on her back for slashers to aim at.

If social media were a character in a 1980s horror movie it would play the drunken, womanizing, perv-job that is so busy doing post-bong-rip keg-stands — in an effort to impress the requisite skanky girl who has just started drinking the last solo cup of beer she’ll ever taste — that he doesn’t even notice the killer sneaking into his bedroom with a pointed shovel to behead him mid-coitus.

All I’m saying is that social media has a personality that splits harder than Norman Bates and his “mother.”  And I, for one, love everything about it, even if it does sometimes need to be killed in the first 15 minutes of the movie.  Because without the terrible parts, without that frat boy getting iced right when he’s being his frattiest, we wouldn’t enjoy it nearly as much when the virtuous teen escapes with her life (*Author’s note: and her chastity belt) firmly intact.  All of this is an unnecessarily long run up to what I’m going to look at in this post.

What would the horror movies that I know and love look like if they had occurred during a time of rampant social media?  Let’s take a look.

And we’ve all been about to head out for the time of our lives when we totes realize that we forgot to snap an adorebz selfie in the bathroom to send out to our “friends.”  It looks like we’re not the only ones:

FIN

(Re-Release) The National Horror Association, Draft Day — Now With Pictures!

Now that we’ve covered the basis of the league and the way in which it will be set up we need to take the next logical step.  As I mentioned in the previous post, this newly formed league will have 8 teams and owners representing their proud cities.  Every good new league needs to have a highly-touted, perennially overhyped draft.  We’ve already determined the draft will be held in New York City and televised by the venerable SyFy Channel.

The draft itself will be conducted in a snake-style draft, meaning that the team with the last pick in the first round will have the first pick in the second and so on, and will be broken down by SyFy’s team of analysts featuring The Ghost of Vincent Price, The Gothic Kid in High School Who Has a Morbid Curiosity With the Dead and Always Somehow Knows Shitloads About the Killer, and a team of sideline reporters.

Through a random drawing we have established a draft order:

1.  The Portland Prank Calls From the Killer
2.  The Minneapolis Maybe He’s Actually Dead This Times
3.  The San Francisco Shower Scenes
4.  The Pittsburgh Pre-Martial Sexers
5.  The Dallas Dream Within a Dream Sequences
6.  The Utah Underage Drinkers
7.  The Niagara Trips and Falls Over Nothings
8.  The Philadelphia Flickering Lights

Let’s go, now, live to Radio City Music Hall in the heart of New York City where the draft order has been established, the owners are standing by with their draft teams, and the slashers, ghouls, monsters, and psychopaths are anxiously waiting in the green room for the moment when they hear their names get called and their dreams are realized.

(As the broadcast begins we see commissioner John Carpenter sitting alone at his synthesizer.  A thin layer of fog pools up by his feet.  He immediately kicks into skin-crawling, undoubtedly 6/8 time, synth-doom and the crowd roars to life.)

The Ghost of Vincent Price
Eat your heart out David Stern.  Or, if you’re not interested, Zombie Al Davis will certainly eat it for you.
Hello and welcome to the first annual National Horror Association Draft.  I’m The Ghost of Vincent Price
and with me is my broadcasting partner, The Gothic Kid in High School Who Has a Morbid Curiosity With the Dead
and Always Somehow Knows Shitloads About the Killer.

Gothic Kid
(Sighs) Huhhh. . .what’s up?  We’re all going to die. . .I hope you know that.

The Ghost of Vincent Price
Terrific stuff as always.  Let’s go now to our sideline reporter, the overly-ambitious, manipulative and
sensationalism-driven reporter, Gail Willalwaysbeundonebyherambitionanddisregardforhumanlife.  Gail?

(Gail Willalwaysbeundonebyherambitionanddisregardforhumanlife is standing next to a hockey mask wearing Jason Vorhees and his insanely creepy mother.)

Gail
Thanks, Vincent.  If I may say, your ghostly mustache is looking pencil thin tonight.  Well played.
I’m standing by here with potential first round draft pick Jason Vorhees.  Jason, there’s been some
talk that you could go in the first round, but many analysts have predicted that you’ll slide further down
in the draft due to what some are calling “mommy issues.”  Any response?

(Jason stands mutely by)

Mrs. Pamela Vorhees
My son doesn’t have mommy issues.  He was a good boy.  Do you hear me?!?!  A good boy.
It was those counselors. . .they weren’t paying attention to him.  They snuck off to
make love and they let him die!

Gail
There you have it.  Straight from the horse’s mouth.  Normally I would say that these two appear highly
unstable and should be avoided at all costs, but I’m looking for a network news gig so I’m just going
to keep right on pressing forward.

The Gothic Kid
Gail, that might not be the best idea.  Jason Vorhees is a slashing, murdering, killing machine.

(Jason and his mother turn and begin to walk away)

Gail
(excitedly)
Oooooh. . .look.  They’re heading into a dark, abandoned part of the draft room.  I’m going to go
investigate this.  Alone.  Back to you, Ghost of Vincent Price.

GOVP
Well I think we all know how that’s going to end.  Let’s go now to the dais where
Commissioner Carpenter is standing by.

(Carpenter has ceased his ominous synth-death-ballad and has taken the microphone)

Carpenter
Hello everyone.  I’m pleased to announce that this is the first annual National Horror Association draft.
It’s amazing to see we have such a great turnout.  I’d like to extend a special welcome to the spring breakers
drinking heavily, teenagers gossiping on their phones while wearing only their underwear, the campers making
poor life decisions, and even the kids who have cars that won’t start, are out of gas, and will inevitably break
down at the wrong time.  It’s good to be here isn’t it?

(The crowd cheers wildly)

GOVP
The draft order has been decided.  And the first pick is in.  Let’s go now to Commissioner
Carpenter for the first pick.

Carpenter
Ladies and gentleman, if I may have your attention please.  With the first pick in the NHA
draft, the Portland Prank Calls from the Killers have selected. . . Michael Myers, from
Haddonfield, Illinois.

(The commish nods happily and the crowd erupts into cheers.  Carpenter sits down at his synthesizer and plays Myers’ theme song)

GOVP
And there you have it, my young, black-nail-polish-wearing friend.  The first pick is a
real doozy.  Your take?

Gothic Kid
Well, first off let me start off by saying, death comes for us all.  Let me make that very clear.  This
pick will certainly doom us to an excruciating, terrible demise.  However Mike Myers is a homerun
first pick.  Every few years a Peyton Manning-level talent comes along and you just have to make
sure to grab him, GVP.

GOVP
Truly.  People were saying that Myers was this year’s can’t miss prospect and he’d even drawn some
comparisons to a young Tony Romo.

Gothic Kid
Finally, someone in the big leagues who can out-choke Romo.

GOVP
Indeed.  Myers has finally stalker-walked his way to the stage.  Let’s see if his reunion with
commissioner Carpenter is a happy one.

(Carpenter give Myers a hug.  Myers turns his head quizzically sideways.  Carpenter presents him with a fitted, custom-made white mask that has Portland’s logo on the side and a mechanic’s jumpsuit with a sewn on number one.)

Gothic Kid
Myers has given that look to many of the nearly 88 people he has brutally murdered.

GOVP
Hmmm. . .this might not be good.  Look you can just make out the gold-plated knife that his
agent, Drew Rosenhaus, gave him as a signing bonus.

(Carpenter suddenly realizes he’s in danger and jumps back right as Myers slowly raises the knife dramatically.  An ancient man in a trench coat, wearing black gloves suddenly pushes his way to the front of the dais)

GK
And right on time, there’s Doctor Loomis, Myers’ ancient, undying adversary.

(Loomis pulls out a 6-shot revolver and shoots Myers seven times in the chest.  On the 7th shot, Myers stumbles backwards and falls off the back of the stage.  Loomis turns and limps off mysteriously)

GVP
There you have it, folks.  An explosive first overall pick.

GK
(stunned)
And he even used the patented 7th bullet out of his six-shooter.

GVP
Let’s see what happened to Myers.  Surely he’s dead for good this time.  This has got to be almost as
big of a draft-day fiasco for Portland as spending their first pick on Greg Oden.

(The cameras rush over to where Myers fell off the staircase and the body is gone)

GVP
(chuckling in a stereotypical announcer laugh)
And it appears as though his body is gone.

GK
Well, it’s a little known fact that Radio City Music Hall was built on an old Indian burial ground,
which sat on top of a giant underwater cave system.

GVP
And let me guess?  There’s a river underneath?

GK
That runs to all 50 of the states in the contiguous U.S.

GVP
And there’s still hope for a title in Portland!  Well, we’re moving right along here, my torn-at-the-knee,
skinny-jean-wearing compatriot.  Looks like commissioner Carpenter has recovered from his
near-death experience and has Minneapolis’ pick ready to go.

GK
I have a bad feeling about this.

(Carpenter steps up to the microphone)

Carpenter
With the second pick in the National Horror Association Draft, the Minneapolis Maybe He’s
Actually Dead This Times select. . .Frederic Krueger, Springwood, Ohio.

GVP
Wow. . .and we have our first shocking selection in the draft.  Most draft experts and analysts
had predicted a sure-fire Myers-Vorhees 1-2 selection.  Gothic kid?

GK
Frankly, GVP, I’m a little shocked myself.  Jason Vorhees seemed like an obvious choice for the number
two pick here.  A couple issues that the scouts saw with this selection: there are concerns about
Krueger’s work ethic, his reliance on sleeping medication to trap victims and the simple fact that his fashion
sense might be the worst of all the draft picks tonight.

GVP
All valid points, Gothic Kid.  Let’s check in live with Gail and see if she’s gotten any word on
this shocker from down on the draft-room floor.  Gail?

(The cameras give us a closeup of Gail in an interview chair passed out cold.  Sleeping with her head resting against a wall.  The cameras jump back to the announcer’s booth.)

GVP
Gail?  Gail are you– (GVP nods intently while holding a finger to his ear).  I’ve just been informed
that Gail has been drinking charcoal-filtered vodka straight from the bottle and chewing Oxycodone
like they’re Tic-Tacs.  She might be taking a little nap.

GK
Shouldn’t we try to wake her up?  Freddy massacres people by the dozens if they fall asleep.

GVP
As someone who once abused pain pills with JFK, believe you me, it’s a completely dreamless sleep.

(Gothic kid pulls his hoodie up over his head and pouts)

GVP
Oh, alright.
(Shouting)
GAIL!  GAIIILLLL!

(The cameras jump back to Gail and she’s dead; tongue lolling in an insane manner out of her mouth)

GK
We’re too late.  Oh, man. . .oh, man.

GVP
Whoops.  Looks like Gail finally got her big scoop.  Ummm. . .and the commissioner is back
with the third pick in the draft.  Let’s go back to Mr. Carpenter.

(Carpenter mounts the stage and moves up to the microphone)

Carpenter
And with the third pick in the NHA draft, the San Francisco Shower Scenes select. . .
Chi-Chi-Chi-Ahh-Ahh-Ahh.  Jason Vorhees, from Camp Crystal Lake, New Jersey!

GVP
And there you have it.  Vorhees is off the board.

GK
I’ve been doing some research in a conveniently dark and musty library by myself at
inordinately late hours and have a few facts about Jason Vorhees for the listeners.
1.  He doesn’t like it when people have sex at his lake–

GVP
If the tent is a rockin’ the slashers come-a-stalkin’. . .

GK
2.  Weapon of choice is a machete, but he’s an equal opportunity slaughterer–

GVP
A switch hitter, capable of going deep from either side of the plate. . .

(The repartee between the two announcers is interrupted as the cameras cut back to the stage where Vorhees has slowly climbed the steps.  His mother is at his side and she steps up to the microphone first)

Pamela Vorhees
Did you know a young boy drowned the year before those two others were killed?
Jason should’ve been watched.  Every minute.  He was… He wasn’t a very good swimmer.

GVP
Alright. . .

(Jason Steps up next to his mother and puts on his new San Francisco, custom-made hockey mask with his team logo and she gives him a huge hug)

GVP
(With his hand to his ear again)
Okay. . .Okay.  I’ve just been told that, since we knew Gail’s doom was imminent, we hired a backup
reporter.  A young, shockingly-attractive and unshockingly-troubled-in-the-man-department, reporter.
She has an expert on this up-and-coming star, Jason Vorhees.  We go live, now, to
Jessica Hasadarksecretshehopesneverresurfaces.  Jessica?

(Jessica is standing alongside an old, grizzled weirdo, who appears to be seated on an ancient, beaten down bicycle)

Jessica
Hello, Ghost of Vincent Price and Gothic Kid.  Glad to be here.  Rest in peace, Gail.  I’m here
with Crazy Ralph, longtime resident of Crystal Lake, Jason Vorhees’ hometown.  You must be very proud
of Crystal Lake’s hometown boy?

Crazy Ralph
I’m a messenger of God.  You’re doomed if you stay here.

Jessica
Oh, no. . .that reminds me of the time. . .

GK
And she’s clearly having a very dramatic, internal flashback here, GVP.

(the cameras zoom in tight on Jessica’s face and she’s tearfully oblivious; pensively looking deep into her past. . .into her very soul.  Crazy Ralph shakes her from her revery)

Crazy Ralph
You’re all doomed!

GK
(sighing mournfully)
He’s right, you know.

GVP
Ground-breaking stuff, there, Jessica.  It looks like the fourth pick is in.  Let’s take a listen.

(Carpenter strides purposefully out to the podium)

Carpenter
With the fourth overall pick in the NHA Draft the Pittsburgh Pre-Marital Sexers select: Ghostface,
from Woodsboro, California.

GVP
And the hits just keep on coming, don’t they, my guy-liner-wearing friend?

GK
Absolutely, GVP.  Absolutely.  There were some legitimate concerns with Ghostface that had many experts
shying away from him this early.  He’s known as one of the clumsier, less invincible slashers out there.
However, he does move faster than a lot of the other slashers in the draft.  His 4.9 40-yard dash time was a
staggering 10 seconds faster than Jason Vorhees and 22 seconds faster than the
slower-than-an-elderly-woman-with-a-walker Mike Myers.

GVP
Speed can erase a lot of those flaws.  We go now to Jessica once more, standing by.

(The cameras go to Jessica)

Jessica
Thanks, guys.  A lot of people here are buzzing about that last pickup by the Pre-Marital Sexers because–

(her phone rings)

Jessica
Excuse me, I’m going to get this really quick, guys.
(into the phone)
Hello?  Yes, this is she.  My what?  Oh, well if I had to pick one I really like Psycho.
Yeah, the Alfred Hitchcock one.

GK
Jessica!?!  Don’t answer the phone.  Can you hear me?

Jessica
(to the broadcasters)
I’m on the phone, here, Gothic Kid.  Manners much?  Besides this kind of reminds me
of once, long ago. . .

Jessica & GK
(in unison)
When I was a little girl.

Jessica
(back into her cellphone)
You do?  Alright.  Where should I meet you?  Terrific.  (she hangs up and looks at the camera)  I’ve
gotten an anonymous tip that seems really trustworthy.  I’m going to meet them in an empty
warehouse by a large body of water where a human body could easily be disposed of.  I’m so close to
uncovering the truth.
(she pulls out a flashlight)
The batteries on this are a little low. . .it kind of just keeps flickering.  Anyway, I’ll be right back.

GVP
Seriously?  Do we have any more reporters on staff here, Goth Kid?  Ooops. . .there she goes.
And just in time, it looks like Commissioner Carpenter is ready again.

(Carpenter strides to the podium once more)

Carpenter
With the fifth pick in the NHA draft, the Dallas Dream Within a Dream Sequences have
selected. . .Leatherface!

GVP
And Dallas takes the Big Southerner.  Your take, Gothic Kid?

GK
Not a huge surprise here, GVP.  We know that the people in Texas think that everything in that
godforsaken state is the best, and they show it here by swooping in on the #1 rated in-state prospect
and pulling him off the board early.  There’s gonna be a few disappointed teams who were hoping he’d slip a
little further down since he hasn’t had a hit movie in years.

GVP
Very true.  And, wow this is a surprise, it looks like the next pick is already in.  That sure was fast.

(Carpenter’s back at the podium)

Carpenter
With the 6th pick in the NHA Draft, the Utah Underage Binge Drinkers have selected, Chucky!

GVP
Wow!  And there’s another big shocker.  The second one of the day.  There was obvious concerns
about Chucky’s size.  Lest we forget, you can really just punt him if he gets too close.  Goth kid?

GK
Oh, this is so bad.  Such bad news.  Well, my friend, we know that Chucky doesn’t exactly stuff the
physical stat sheet the way some of his fellow draftees have, but the simple fact is this: he’s a proven winner.
He’s got a sequel percentage that’s nearly unrivaled among the killers today and he’s even had his own awkward,
kind of creepy sex scene.  That’s moxy for you.  He’s got all the intangibles.

GVP
Wait, are you talking about Chucky. . .or Tim Tebow?  Let’s go down live to our hard-working sideline
reporter, Jessica.  Jessica, what have you got for us?

(The camera cuts to Jessica.  She’s impaled on a stool next to Gail)

GVP
Oh for the love of. . .
(shouting off camera)
Do we have anyone else down there?  Oh, it doesn’t matter right now.  I’m told the commissioner is keeping
things humming right along.  We’ve got the next pick in already.  Let’s see what owner M. Night Shyamalan
decides to do with his first round pick.

(Carpenter steps up)

Carpenter
The Candyman.  Er, I mean, with the seventh overall pick in the 2011 NHA draft, the  Niagara Trips and
Falls Over Nothings select The Candyman, from Cabrini Green, Chicago, Illinois.  Sorry, I got a little ahead
of myself there.

GVP
Oh!  And in typical, M. Night Shyamalan fashion, the plot twist for the Niagara Falls Over Nothings
is revealed way too early.  Outstanding stuff, here, Gothic Kid.

GVP
We’re witnessing history here, GVP.  The Candyman is the Jackie Robinson of horror.
Not only did he shatter the color barrier, but he killed buxom white women and crackheads in the hood
as well.  Truly historic.

GVP
I’m being told we have yet another sideline reporter in the wings, waiting to interview the potential 8th pick in the draft,
Ben Willis, the star of I Know What You Did Last Summer.  I’m told Jamie Dirtygirlwhoconstantlybangseverythingthatmovesuntilshegetsmurderedwhileintheactofsex is standing by now.  Jamie?

(Jamie is standing next to a dark, shadowy figure wearing a rain slicker.  She’s putting on lipstick and only wearing a towel)

Jamie
Wow, GVP, your voice sounds totally hot.  I can’t wait to meet you and Goth Kid in person.  Anyway
I’m here with some guy, who might be really cute underneath that rain poncho.  I just can’t quite see.  I’ll
probably have to bend way over to get a look.

(Suddenly a red Ferrari comes screeching into the frame and slams into Ben Willis, sending his body flying into darkness.  The boy driving comes stumbling out holding a pony keg and drinking straight from the tap)

Jamie
Hey!  Check it out, guys, it’s my boyfriend.

GK
Uhhh. . .Jamie?  The interview with Mr. Willis?

(Jamie is making out with her boyfriend.  She turns to the camera)

Jamie
I don’t think he’s alive anymore.

Jamie’s Drunk, Idiot Boyfriend
Yeah.  Clearly dead, bro.  Now F-off.

Jamie
(leading away her drunk, idiot boyfriend)
Now. . .I could have sworn I saw a shower around here. . .maybe you can wear that sexy rain poncho
I bought you for Christmas, too.

GK
She lasted a shorter amount of time than even the other ones.  Damn.

GVP
And it looks like the Commissioner is ready to deliver the final pick of the first day of our draft
coverage.

(Carpenter steps to the mic)

Carpenter
With the eighth pick in the NHA draft, the Philadelphia Flickering Lights select Angela Baker, from
Sleepaway Camp.

GVP
And talk about ending on a high note!  The diminutive killer from multiple, and might I add terrible,
horror movies is the final selection taken in the first round.

GK
Oh, man. . .oh, man.  I just don’t think we should be here right now.

GVP
Oh, man is right.  Angela, who turns out to be a dude later on in her horror movie
plotline, technically fulfills half of the NHA’s title IX requirements, however, so that was a wise
pickup by team owner Jack Nicholson.

(theme music begins playing once again)

GVP
And that, my black-mo-hawked little friend is our cue.  It’s been an absolutely astounding first day to the
NHA draft.  We’ve had some ups, downs, murders, and gratuitous nudity.  In short, it’s been a hell of a time.
We’ll be back with more draft coverage tomorrow night.  For Gail Willalwaysbeundonebyherambitionanddisregardforhumanlife,
Jessica Hasadarksecretshehopesneverresurfaces, and
Jamie Dirtygirlwhoconstantlybangseverythingthatmovesuntilshegetsmurderedwhileintheactofsex.
And for my colleague, The Gothic Kid in High School Who Has a Morbid Curiosity With the Dead and Always Somehow Knows
ShitloadsAbout the Killer, let me just say thanks for tuning in.  I’m the Ghost of Vincent Price.  Goodnight.

FIN

(Re-Release) National Horror Association League Formation: Now With Pictures!

(*Author’s note: as it is nearing Halloween, the Huskers have yet another bye week and since the NFL will be closing sooner than any of us would like to think due to concussion-related woes, I decided that now would be the ideal time to found a new entertainment league.

As a horror movie aficionado, who is currently busy gorging myself on slasher films, thrillers, and terribly acted teen murder movies that grace the entire month of October, I decided that we should set up an imaginary league that will allow the general public, or the whack-jobs like myself who love the horror film genre, a way to debate and enjoy their favorite psychopaths and villains.  This first post will discuss the layout and division of the league and lay the foundation for when/where/and how the league will work.  The next post will chronicle the NHA draft.)

Location for the Draft:  If this event were to happen, it would have to go down in New York.  Even though, in the horror genre, there’s not a more disgusting, vile, easy-to-slash-people-in-broad-daylight-and-get-away-with-it kind of city.

(*Author’s note: seriously, New York is the villain in more than a few slasher flicks.  It’s ridiculous.  I’ve been there and I wasn’t stabbed a single time and the worst thing that happened to me was a dude trying to sell me a fake Rolex.  After I declined, he offered me weed directly in front of my parents.  I bought neither but found the city to be amazing and entirely devoid of serial killers and dead bodies on every corner.)

Since we have a location, the draft would also have to be televised.

I’m thinking the SyFy network would be the ideal candidate.  They continue defy all human logic by turning a profit and, despite their gratuitous lack of spelling ability, have the audience base that would be willing to turn off their X-Box 360s and put down their graphic novels to watch such a historic event.

The eight teams would need managers and home cities to represent in the National Horror Association.  Without further ado, ladies and gentleman of No Coast Bias, I give you the teams and managers of this new league.

---

The Minneapolis Maybe He’s Actually Dead This Times

(Owner: George A. Romero)

The zombie king loves himself some horror movies.  While the league doesn’t cater specifically to the undead hordes that Romero tends to love the most, he would be an ideal owner due to the fact that the zombie industry is currently responsible for half of our national GDP.  Seriously.  The Government may be shut down but if they could just work out some kind of profit sharing with The Walking Dead (*Author’s note: and its 16 Million viewers that watched the season debut on Monday) we’d be home free.

---

The Philadelphia Flickering Lights

(Owner: Jack Nicholson)

Jack Nicholson has starred in more horror movies than he’d like to admit.  Some were okay (see: Wolf), some were great (see: The Shining) and some were dirt (see: The Witches of Eastwick and any other movie that stars Cher, really).  However, one thing is clear: Jack has a lot of free time and there are only so many 18-year-olds and only so many you nights you can spend free-basing a Viagra buffet before you just need to find something else to do.  Here’s Jack’s chance.  He’s a horror movie icon and you can just imagine the highly dramatic rants he could use when chastising the media.  In fact, here’s what he’d look like telling reporters to come after him, because he’s a man and he’s 40.  Or 75.

---

The Niagara Trips and Falls Over Nothings

(Owner: M. Night Shyamalan)

Shyamalan, once a promising rookie on the horror movie scene, hit a sophomore slump that’s lasted all the way to graduate school.  He had a legitimately creepy, smash hit in The Sixth Sense and followed that up with the utterly horrifying Stuart Little (*Author’s note: has there ever been a stranger 1-2 punch than a horror phenom cranking out The Sixth Sense followed up immediately by a kids movie about a family dumb enough to adopt a mouse?  Let me repeat: THEY ADOPTED A MOUSE!)  He then peaked with Signs, which was one of the creepier Alien movies of the early 2000s, and wrote half of a really scary movie called The Village.

After the midway point in The Village, Shyamalan’s career took a downward turn.  He started believing the hype surrounding his mini-empire in the making and cranked out a series of craptastic movies, including one where plants try to kill “The New Girl” and her husband, Marky Mark.  He is the horror equivalent of Shawn Kemp: a staggering amount of potential and a great beginning of his career that crashes to a brutal, overweight (or in this case over budget) end.  So, M. Night’s final tally?  2.5 scary movies, millions in the bank from his early successes and now he’s making a comeback by owning a team.  He needs this more than anyone.

---

Pittsburgh Pre-Marital Sexers

(Owner: Jamie Lee Curtis)

Jamie Lee Curtis was once labeled a “Scream Queen” by people who can apparently appoint you as such.  She had an epic run of horror movie madness starting with her starring role in the ultimate slasher film (*Author’s note: I’ll debate you on this if you challenge me) Halloween.  She followed that up two years later with The Fog, Prom Night, and Terror Train in 1980 and then brought it home with Road Games, Halloween II, and a made-for-T.V. joint called Death of a Centerfold: The Dorothy Stratten Story.  That’s the horror equivalent of the early 2000s Lakers teams.  She also starred in a cinematic gem called Freaky Friday which, despite it’s title, wasn’t designed to be a horror movie.  We’ll give her bonus points for working with Lindsay Lohan, who at that time was almost certainly psychotically addicted to blow and was challenging Macauly Culkin for the “too much, too soon” all-time championship.  So good a stretch did Curtis have in her heyday, that we can even forgive her for now pitching products to help old people poop more often.  Welcome to the league.

---

The Portland Prank Calls From the Killer

(Owner: Wes Craven)

Craven is horror movie royalty.  The creator of not one but two horror super-franchises, having created both the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise and the Scream movies, and having written and directed countless other horror movies, he makes perfect sense to man this franchise.

---

The Dallas Dream Within a Dream Sequences

(Owner: Stephen King)

He’s a bajillion-kajillion-quintillionaire.  As the esteemed pop culture critics, the Ying Yang twins, would say: he’s got fifty-leven billion dollars.  He’s the best horror story writer since Edgar Allan Poe and countless novels and short stories of his have been turned into movies that range anywhere from terrible to awesome.  Are most of his books and stories far, far better than his TV and/or major motion pictures?  Certainly.  Should that stop one of the biggest names in the genre from owning a franchise in the NHA?  Hell no.

---

The Utah Underage Binge Drinkers

(Owner: Tobe Hooper)

 

 

 

Bear with me here, the seven of you that have continued to read this far down.  I wasn’t entirely sure who Tobe Hooper was either until I started IMDBing the hell out of this idea.  Suddenly his name was everywhere.  He hasn’t even bothered to try anything but horror movies.  Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Salem’s Lot, Poltergeist.  All classic horror flicks.  All directed by Hooper.  He was also behind movies with amazing titles, if not plotlines, like Eaten Alive, The Mangler, and my favorite: Spontaneous Combustion.  His pedigree and dedication to the genre make him an obvious choice for owner.

 

---

The San Francisco Shower Scenes

(Owner: Zombie Al Davis)

Bear with me here.  Because Davis only recently kicked the bucket but — and I’m sure that George A. Romero was delighted by this amazingly convenient plot twist — as it turns out. . .he’s not actually dead.  He’s the undead.  That’s right.  Al Davis, long believed to be a corpse that is somehow shambling around in the delectable combination of Pampers, sweatsuits and gold chains, has decided that, since the Raiders are almost look like they’re onto something with Terrelle Pryor, he needs to find another team to run directly into the ground.  Zombie Al Davis had this to say about getting his new team, “Arrrggghhh. . .ungggh. . .annnnnggggghhhh.”

---

League Commissioner: John Carpenter

When choosing a commish for this league, I wasn’t sure exactly which way to go.  While “The Ghost of Steve Jobs” and “Alfred Hitchcock the 4th” were all high in the running I couldn’t shy away from the master of all horror.  I also looked into the man who wrote the original Friday the 13th but found out, much to my very real, very-un-Hollywood-scripted terror that he spent most of his time writing for All My Children.  Yes, that All My Children.  (*Author’s note: I must admit, in the realm of genuine shock, the stupor level when I saw that was near a 12.9)

Finally I settled on The Man.  The guy who has the single greatest horror movie, and horror movie franchise to his name: Halloween.  Without him, who knows where Jamie Lee Curtis’ career would be.  Activia certainly wouldn’t be aiding and abetting seniors in their deuce droppage with nearly as great an effect, that much is for certain.

Carpenter fits the mold.  He’s a five-tool horror player: writing, directing, producing, editing, and composing his own music.  He has the resume (See: The Thing, Halloween II) the staying power, and once cast Ice Cube as a convict that must fight alien zombies to save a mining town in Mars and also cast Rowdy Roddy Piper in They Live (*Author’s note: this cult classic features one of my favorite lines in movie history, “I came here to chew bubblegum and kick ass. . .and I’m all out of bubblegum” and the single greatest fistfight in all of moviedom)  Don’t believe he should be the commish?  Check this out:

I know it’s not directly horror related, but THAT is commissioner worthy.

So the basis for the league is now set.  We have our two divisions:

The Legends

–  Niagara (regional team, in Buffalo Metropolitan area)
–  Minneapolis
–  Pittsburgh
–  Philly

The Bleeders

–  San Francisco
–  Utah
–  Portland
–  Dallas

So with the divisions set, the commissioner in place and the deep-pocketed, occasionally dead owners in place the league is ready to go.

Up next. . .the NHA Draft.

To be continued. . .

Crunktober: 6 More Reasons October is the Best Month Ever

Do you feel that, the reader?  That subtle, unclenching of summer’s white-knuckled fist?  That loosening of the hangman’s knot of heat that’s been anaconda-ing around our sweaty throats for months now?  That’s the feel of fall creeping back into our lives.  That’s the feeling of the best month out of the 12 starting last Tuesday and the glorious, delectable weeks to follow.

In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a bit of an October aficionado.

I think that it’s the Michael Jordan of months, playing on the Dream Team of seasons (*Author’s note: the fall) and that it is seated firmly atop the throne for greatest single month of all time.  Don’t believe me?

Ladies and gentlemen of the Burnpoetry jury, may I present to you Exhibit A in the case of Crunktober V. Everyothermonth.

The October Diet

What exactly are we talking about here?  Hot apple cider.  Pumpkin Spiced everythings.  I’m talking candy on top of candy mixed in with horror-movie-clutching popcorn.  I’m talking so many candied, porking-you-up goodies that even the flesh-eating hordes of zombies from 28 Days Later will say, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, man.  Ease up on the mini-Snickers, will ya?  I’m not trying to get diabetes, here.”

The food in October is the best.  Soups and chilis are starting to make a comeback.  Tailgate food is Rodney King-ing your arteries in the best possible way.  Hot cocoa is exhumed from the shallow grave of August and begins hitting your tastebuds once more.  In short, if your menu for the entire month doesn’t look something like this:

then I really don’t think we’re probably going to be friends.

Moving on to exhibit B. . .

Football is on a Minimum of 5 nights a Week

And, as the recession-proofed self-sustaining economic juggernaut that is football in America has continued to boom with weeknight games, they’ve morphed from atrocious games to pretty good matchups.  Sure, sometimes you’ll get “stuck” watching The Cal Poly Technical Institute of Santa Barabara at San Bernadino V.S. the Montana Culinary Institute of Bozeman.  But you know you’ll watch just a little bit of it.  It’s at least worth a drive-by watching on your way to the 4th scary movie of the day, isn’t it?

And, even though my wife is probably mentally signing the divorce papers right now, it’s the perfect time to plop down on the couch, pile underneath some blankets and watch and watch and watch and watch.

Before we hit up exhibit C, here’s a quick example of what my DVR/TV Guide looks like in the greatest month ever:

Fall Fashion?  Fall Fashion.

I needed to repeat it to myself to make sure I was actually typing a heading called “fall fashion.”  But, can’t we all be honest with ourselves: sweat pants and hoodies are the best.  Not only do they make us look like we’re in Eminem’s posse for a 2006 music video shoot, they’re also comfortable.  As.  Shit.

Here’s a glimpse at what everyone feels like when they’re rocking a gigantic, comfortable sweatshirt:

And if that doesn’t make you feel like bumping some G-Unit then I don’t know what will.

We may have even tried to pull them out of the closet at some ill-advised point this summer, whether it be for a camping trip or when the weather took a precipitous turn towards not-hotter-than-hell, but it proved to be too soon.  Not anymore.  It’s time to toss on some warm clothes, pimp-walk out to your nearest pile of leaves and dive in.

In honor of the rap-theme in this reason, we’ll call the next piece of evidence Xzibit D. . .

All Horror Movie Everything

I’m an admitted horror movie junkie.  On any give night you can find me thumping my digital forearm, looking for the perfect vein to inject another fix of pre-marital-sexers-getting-iced and boozed teenagers getting hacked to pieces.  I am continually thrilled by sobbing people who can’t ever seem to find their footing in the dark woods and inevitably crash and burn while looking over their heaving shoulders.

October gets me.  October doesn’t judge me for creating things like this:

and October understands that this insane enjoyment of murderous mayhem isn’t an unnatural thing.  It understands that I don’t, in fact, needed padded walls and intense psycho-therapy for 4 hours a day, what I really need is Halloween 4 followed up by Halloween 5 followed up by Halloween 4 again.  October understands that creepy movies are the best movies and that vice-gripped handholding is best when it’s done under blankets as a chill breeze seeps through the windows and darkness falls a little earlier than you’d like it to.  Embrace the creepiness.  Over-indulge in horror and let yourself get a little creeped out.  October would be proud.

Exhibit E coming at you next. . .

The Leaves Change Colors. . .And I Promptly Lose My Shit Over the Beauty of Nature

I’m prone to nature-related sentimentality in all forms.  I enjoy a good full moon over freshly fallen snow.  I appreciate a great view of the summer stars out in the country.  But in no way do these other natural occurrences prepare me for how ludicrously hyped up I get for the leaves to change colors on the trees.  In October, we suddenly go from uniform, boring green leaves, to an explosion of nature-concocted Molotov-cocktail-kissed beauty.

Before you accuse me of being a total sap (*Author’s note: I am) and before you start asking me to pack up my emo-praise for the all-encompassing beauty of nature, just think about it.  Do you like fireworks?  Who doesn’t right?  So what if you could take fireworks, stop them in mid-explosion, stick that mofo into the ground in your yard and then look at them for an entire month.  If that doesn’t sound cool to you, then just move to the Saharan desert you slash-and-burn-the-rainforest, paradise-paving-for-John-Mayer’s-parking-lot jerk.  October doesn’t need you.  You can have August all to yourself.  Go wait there.  We’ll be back in 10 months.

And, finally, there’s Exhibit F. . .

HALLOWEEN!

This holiday, which is definitely in the top 3 of American Holidays gives everyone what they want.  Are you a girl that has always wanted to let our her inner floozy?  Pow.  Halloween has got your back.  You can wear Saran wrap for all Halloween cares.  You wanna put fake blood stains on an old work shirt and claim that you’ve finally gotten your revenge on Stan, the IT guy from 3 cubicles over?  Halloween will laugh at that like it’s the funniest joke ever (*Author’s note: not a reason to check into getting a frontal cortex lobotomy.).  You want to just sit back and perv-out on girls wearing Saran wrap or watch as normally sane people attempt to dress up like Snookie-if-she-was-an-undead-zombie?  Halloween is cool with that, too.  End by extension, so is October.

In conclusion: October is crunktober.  I now rest my case.

FIN

“Dazed and Confused” Was Released 20 Years Ago Yesterday: A Lot Has Happened Since Then

One of my all-time favorite movies, Dazed and Confused, was released on this date 20 years ago.  It had memorable characters, infinite quotability, a flawless soundtrack and — essentially — no plot to speak of.  The plot part never truly bothered me.  It was a fascinating window into a time period that had happened long before my time, in an era that seemed like it had to have occurred on another planet or plane of existence.

That was part of what made the movie so special.  The brazen drug use.  The social upheaval.  To a guy born in 1986, it all seems to rely a little too heavily on the watcher’s suspension of disbelief.  But that’s the way things were back then, to some extent, and that’s the way they’ll remain forever in my mind, due in large part to Dazed and Confused.

There have been rumors of a potential “spiritual sequel” to Dazed and Confused that has already been written by writer/director Richard Linklater and even a guest appearance by Matthew McConaughey’s wildly popular character, David Wooderson, in a recent music video shoot.

With all this heavy Dazed nostalgia fluttering around these days, and with the 20th anniversary finally landing in our laps, I thought now would be a good time to do a little recap of what has happened to some of our favorite characters from the movie.  And, no, I’m not talking about the actual actors, man of whom have gone on to have phenomenal careers.  And I’m not talking about doing your generic, done-to-death-then-done-again “where are they now” pieces about the group that made this movie.

I’m talking about the characters.  What would have happened to these high schoolers had they grown up?  Let’s find out.

Randall “Pink” Floyd

After being suspended for the first half of the first game by the team for conduct unbecoming a starting quarterback, Floyd came back his senior year to lead the Lee High football team to an appearance in the state title game.  However, after getting into a shouting match over the Vietnam war with his knee-high-socked football coach, Floyd was benched and the team promptly lost the game by 35 points.  In spite of this highly volatile breakdown on the sidelines, Floyd is given a check for $2,000 to accept a scholarship at Southern Methodist University where he becomes one of the highest paid benchwarmers in college football history.

After failing his 86th drug test, Floyd was summarily booted from the team.  Capitalizing on his recreational drug use, and his incredibly cool nickname, he scored a job working as a roady for Whitesnake.  Parlaying his success as a roady, and his natural ability as a rebellious, naturally gifted leader, he eventually became the band’s manager.

However after differences arose between the band and Floyd, he was booted as the band’s manager, prompting him to famously tell them, “Here I go again, on my own.  Walking down the only road I’ve ever known.”  The band would later cite Floyd’s wisdom and animalistic charisma to inspiring their greatest hit song as well as their best one-liners with groupies in the late ’80s.

Now 55, and the father of three hipsters, Randall “Pink” Floyd is the co-vice-chairman of Metal Edge Magazine, a small but successful publication that caters to current metal heads in a niche market that he helped to create.  He still has a belt buckle that doubles as a weed pipe tucked away somewhere deep in his closet, hidden underneath purple and white button-ups and white bell bottom pants that he hasn’t been able to let go of.

Fred O’Bannion

After finally graduating in the summer of 1978 Fred O’Bannion retired as the single-day and career ass-paddling record holder of Lee High.  His paddle was bronzed and affixed to the top shelf in the school’s trophy case where it still resides to this day, stashed behind an honorable mention Dance Team plaque and three trophies for the forensics team.

Even though this may seem like a complete impossibility, O’Bannion’s life after he graduated went downhill very swiftly.  Suffering from a debilitating phobia of paint, due to a reverse-prank pulled on him by a group of soon-to-be-freshmen in the summer of ’76, he was unable to find steady work in the town and resorted to boosting cars and selling them to a local chop shop.

In the fall of 1984 Fred O’Bannion was pulled over in a gun-metal grey, stolen Dodge Charger.  The resultant car chase — one that involved 15 officers, a firefight, a pyrotechnic-laden bridge-jump, and the national guard — led to the creation of the game Grand Theft Auto.

O’Bannion was due for parole in 1992, but he opted to stay in prison due to the lack of wet paint and since he had achieved an almost cult-like status among inmates for his ability to pick on the newer inmates.  He was finally released in the summer of 2010, where he quickly traveled out to the west coast and began acting for a living.

He most recently made headlines when he was offered the role of Batman in the Batman V.S. Superman movie.  His appointment as the lead character led to the collapse of civilized life on earth and caused Twitter to collapse in on itself like a dying star of nerdiness.

Mitch Kramer

Burgeoning baseball star Mitch Kramer went on to graduate from Lee High in the Summer of 1980.  He was able to parlay his skills on the baseball diamond into a career playing for the minor league affiliates of the Houston Astros.  Wrapped up in the steroid culture of the mid 1980s, however, Kramer eventually got so juiced up on anabolics that he could no longer itch his own back, let alone go into a windup.  Cut from the Astros’ Double A team in 1987 he found himself dealing with gigantic rage and tiny testicles and looking for work.

He was able to find work as a hairstylists for the rich and powerful set in the suburban Houston area and made his mark throughout the late ’80s and early ’90s, eventually opening his own salon: Kramer’s Kurls.

However, when the late ’90s hit, he lost everything when he became embroiled in a particularly nasty lawsuit against the pop group Hanson, whom he attempted to sue for copyright infringement on “his look.”  He bottomed out financially during this time period and found solace, once again, in the game of baseball.  He moved back to Lee High School where he is currently an economics teacher and the head pitching coach for the varsity team.

Darla Marks

After graduating from Lee High School, Darla Marks went on to college at the University of Texas.  While there she joined up with the Alpha Chi Omega sisters to form one of the most hellacious hazing units that the nation has ever seen.  After being kicked out of school, and charged with hazing in a landmark Supreme Court Case, a disgraced Marks went to work at her father’s family business where she is now the Chief VP of Accounts Receivable.  To deal with her pent-up aggression she joined a roller derby team in 2002 and is now currently the oldest member of The San Antonio Sanguinarians club team where she moonlights under the name “Helen of (Des)Troy”.

Mike Newhouse, Cynthia Dunn, and Tony Olson

Graduating as numbers 1, 2, and 3 in their class, these three trailblazers are often recognized as being the Cro-Magnon man (*Author’s note: and woman) of the hipster evolutionary tree.  After crushing the rest of their drug-addled class in academics they ended up going on to create a small company known as Apple Computers, Inc.  However, they were so busy debating the merits of Friedrich Nietzsche’s poetry that Steve Jobs was able to successfully break into their garage and steal their research and computer technology.

While little is known about these three intrepid intellects, they were last spotted in India in 2003 working on a renewable energy breakthrough that would allegedly make fusion generators seem like AA batteries.

Ron Slater

Ron Slater eventually dropped out of high school midway through his senior year.  His rampant drug use had led him to believe that he could achieve a higher plane of existence by dropping three tabs of acid while humming Aerosmith music “in the language of the gods.”  So prolific was his drug use that he was once spotted getting high with Bob Marley and Mick Jagger on the same day.

During the ’80s Slater’s whereabouts were unknown for much of the time, only surfacing at an occasional Grateful Dead concert.

In 1992 Slater was reported to have opened his eyes fully for the first time since 1974, blinked twice, and then gotten his GED and become a drug education counselor.  He now runs his own wildly unsuccessful rehab clinic called “We Only Smoke Weed and Watch Movies Rehab Facility.”  A pioneer in helping stars that don’t want to help themselves, he’s worked closely with such A-listers as Lindsay Lohan (*Author’s note: and her entire family tree) and counts actor Charlie Sheen among his personal friends.

David Wooderson

After picking up his 3rd “soliciting a minor” ticket in the span of 14 months, Wooderson became one of the most infamous sex offenders in all of the county.  However, after realizing that despite high school girls staying the same age he was turning into an aging pervert, Wooderson turned his life around.

After getting out of prison, he started working out and joined an elite male strip show where he was able to put his pipes, his rougish good looks, and his love of getting freaky to good use.  He continued working in this field throughout the ’80s and early ’90s.  Blessed with a limitless supply of things that took him directly back to his heyday as one of the biggest ladykillers in 1976 — classic rock tunes about doing it and hordes of women prepared to make bad choices — he had found his niche in the world of male stripping.

Wooderson died of a cocaine/orgy overdose in August of 2008.  His funeral was attended by his high school friends, sobbing piles of housewives, and even former President George W. Bush.  Engraved on his tombstone was the solemn oath of a solemn man during a solemn time in our nation.  “Alright, alright, alright.”

RIP, Wooderson.  RIF-ingP

FIN