Rarely do we here in the editorial bunkers of Jose el Retardo beat a dead horse, but in the case of Stephen the Demon Dubner, we are making an exception. So today, we are mining the customer reviews of Amazon.com in search of people’s real feelings about this behemoth of American literature.

It’s no surprise to find that a lot of people aren’t at all interested in the blather contained betwixt the pages of Freakonomics (I refer to the crappy book, not the stupid site that I’m not even going to include a link to). Says cavywrangler of California:

This is the most over-hyped book I can remember reading…[it tries] to make some point that is beaten to death…snore.

Goosecat of Portland, OR, in his review titled Correlation doesn’t mean causation, reports:

I was expecting this book to be completely different. It has nothing to do with economics at all…many of these correlations could lead to dangerous misinterpretation…simply not all that interesting.

Theodore O’Neill of New York, NY laments:

If you wish to remain illiterate about statistics, but gain trivial information for your next cocktail party, go ahead and buy the book.

George Mitchell of Oakland, CA bemoans:

I’m baffled at how this book is a bestseller. I’m embarrassed my boss gave it to me.

M.L. Coffina of Brooklyn, NY cries aghast:

I find the inclusion of the NY Times Magazine quotes that begin each chapter with praise for the author to be both annoying and pretentious.

But the most enlightening review comes from a customer ironically named CoolerHeads, who, in the review entitled Hype-onomics, sputters incredulously:

this has got to be the most self-congratulatory book ever. It’s about a brilliant “noetic butterfly” (really, that’s the smooch the author gives the economist) who shocks the establlishment, and the brilliant journalist who gains his trust and respect, and then the brilliant journalist quotes his own brilliant articles about the brilliant economist and calls that a book. It’s a little insulting how we’re supposed to be blown away by these mavericks.

What is there to be learned by all of this? Nothing, really—except that books about economics can be dull, and, in the wrong hands (hint hint, DOUCHE DUBNER), devilishly dangerous.

PS, dear readers, do you like my portrait of this fool? Click it to enlarge and see all the watery/vinegary details. Do you have a drawing you’ve made of the Demon Stephen Dubner? Click here and send it in!

Today, dear readers, the entire staff here at Jose el Retardo have suffered a bitter slap to the face: after many months of faithful attention to the blog Freakonomics.com, I have been told by one of the authors of the site to DROP DEAD.

It begins simply. Morning. Travel. Coffee. A day unusually unfettered with the many trivial bondages (sexy word alert) that usually exert themselves upon me in the early hours of the day. My feet propped on my desk nonchalantly, I breathe in the rich aroma of my French Roast—just a touch of skim added, which is something new for this man of black coffee—and I contemplate my life through a lens less tainted from the haze of frantic cacophony. Maybe I’ll get things right this time, I tell myself. Today feels like the kind of day that a man can turn to his favor; can take the spare moment to find the bit of enrichment that tips the scale, finally. Yes. Why not me?

So I pop open my internet browser, and I check the ole’ Google Reader, just to see if any of my regular iHaunts (I am coining a phrase as we speak, people) have anything new to spout. As usual, there are about 50 new posts on Freakonomics, so I begin to sift through it all, looking for anything interesting. Finding nothing truly fantastic, I settled for the mildly appealing. I read. I was not moved, per se, but I was engaged, and so decided to leave some comments behind. I often participate in the comment side of the blog world when I have the time, because hey, that’s one of the perks that make it more interesting than standard print—not to mention that I like to speak my opinion regardless of whether or not anyone is actually listening to what I have to say. I guess the fact that I slave my days away in a cubicle at the offices of Jose el Retardo is proof enough of that.

Great. I learn a few things, I speak my mind a touch, and now time to work. My comments haven’t appeared on the Freakonomics site yet, but I’m sure it will only take time. I know that the guys over there must have a rod shoved pretty fucking far up their tight, over-educated ASSES, because they reserve the right to approve EVERY GODDAMNED COMMENT that passes through their precious opinion page. Whatever, it’s their prerogative, they can do what they want to do, cause what they’re doing, they do for you. Sing.

HOWEVER, soon enough I receive in my inbox an email from none other than the so very important and so deeply intellectual Stephen J. Dubner, co-author of Freakonomics. Hey, wow, I think. Maybe he saw my url in my comments and wants to congratulate me on my hard work, and to let me know that if I just hang in there, I’m gonna break through, that I’ll see the dollars and cents eventually because my kind of writing is BOUND to find an audience. Maybe he’ll even get some of his own friends to see and love my site! Maybe this is the breakthrough I needed! Holy shit.

I tremble slightly as I open the email.

Stephen J. Dubner has written to me:

why are you spamming freakonomics.com? i sure would like it if you stopped

Huh. Even though I am alone at my desk, I feel slightly awkward, as if I just insulted half the table at a dinner party but I’m not sure what it was I said to cause the hurt. And then, as I usually do, I become immediately indignant. What the fuck? What did I do wrong? Nothing! Well, hell. I don’t have to take that from him. I write back:

I was simply reading your site and leaving comments. I don’t usually have the time in the morning to leave the comments, but today I did. I have enjoyed your blog in the past, sent my own readers your way when something really caught my eye, and have a subscription to your feed. I’m not sure how any of this amounts to spamming, but rest assured, it will all cease today.

I waited for his reply, knowing that this alone would surely cause him to apologize and approve my comments and let us all get on with being humans on this god-forsaken earth.

And reply Stephen J. Dubner, friend to the literate, does:

if i am mistaken, forgive me. but if you don’t know the difference between a comment and spam, then it’s on you. but, back to no. 1, if i am mistaken, forgive me.

best, sjd

Oh dear Lord. No. Come ON. Are you KIDDING me, dude?!? Is that the best you can come up with? Dear reader, I implore you, have you ever heard such a back-handed apology in your life? Basically, the guy said this: “Hey, sorry about that—unless I’m right, which I am, so fuck you, you fucking dickweed. Otherwise, sorry, and fuck off”.

I mean, who IS this rat bastard Stephen J. Dubner from Freakonmics anyway? He writes a couple of books that I am willing to bet a thousand of my hard-earned dollars that less than one-sixteenth of you have read, writes some articles here and there, has a blog—and like, really, who DOESN’T have a fucking blog these days—and he’s so good he can just shit on a regular reader like this? Well, so freaking SORRY, Lord Stephen. Forgive me for wasting your precious time. I responded:

The only thing I can think of is that I used my url as my signature (a very common practice, as I’m sure you know), which, in all actuality, makes me far more answerable for my comments than the people who simply sign off with an anonymous handle. It allowed you to reach me and question my actions, no? Aside from this far-from-abnormal behavior, I cannot see how my four comments to your site were any more or less useless than any of the countless others.

The blogging community depends on us reading each other’s work. If you feel you are above this ethic, then maybe you should stick to “straight” journalism and leave the blogging to those of us who have an interest in each other.

As of this moment I’ve heard nothing back, but either way I’m done reading Freakonomics.com. The rest of you can return, if you feel like shitting on me even more than Lord Stephen the Demon has already done. Whatever. Fuck you, Stephen J. Dubner, the consummate douche.

For some time now, I have suspected human beings of making far too big of deal of their position on this planet, and of placing far too much stock in their own abilities. There’s no doubt we can kill things better than any other animal, and this, more than anything else, explains our huge numbers on the earth (although ants far outnumber humans). But just how intellectually or emotionally superior are we?

Along these lines, today I noticed another interesting blog entry from the good people at Freakonomics describing the mosquitofish’s ability to count—almost as well as some humans. You can read the post by clicking here. Not surprisingly, there have been previous studies that show how monkeys can perform math, but seeing a study demonstrating such ability in stupid fish is downright hysterical. What I like about this is that, in my mind anyway, it kind of deflates the whole notion that many people have about human intelligence and how beautifully unique it is.

Math is such a sacred field. For much of history, men in funny jackets have pointed to math and said, “See?” And we have said, “Oooooo…” And then we head off for home, slip off our shoes, pour a brandy, and watch Wheel of Fortune. But why do we hold math in such esteem? A fucking FISH can do it. Sure, it’s important to learn, and everyone should at least know the basics before being allowed to perform even the most menial labor, but does it really make us special? Yes, we delve into it much more deeply than a monkey can be bothered to do, but then again, it isn’t the monkeys who are in danger of blowing up the fucking world on a daily basis. Here is a great example of what we do with math:

In another article from the New York Times website, I read about a monkey’s ability to become wrapped up in rationalizations. Before discovering this article, if a person would have asked me what, in my opinion, defined the human mind, I would have said it was the ability to lie to oneself about nearly everything that goes on around them, and how this makes our existence on this miserable rock tolerable. But shit jack, even the monkeys are creeping up on the ability to ruin one’s own life. Wasn’t THAT what made us human?

I think in the long run, we’re going to find out that many of the things we thought were distinctive to humans—emotional and intellectual—are actually shared to some extent by nearly every other being in the universe—including the ability to fuck everything up.

Earlier in the year we here at Jose el Retardo expressed our sincere disappointment in the United States military for not having the foresight to make real laser beams with scary colors and crazy “pew pew” sounds that would make a person shit their pants before being completely evaporated in a puff of fine, red mist (click here to check out this fine piece of blogtation). We stand by this concern; I feel it’s legitimate, and would like to add another point to this already lucid op-ed piece by saying that one of the best ways for any government agency to gain public support is to wow the ever-loving shit out of us with big, shiny, dangerous devices that do crazy-ass things in crazy-ass ways. Let me stress that simply making bigger, louder explosions that blow the limbs off of innocent children is NOT a means to this end, but simply distasteful, and makes us all very, very angry.

There is a point to all of this blathering, faithful reader. I am delirious with pride to announce that the military has heard the insistent call of Jose el Retardo; they have seen the unremitting desire for civic pride that rang so true in your succinct and astute comments. Because of our united cries for technical satisfaction, finally, the armed services have decided to wow us. Behold the weird insect/dog/deer creepy thing:

Is that fucking CRAZY, or what? The beauty of this is that it works on two levels: firstly, if you cover a ginormous version of this mechanical monster with funky hair and spikes and other assorted scary shit and mount a big ass, acid goo gun on the top and send it over the hill and through the smoke…friend, our enemies will literally shit their fucking pants. Add to the mix a big, glowing set of red, blinking, sensor thingies and evil, ragged pinchers, and there’s probably a fairly decent chance that a shot need never be fired.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, make a small version, cover it in friendly, smooth plastic and give it huge, pouting eyes, and you have a fantastic, all-around house helper. I could totally see myself snagging a beer from an Igloo brand cooler mounted on the back of such a cute, rugged item. Envision a whole new industry created from the possible attachments: vacuum cleaners, bed makers, dog walkers, child playmates, home entertainment systems of infinite varieties, pest control (I would love a mouse-shooting laser beam—how cool would THAT be?), general cleaning, gardening and weed pulling, laundry folding, cat training, Frisbee fetching…the list goes on and on, people. Endless possibilities bring bottomless joy. Can you feel the satisfaction as you send your killer bugbot out to dispatch a feckless burglar?

This is our moment of triumph. Revel in it, but not for too long. It is only with constant diligence that we can win that battle against the lethargic leanings of bureaucratic behemoths.

I have been perusing a crazy blog lately that most of you have probably seen and spent a large amount of time reading (http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com), and through it I stumbled upon an article from the New York Times website about young, affluent urbanites going out to farms and getting elbow deep in pig shit in order to show the rest of us how we might make a better world. Here is the link to the Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/16/fashion/16farmer.html?scp=1&sq=Trucker+Hat&st=nyt

I suppose I should give credit to people who put their money where their mouths are and do the dirty work they always felt was so noble—but I just can’t seem to rise above. When I hear about Williamsburg hipsters, who were raised on the east side of Manhattan, heading upstate to start their own organic produce farms, it makes my eye twitch. Have they any idea how badly the kids who were raised on small, struggling farms throughout the country want to get out? I know, I know, it’s their prerogative to choose such a difficult life, and their reasons for doing so are none of my business—but every single one of these crunchy ass-breaths in this article struck out to raise “organic” produce and livestock, which they will in turn sell back to the wealthy people in the urban centers they just left behind. Lower income households certainly can’t afford the kinds of prices necessary for the ex-cool kids to live in adequate quarters while “living off the land”—and here is where the whole idea of nobility starts to fall apart.

These people have the skills that so many others desire in order to live a more promising life. But they would rather move to the sticks and take jobs away from others that lack the ability or the means to find better. It is all enough to drive me freaking bugshit, and then I read a quote like this, and my blood boils in my veins:

The Billyburg scene has changed, said Annaliese Griffin, who contributes to a blog called Grocery Guy. “Having a cool cheese in your fridge has taken the place of knowing what the cool band is, or even of playing in that band,” she said. “Our rock stars are ricotta makers.”

Holy crap. Well, Annaliese, let me guarantee you this: somewhere out there a poor farmer’s son could care less about fucking goat cheese and would so love to go see a rock star one day. Can he have your old record collection, Annaliese? You PIG.

Soon enough all these new hippies will get tired of getting up at 5 AM every day, working their asses off until they feel like dropping in their well-heeled tracks, and then they will head back to the city to start up research firms, just like the old hippies did.

The last week or so has shown everyone here at the home office of Jose el Retardo just how enjoyable it can be to shit on the things people love the most—and if it feels good, do it, right? Yesterday we kicked the Beatles around a little; today, it will be the monolithic champion of the literal world; mention his name in certain circles and watch as grown men swoon like school girls: Billy Shakespeare. Here is how most English Lit/Theatre/Art History majors feel about Billy:

In all reality, “The Bard” (I felt gross just typing that) had diarrhea of the pen, and his comedies are simply not funny. In fact, the best thing to happen to Shakespeare in the last four hundred years or so is the Hollywood screenplay. Any dialogue-driven vehicle for storytelling that runs over four hundred freaking pages needs a cold-hearted bastard of a producer to cut shit out, yo. I mean, come on. I’m not crazy, right? Am I crazy? What in the fuck do you elbow-patch wearing, pipe-smoking (all cuddled up in your fisherman’s sweater with your goddamned moccasins on) mother fuckers want from me? And oh, I can hear you now, bemoaning wretchedly the loss of the author’s original intent, the integrity of the voice of history lost to the crass hands of modern man’s impatience. Crap on that. Crap ALL OVER that. The guy was long-winded and needed a good editor. End of story. Here, read this excerpt from Richard III, act 1, scene 2, and tell me why in the world it couldn’t have been said more concisely (seriously, leave it in the comments; rid me of my ignorance, genius):

LADY ANNE

Foul devil, for God’s sake, hence, and trouble us not;
For thou hast made the happy earth thy hell,
Fill’d it with cursing cries and deep exclaims.
If thou delight to view thy heinous deeds,
Behold this pattern of thy butcheries.
O, gentlemen, see, see! dead Henry’s wounds
Open their congeal’d mouths and bleed afresh!
Blush, Blush, thou lump of foul deformity;
For ’tis thy presence that exhales this blood
From cold and empty veins, where no blood dwells;
Thy deed, inhuman and unnatural,
Provokes this deluge most unnatural.
O God, which this blood madest, revenge his death!
O earth, which this blood drink’st revenge his death!
Either heaven with lightning strike the murderer dead,
Or earth, gape open wide and eat him quick,
As thou dost swallow up this good king’s blood
Which his hell-govern’d arm hath butchered!

I think this chick is pissed because some guy killed her husband or something, but who can be sure? It’s so shrouded in “poetry” that a normal person has to sit in a damned classroom with twenty other people and discuss every freaking line for a half hour each in order to discern any meaning. And I can guarantee you this: fill twenty classrooms with twenty students and let them discuss the meaning of one soliloquy for twenty hours. You will end up with twenty different explanations. I promise you will. I swear it.

This being said, I do agree that, with vicious slashing, a Shakespeare drama can be entertaining and even gripping if placed in the right hands; I truly enjoyed Mel Gibson’s Hamlet (I think I just heard a scholarly head explode).

But none of the comedies are funny. None of them. Not one. And the only people who ever laugh at them are people who are afraid of what their academically militant friends will think if they DON’T laugh at this trite, vaudevillian nonsense. Every plot in Shakespeare’s desperate attempt to get people to like him (I bet back then everyone thought he was a HUGE kill-joy) seems to be the same: a girl dresses like a guy in order to achieve some goal women can’t normally attain as a female, falls in love with a guy who doesn’t know she’s a chick, and then some more corny shit happens until the end, when all the characters find out she’s a chick. It’s such a rip off of Just One of the Guys that it makes me shiver.

Here is an example of a “joke” from a Shakespeare play called The Comedy of Errors:

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Was there ever any man thus beaten out of season,
When in the why and the wherefore is neither rhyme
nor reason? Well, sir, I thank you.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Thank me, sir, for what?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Marry, sir, for this something that you gave me for nothing.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
I’ll make you amends next, to give you nothing for
something. But say, sir, is it dinner-time?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
No, sir; I think the meat wants that I have.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
In good time, sir; what’s that?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Basting.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Well, sir, then ’twill be dry.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
If it be, sir, I pray you, eat none of it.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Your reason?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Lest it make you choleric and purchase me another
dry basting.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Well, sir, learn to jest in good time: there’s a
time for all things.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
I durst have denied that, before you were so choleric.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
By what rule, sir?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Marry, sir, by a rule as plain as the plain bald
pate of father Time himself.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Let’s hear it.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
There’s no time for a man to recover his hair that
grows bald by nature.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
May he not do it by fine and recovery?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Yes, to pay a fine for a periwig and recover the
lost hair of another man.

Oh for the love of Christ. Forget it. I give up. I think there was supposed to be a whole slew of jokes in there, but who the fuck knows. It just goes on and on and on until you basically want to KILL SOMEBODY.

Yet the “really smart” and “droll” people of the Western World insist that he is the most brilliant writer of all time, ever. And they struggle like a tar-ridden lung to explain his greatness in words that are even more confusing than the Bard’s (shudder) own. Here is an actual quote from a hopeless asshole’s review of Richard III, pulled from Amazon.com:

Inextricably, although I by no means empathize with him even remotely, Richard somehow, despite his inordinately decadent reprobate ploys, coupled with his twisted soliloquies pleading to the audience his hopeless case, make him one entirely enigmatic, yet entirely captivating, antagonist that makes this play enticingly enjoyable — in a most devilish kind of way.

“O coward conscience, how dost thou afflict me!”

Jesus, dude. You can’t be serious.

Hype is defined by Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary as: to promote or publicize extravagantly. While there may not be a public relations blitz to keep Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band by the Beatles on top of the current music hot 100 type bullshit stuff, it still makes it to the top of influential music lists compiled by dorks everywhere. I would love for somebody to tell me why. To the best of my reckoning, there are two good songs on the entire album, which according to the calculations performed by the accounting offices here at Jose el Retardo would place the album at the bottom of the Beatles pile; although it did have way cool cover art, and logistically this could have affected many listeners. I have provided to my genial readers a track listing for Sgt. Peppers below, with my Own Personal Thoughts on each song (forever to be known as Jose’s OPT scale):

Side one

1. “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” – Sucks.

2. “With a Little Help from My Friends” – Blows.

3. “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” – Pretty good.

4. “Getting Better” – Barely not crap.

5. “Fixing a Hole” – Eh.

6. “She’s Leaving Home” – Please.

7. “Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!” – Pure nonsense.

Side two

1. “Within You Without You” – Oh come on. What is it even doing on this record?

2. “When I’m Sixty-Four” – Schmaltz. Kinda catchy, but pure crap.

3. “Lovely Rita” – What? I don’t get it.

4. “Good Morning Good Morning” – At least it’s short.

5. “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (reprise)” – What, again? Ugh. Kill me.

6. “A Day in the Life” – Fucking awesome. Truly.

And now, here are some Beatles albums that are at least 50 times better than the above mentioned waste of wax, in no particular order, except that the White Album is obviously the best, and anyone who disagrees has poop on their shoe:

1. The White Album

2. Abby Road

3. Magical Mystery Tour

4. Let It Be

5. Revolver

6. Rubber Soul

7. Help

8. The Early Beatles

And who knows. The rest are probably all better too, but I’ve never been a huge fan of the way early stuff. The true nail in the coffin, for me, is the awful movie Robert Stigwood made back in 1978, the premise of which is still a matter of hot debate in the circles of people that debate retarded things. The Beatles, having been long apart, never appeared in the movie, but history’s most bizarre cast of characters ever sure did: The Bee Gees, Steve Martin, Peter Frampton, George Burns, Arrowsmith, Leif Garrett, Wolfman Jack, and many other mismatched celebrities. It was universally panned. I don’t need to tell you about it, just watch this awful clip.

BTW, can anybody tell me why this old man is being allowed to walk off to destinations unknown with two young girls? Does this bother anyone besides me? Thank god that everything that lives must die, or else we’d be stuck with George Burns forever.

I am going to make a fairly large admission, one that could severely tarnish my credibility as a “man of rock” forever: Upon my first listen to Vampire Weekend, I didn’t vomit all over myself. The song I randomly decided to check out was A-Punk, and I ended up giving it three listens in a row. The opening riff, ska-infused rhythm, and lively melody cannot be easily dismissed, even by the hard-core realists found deep in the underground editorial bunkers here at Jose Headquarters. I then went on to give the tune Mansard Roof a shot, and though I was less impressed, it was still fairly passable (if not just a little too damn nice; it feels about as breezy as the yacht trip featured in the video). Oxford Comma is all very well and good if not particularly exciting. Here here. Nicely done, chaps (mild stifled yawn).

And so while the bile stays below the esophagus, never does my head spin, nor does my spine tingle. I am not transported. And so enough said about the nice but not great music by Vampire Weekend.

I have a different bone to pick with these Fine Upstanding Young Men—where in the HELL do they buy their clothes? I realize that many bands over the last decade or more have eschewed the look of rock and roll. The t-shirts and jeans of Weezer slowly came to replace the garish notions of Mötley Crüe, and began to define the look of even the most devoted music fans all over this fairly decent country, much like the more intriguing (yet too hippiesque) style of the Black Crowes used to do. This mild approach to apparel, for many, was a depressing left turn into Dullsville, taking one of the more outrageous and fun aspects of the culture surrounding rock music and dismissing it, much as the earlier detractors of the musical society had done in the days of the dirty hippies. But Vampire Weekend has taken this dismissal to a whole new and shitty level. The self-professed ivy-leaguers have brought the culture of uptight sweaters (knotted securely about their squared shoulders) and anxious khakis into a venue where it has no fucking business whatsoever, and we here at Jose el Retardo are standing up to say NO.

Come on, boys! You look completely ridiculous. I know what you THINK you are doing, but it isn’t having the effect you would like. You are attempting to say to America and all rock-loving nations of the world, “Hey man, take your notions of what a rock band is supposed to be and shove it up your bums. We don’t care what we’re supposed to look like, we’re gonna play our kind of music on our own terms until curfew. Then we shall retire to study Proust for a few more hours, enjoy a healthy snack, send our girlfriends an endearing text, and call it a night. And we don’t care what anyone has to say about it! ROOOCK ON!”

How pathetic. Believe it or not, Alice Cooper looks far more at ease and less self-aware in his clothes than Vampire Weekend look in theirs. Here is a man who knows where he belongs and has zero regrets for having chosen it.

Ironically, I find myself thinking of another recent band made up of the sons of privilege, and how they were somewhat responsible for bringing some of the carefree outrageousness back to rock dress: the Strokes. Now that I think about it, the sound of the Strokes is also far more immediate and arresting. Makes you wonder if there’s a connection, no?

I think the boys of Weekend need to make a decision. Are you going to embrace this culture you’ve chosen to flirt with but make no commitments to, or are you going to go forward with little girls making comments like this from bbmuffin1224 on your YouTube postings: omg thats so cute =]

A friend and co-worker by the name of Josh (who will probably get quite upset to see that I’ve listed him as a friend, but he can go straight to hell if he doesn’t like it) recently sent me the following video about a little, non-lethal heat beam being developed by the military to safely disperse unruly crowds, create new sex fetishes, and heat 7-11 breakfast sandwiches from 50 feet away (more below).

When the hell is the military going to get serious? Non-lethal? Who gives a good god-damn!? The last I heard, we have a perfectly good, non-lethal method for breaking up angry teenagers brazenly throwing bottles at pasty college history professors—it’s called a fire hose, my friends. We’ve been using them for many years to great effect.

Listen up, you lazy good-for-nothing punk-asses down at the Pentagon wasting my hard earned dimes on this petty bullshit, and get it straight: this is not what we hired you to do. We the people, in order form a more perfectly lean, mean, ass-kicking machine, would like for you to start—today if possible—developing a crazy-ass beam that will KILL people, please. Hell, I can burn people! I don’t need you for that! Give me a match and some lighter fluid in a squeeze bottle and I’ll be all over that shit, brother. How about a REAL laser beam (a visible beam if possible—the only way your gonna scare a mother-fucker is to let him see what you’re packing; make it all eerie and green-ish blue and have it make a ‘pew pew’ noise) that, upon contact with a human body or other structure or object, blows it right the fuck up? Or even better, disintegrates the bastard all together in a puff of red mist. No muss, no fuss, no clean-up. Fire it once on the unsuspecting masses, and I guarantee you that you will not have another crowd control issue ever again.

Come on, General. You cats are failing on all fronts. We simply don’t get anything good out of you anymore. I think the last time you impressed anybody was the tank—but that was like in 1911 and it was made by the Germans. Stealth bombers? Please. It’s an airplane, pure and simple. Where are the hover cars? Where’s the warp drives? Super-human strength suits? Anti-gravity paint?

Heat ray? Get serious. If you’d like to know what you should be concocting in your secret mountain laboratories, all you have to do is pop some freaking pop corn, huddle the kiddies around, and watch some Star Wars, my man. Do you see the big beams that drop dudes mid-sprint and destroy whole planets? That’s what we’re looking for. Land speeders. Floating cities. Robots. Where’s my protocol droid, General?! WHERE IS IT?!

Oh well. Maybe next time. Anyway, thanks for the big, dumb, rolling microwave, I guess. The next time I have the munchies, I’ll grab a Hot Pocket and start a riot.

The world sucks. You know it and I know it, and there’s no use denying it with any namby-pamby “check out the flowers” and “just wait for the sunrise” horseshit. Plenty of baby deer have bitten the bullet (literally) while gazing at a beautiful prairie sunset. They were then field dressed and eaten by fat people. From the very beginning of a human being’s existence—when some grotesque cosmic fool tosses a grimy set of dice down the board in order to decide when, how, and where you’ll start your reality—to the wretched end (you spend a lifetime accumulating some kind of record for yourself, a pocket full of memories, only to have them all slip away in life’s final, frail moments) the constant, grinding challenges set before the individual can wear a soul down to its very nub.

For the love of Christ, isn’t there anything on this god-forsaken rock that can make it all worth while—or, at the very least, slightly tolerable? Yes, of course there is. And that is what this post is all about: the first of many suggestions from your mentor and closest advisor, Jose. Together, they can be used as a guide to the small gratuities that light the dark corners of life.

CHICKEN IN A BISKIT
From Nabisco

Me and Chicken in a Biskit go WAAAAAY back, brother. I remember, as a young boy developing his taste buds in the breadbasket of America, the first time this delectable little crisp of artificial flavor passed my lips. A gathering of sorts was taking place at my home, and a parental unit, in preparation, had placed a wide assortment of salty/sweet snacks upon the kitchen table…and to a child, the array was breathtaking. I paced to-and-fro, up and down the entire length of the table several times, trying to process the overload of bliss: mints, bowls of dip, candied almonds, endless variations of potato chips, cold cuts, cheeses, and…wait a minute…what are these? Something unknown, yet alluring. A tempting, dimple-edged cracker, light and crispy looking, with miniscule granules of flavor you could SEE coating the entire flatbread from end to end—and a scent…indefinable but palpable…mouth watering. The effect was powerful.

Did I dare try one even before the first guest had arrived? Hadn’t I been told REPEATEDLY not to touch the table until the party started? Surely I had never given a damn for the random commands barked at me by the powers that be in the past, so why start now? What could they do to me, right? Oh lord, that cracker looked GOOD.

Using the back of my hand, I wiped my mouth nervously and looked around, checking all angles and shadows for any sign of prying eyes, or, in the case of my sister, flapping jaws (this is, of course, complete conjecture on my part—I don’t actually remember wiping my mouth or looking around).

I snatched it from the bowl and popped it quickly into my mouth. Wow. It was truly a taste explosion. Salty yet somehow smooth, and so crispy it seemed nearly frozen. Several more followed the first, each one more savory than the last. Getting braver by the second, I grabbed a can of easy cheese (cheddar, and yes, I DO remember that) and sprayed the SHIT out of one of those fucking biskits. Chew, chew, chew, gulp. OH MY GOD. Dear Jesus, come and save me. The room began to swim and spin and I nearly fell backwards.

By the time it was over, I felt giddy and dirty all at once. But I knew I wasn’t done with Chicken in a Biskit. Not by a long shot.

And so the years passed, and so many things have happened to your guide Jose that there was barely any room in his life for Chicken in a Biskit. But recently we danced again, this snack cracker and I, and I was delighted to find we still make such a happy pair—which I suppose is fairly a common occurrence in the romances we share with our favorite snack foods…and still…and still…

Is there any real chicken in them? Well, you know, a little. Do they taste like chicken? Come on, does CHICKEN taste like chicken? Isn’t that the weird and wonderful thing about chicken? That it doesn’t seem to have a specific taste?

Anyway, that’s it. Chicken in a Biskit makes this shitty world a little better. Try them. For a different opinion, check out what this asshole has to say.