Thanks for Nothing Ti85

Still have no idea what this thing does.

Math has never exactly been my strong suit. I have to descreetly use my fingers when adding or subtracting anything. If a math problem needs solved and there is at least one other person in the room with me I will stare up at the ceiling making it seem as if I'm doing it in my head but I'm just waiting for someone else to come up with an answer.

I don't think it's not because I'm mathematically retarded or anything it's how they taught math. Insufferable story problems about traveling trains, slices of pie and numbers of oranges donated didn't resonate with me.

That's only the beginning. Basic algebra was like teaching a monkey how to read Egyptian hieroglyphics to me when it got to geometry and algebra 2 it was even worse. The one thing I did walk away geometry class was the fun I had drawing a picture of this kid in the front row that had extremely prominent eyelashes. I mean these bad boys were thick and competely unmaintained. Two bold manes of black bristly hair above his eyes. His eye lashes were complemented with a less than enthusiastic mustache. It fascinated me his ability to grow hair above his eyes completely diminshed two inches south traveling down his face.

I drew him in a hot dog outfit, as an elvis impersonator, as a Mr. Potatoehead (complete with detachable eyelashes obviously) and as every character from the Harry Potter movies gradually over the semester. I wonder if the person I consistenly distracted during that class still has those pictures. Probably not. He probably burnt them up after he failed to grant his grandfather's dying request of him becoming a civil engineer. He could never get into engineering school because he was constantly distracted in geometry back in 10th grade by my pictures of this kid in a hot dog outfit.

My point is, I've never needed to know the logarithm of the square route of my ass crack. Yes, I know that is not even close to a mathematical term but my distaste of arithmetic inhibits me from doing a simple google search for a phrase to use.

I wish I would of been learning useful stuff that I would like to know now. Like if one of those math problems was...

You have $45 dollars to your name. You need food, gas and a little extra left over to pay your cable bill next week. Do you...?

A. Get some groceries, gas and save the rest.

B. Eat that can of soup in the cabinet, just get the low fuel light off and save a lot more.

C. Don't eat, roll on fumes and blow the rest at Seventh Veil Gentleman's Club.

After year's of bullshiting essays and just picking c on the test you can guess what my answer was. That's not my fault though! Our school systems should get real and prepare our kids for real world scenarios. I doubt my Texas Instruments Ti85 would be able to tell me how much to tip for a lap dance from Candi, the hard working single mom that is probably going to use that money to buy her kid a pointless Ti85 he needs for school.

This is the 21st century though and we prove as time progresses we have less and less intention to use our brains whatsoever. In a few years I'm sure the only lesson that will be taught about the Ti85 is that if you type in 8008 and turn it upside down it spells boob.

My inability to compute numbers isn't a great handicap. It reminds me I'm human and have no future in the world of economics, like I would want one anyway. On the other hand I do think I'm perfectly qualified to be a pundit on CNBC or MSNBC or ESPNBC. I could give advice on where to invest your money, make lots of wacky faces and crazy sound effects.

Just don't invest in Texas Instruments Ti85 graphing calculator, I don't even know what it does.

Welcome to the "Real" world

I have written about the "real" world before so I hate to be redundant. When I say the "real" world I of course refer to the most used term for unwanted responsibility by soon to graduate college students or soon to be grad students. It's an imaginary ritualistic transformation to adulthood that has completely mystified me from inception.

Last weekend I was taking some contestants from the stage back to their hotel and with them being my age I asked them about their college plans or otherwise. The two girls of the group said they were content after graduation to going back to their hometowns but one said he was putting off the "real" world and going to graduation school. I was instantly interested and asked what he planned on studying in graduate school.

Oh, what I plan to study in graduate school? He asked with a puzzled grin.

Yea, like what's your field man? I asked warding off an inappropriate yawn. 

Well, I majored in business finance and art history. I had a minor in political science too so I was thinking of doing some engineering. I'm not sure though. 

Sounds like you have a great resume for designing strip malls. 

You think! Because I think that's totally something I could do!

Stay in school kid. Real life is hell. They make you get extra ranch dressings for cobb salads when clearly one will do. There is also credit card payments, cable bills, periodical bills and a crazy Mexican lady who makes your life hell. 

A crazy Mexican lady?

Don't ask questions kid this is your stop. The Ramada Inn, thanks for participating on American's Funniest Videos and have a nice life. 

There is a picture of a crazy person giving the bird above. I know that this picture is:

1.)Hilarious 

2.)Defines exactly how I feel about your fucking "real" world. 

Would you like to know about the "real" world? Let's introduce you to my good friend Daryl that lives a block from my apartment underneath the 101 Freeway and jerks off behind the south bound entrance wearing a pair of bunny ears. Welcome to the "real" world son. 

One time I was in the office, it was no different than any other time and the normalcy struck me in a very poisonous way. 

I was doing my work. Minding my own business trying to stay busy and quiet when normal conversation sparked up about celebrities, VH1 programming in general, relationship drama and gossip that drives a sane man to suicide. 

I became physically ill at one moment where a specific moment of "For The Love of Ray J" causes concern enough to raise their voices. My BLT on toasted sourdough with mayo rocketed from its comforted spot in my stomach, through my throat into my mouth. 

As a seasoned binge drinker over the years I've mastered the art of holding vomit back in public places. I was able to hold my sick back but my face expressed so much. The eyes can not lie and it was clear I had something to say. I locked eyes with both participants in the meaningless conversation, cheeks bloated with digested BLT. 

For a moment I thought about letting my lunch out all over them. Covering the monitors displaying dogs chasing their own tails and cats with their heads stuck in a can. I thought about letting it out over the blank tapes of the hundreds of thousands of people who were so positive they had a $100,000 tape. I thought about my sick dripping over the pictures sent in from the elementary schools who were so pleased with our last penguin montage so the entire 3rd grade drew a penguin in their image. I pictured how my half-eaten tomato slice improved Tommy's penguin with a perfectly placed beak. 

Then I turned my chair around and swallowed my own sick right back down into my stomach. It required several swallows but I got it all back down. 

That BLT was easier to get down the second time than back-to-back valley runs. 

I would of said something about California's unemployment rate or our country's failed War On Drugs that has resulted in thousands of lives lost or political unrest in Thailand or that the US doesn't feel they should prosecute CIA officials who tortured people or that it doesn't matter if two people love each they can not marry because they are gay.

I didn't say any of these things. I swallowed my own vomit because they didn't deserve my opinion.   

With All My Love & Respect Always, 

Mike James 

The Problem With Tea Bagging

I am a very patriotic person. I have voted in every election I have been eligible to do so, I make patriot toast in the morning and would push Ann Coulter off a tall building if the opportunity was to ever present itself.

This is one thing I have never done, tea bagged someone. I've done some messed up things in my life but tea-bagging someone (*specifically against their will) is not one of them.

Yes we are in the midst of an economic apocalypse that will no doubt leave decades of debt and strive for our children. So the best defense we as a country can come up with is to teabag our government? Incredible.

The organizers of these "Tea bagging Protests" I'm sure mean well.

But do they not know that the Boston Tea Party of 1773 was in direct protest against the Tea Act the British Parliament was imposing on the colonies? Their beef with King George was over taxation from representatives that they did not elect. We not only elected this guy but we were all giddy girl about it.

The bank bailout, the AIG bonuses, the toxic assets, Jim Cramer and any other problems we are currently facing have absolutely nothing to do whatsoever with tea.

I'm sure some of the same morons throwing tea bags into Boston harbour now were balling their eyes out during President Obama's inauguration.

This is a day I'll never forget. Oh, hold me Billy. I'm just overwhelmed with HOPE!

Fast forward only a few months later.

LET'S TEA BAG THE SOCIALIST SON OF BITCH!!!

Tea bagging is one of the lowest forms of humiliation, next to getting queefed in the face, it's an extremely damaging action. An action taken that is guaranteed not to help us at all.

Then again that would be the American way. God speed.

EDITOR'S NOTE: If you have been living in a cave or are just lame here is the definition to Tea Bagging. http://tea-bagging.urbanup.com/60246

Random Thought

I was thinking tonight "What if you were to hit an car in oncoming traffic while picking your nose?"

The worry is that caught in the midst of excavating a real big angry boogie you become distracted causing an accident. Your finger would be thrust deep up into your cranium. Your index finger would be lodged almost to the knuckle up into your skull. Depending on your speed before the collision would depend on any other physical damage but most likely cause of death would be your finger in your brain.

It would also be difficult to explain to loved one and friends. Imagine the wake.

I heard the other person was fine, that it wasn't a high speed accident.

The steering wheel hit his elbow causing him to impale his own head with his finger while digging out a massive green beast.

Wow. Looks like he didn't pick a winner.

That's not funny.

It was too easy.

Moral of the story is...don't pick your nose in traffic.

Happy Easter. Ok.

An Ode From the Hollywood Bottom

I am supposed to feel ashamed for enjoying grit and grime. I shouldn’t enjoy the dirt that collects beneath my fingernails. The roaches that craw along my plates, my cups and my Triscuits don’t mind the clutter. There is no judgment in their inhabitance and they promptly leave when they know they aren’t wanted, unlike other inhabitants of my domicile that knock.

I will pick up the empty beer cans and the loose leafs of paper. Cigarettes stained purple on the butt from cheap wine get thrown away too. Empty bags of chips left from laughing and happy people. They ingest, they receive pleasure and once sated they leave.

I enjoy the stains on the bathroom wall. The stains are proof of life. Physical evidence of existence is comforting and exciting at the same time because plain walls can kill souls.

I don’t mind it when I wake up and my throat feels like an exhaust pipe on the 405 in August and I take a swill out of a beer I used for an ashtray the night before. I like falling asleep to the sirens of the police and the contradicting sounds of drunk drivers racing down the street searching for parking like savages.

Stacks of periodicals, old newspapers, and clippings from National Geographic that moved me to cut out excerpts with no destination scatter my small studio. I spend a lot of time worrying what a girl will think of my place before bringing her over. I don’t spend a lot of time cleaning it up for her.

Dirty clothes have a tendency to pile up. It’s not because I’m lazy. I’m actually quite ambitious. I just loathe tedious tasks. I prefer the laundry to escalate to an intimidating task. I want a pile of clothes that will make you sweat on a quiet Sunday afternoon. I want to make my way down three floors with the pile blinding my vision and making me stumble down the steps spraining my ankle. There might be a cute blonde at the bottom of those steps to heal my ankle.

Now who is the lazy one?

I do not possess any short-term memory. It has been completely eroded over the years. In no way is it a handicap however nothing is unless you make it one. To compensate I make many notes. Note cards that represent a small stock of my brain. Each gets a small piece of scotch tape and is then attached to my walls. This is so I can see what’s going on inside my head. The default operating system that has ran my brain for 23 years is unfortunately plagued with SPAM and spyware. Expelling all ideas onto note card to visually take in is a way around junk that clogs my head. I’m a child of the 21st century and that’s how we were programmed to receive information instantly & visually, with a few Target ads inbetween.

I rarely read a book cover to cover. I have a hopelessly short attention span and am constantly switching interests. I can barely stand TV and only having power over commercial breaks entice me enough to invest my time in it. The same is with my reading. I’m an obsessive consumer of information. Half-read books, torn pages adorned with strange drawings I added in a drunken excited stupor and pieces of yellow tablet paper with slices of my worthless analysis on life scatter every inch of my apartment.

Old hard-boiled eggs make opening my fridge like taking a solid pop to the nose, but a little cayenne pepper makes them easier to get down. Bologna and hot dogs are fixed seven different ways and each recipe more desperate and sad than the last. Eggo waffles are no longer just waffles but an agreeable replacement for bread and an excuse to add syrup to a bologna and Eggo sandwich.

If solitude wasn’t exciting enough then get ready to meet the neighbors. Years of heartache, lost dreams and mental anguish flow with more tenacity than any raging body of water when the right set of ears is found. Souls infested with disdain are more presently crawling around than the bugs in my kitchen. They are a pity. I wish I could reward them with as quick a death as the roaches I battle with in my kitchen. Unfortunately people aren’t always as lucky as the bugs we walk over.

On cold nights I turn the oven to 500, open it up and close the windows. I read in the kitchen next to the open oven, over an out of place lamp with cheap wine. I sling an old quilt made by my grandmother over me because I’m naked, trying not to create more laundry for myself.

Many would call my lifestyle irresponsible. They would ask why with such a brain I wouldn’t use my journalism degree. How could I not be able to just fetch some coffees for a few years then be granted a golden ticket to stardom? All you have to do is serve your sentence of indentured servitude to the Hollywood Gods until they deem you worthy of their presence. And then and only then!...Would you receive desired respect.

Like reality television and people who have some kind of philanthropic endeavor they are involved in; it bores me to tears. Pursuing a career is like waiting for an over-sized check to arrive at your door with pretty ladies and balloons.

I’ll move out of my flea-bitten, roach infested and narcotic drenched apartment building the end of May. Like everything in life, chapters come to a close and a time comes to start something new. It will be difficult to leave The Manor however, like The Eagles song goes “You can check out but you never really leave.”

My building is alive. Not just with insects but with stories of people with similar paths and dreams as mine. I like that. I like knowing others have appreciated the same roaches and the same stink in the air. I like the walls and the stories they will never be able to tell.

One day when there are no humans and only the Walls rule the earth they will tell of one farm boy that moved to Hollywood. He was clueless but ballsy. He was a Road Man for The Lords of Karma and they appreciated him. He was respectful and he has honest. The Lords of Karma don’t care about hygiene they care about character.

Which is the complete opposite of Hollywood.

With Love & Respect,

Your friend till the end,

MIKE JAMES

Death on the streets!...No biggie.

People die horrible deaths all the time. We just don't witness them. Kind of like if a tree falls in the woods, will it fall on the Pope while he's taking a shit?

I don't think that's the correct usage of that saying but nonetheless my point remains the same. My first real memory of grasping the delicate balance between life and death wasn't with a person. It was a pig. The pig's name was Oreo and I loved Oreo very much. 

As the circle of life goes with pigs on the farm it's not that circular at all, much more linear. A sweet little boy who gives the pig jelly beans shouldn't have to understand that concept but it's inevitable. I was told he went to a friend's farm to run and play in their open pastures of sunshine. It actuality he ended up between two slices of bread with some lettuce and a fresh slice of tomato. I was overwhelmed with sadness with I realized what happened to Oreo. So I finished my sandwich of Oreo sadness. Delicious, crunchy and satisfying sandwich of sadness. 

But one moves on and grows up. You go to college. You hit somebody on a dark, foggy night with a car full of booze and underage girls. Then you have to dump the body in the bay and make a promise amongst everyone never to say anything. The next summer you return only to find out that mystery person you killed is now murdering your friends with a fish hook. 

I think that's the plot line to "I Know What You Did Last Summer" but I feel there are some solid life lessons in it. 

My friend called me at work on Friday. 

"Mike I got laid off today and saw somebody die."

"What?! Wait, was it in that order? Are you about to ask for a really big favor?"

"No, actually I watched somebody die this morning. There was a car wreck right outside and they were giving somebody they pulled out CPR for awhile, then stopped."

"Maybe it worked. Maybe you just couldn't see them moving."

"The medic giving CPR stood up, lit a cigarette then started texting."

"Oh, not in a big hurry then eh?"

"Nope. It was pretty ominous. I don't normally see people die so I wasn't real surprised when I got the ax at the end of the day."

"Wow, I'm sorry but we are in a recession buddy. Everybody is losing their job you can't blame it on the home-boy that wished he used his turn signal."

"It's pretty strange though don't you think?"

"No dude, there's war in the streets and war in the Middle East."

"That's a Tupac lyric and doesn't help in anyway."

"You coming over later?"

"Yea."

"Bring beer."

Times are tough. Bamboozlers bamboozle the bamboozable. So you are either a bamboozler or you're gonna get bamboozled. I'm going on unemployment. I plan to bamboozle the bamboozlers.  

I was worried at first about my employment situation, my future, my financial situation and many other worthless stresses that everyone sweats about. It took a couple weeks but I've come to a comforting conclusion that follows the ideology of our heads of state and heads of industry that have vowed to lead us out of this disaster. 

I just said "fuck it".