The modern press are a bunch of plasticized, failed model, lazy, non-reporting douce bags

It would be nice if we had a press that actually did its job as the so called "Fourth Estate." The modern press is lazy, and providing a great disservice to the public with its non-reporting techniques, i.e. merely collecting sound bytes without actual questions asked. A rather simple example: Every time a politician spews forth the idea that the path to economic recovery is to reduce spending, lower taxes, and reduce the size of government, nobody has asked the obvious question of "Can you show us a historical example where this approach as worked to end a recession/depression?" or "Didn't the Hoover administration try this with disastrous results seventy years ago?" or how about "If nobody has a job or any money to spend, and therefore cannot buy goods and services from a business, how does lowering the businesses tax rate compel the penniless and unemployed to buy goods...and therefore encourage the business to expand and hire?" Stop with the mindless regurgitation of talking points, and make people defend and explain their ideas and philosophies!

All the worlds a douche bag...

I used to have this idea that douche bags were few and far between, and the ones that existed were easily spotted. For me, the obvious douche bag was that Ivy League educated, east coast, blue blooded investment banker with a squash racquet up his ass. The pin striped dickhead who votes for Jesus with one hand as he steals the coins out of your pocket with the other. You know, THAT GUY. And he (and she) is. A douche bag that is. But while watching TV the other night (not right now mind you, because my TV is in the shop...I had no idea how empty my life was without my 46 inch HDTV until it was gone...kind of like that lover you didn't appreciate until they were no longer around. Then again, we ARE talking about my TV here...and while human interaction is nice, it doesn't bring me 200+ channels of useless entertainment ranging from shows about the wonders of the cosmos to a screen full of full frontal nudity with little or no plot line. In fact, I propose a theory I'll call the "entertainment inverse nudity sqaure law" ((or EINSL)) which goes something like this: the higher the content of nakedness in any form of video entertainment, the logic/reality/probability behind the plot line is reduced by its square root. This explains why nobody you know has ever received a BJ from a nurse while in the hospital, despite what the Playboy Channel would have us believe. But I digress...) I realized that douche bags are everywhere.

I was watching this live music thing with Katy Perry. I know, "Why in the hell were you watching that drivel?" Well, I used to think she was kinda hot. I don't know anything about her music, or her as a person. I had just seen pictures of her, and she had this retro thing going on and I thought "kinda hot". So, whilst channel surfing, I caught her in an "unplugged performance" and watched it for about five minutes. Talk about a buzz kill. Have you ever really looked at artsy fartsy people and thought "you're trying too hard...and coming across as kind of a douche bag." Well, while watching Katy and her band, that was my reaction. Her bassist wore his hair in a manner that stated "I just rolled out of bed and didn't have time to comb it I was in such a hurry", but upon further inspection you could see the gel and styling in it that ACTUALLY stated "It took me three hours with a stylist to get my hair to look like I just rolled out of bed and couldn't bother combing it". Douche bag poseur. Another was tatted up to the point of ridiculousness. Now, tats are fine. I know lots of people with them, and cannot remember the last woman I've met who didn't at least have one (no joke...I can't remember when). But a tattoo, in my opinion, should mean something other that TRYING to look cool. This guy was trying to look all menacing and hard core. Menacing? Hard core? Are you fucking kidding me? You're a musician for KATY PERRY of "I Kissed A Girl" and "You're So Gay" fame for Christs sake!!! The "hardest core" thing you deal with is whether your hotel room stocked your Evian spring water as you requested as opposed to, horror of horrors and god forbid, something non-imported. At the very least, your tattoo should mean something important to you, but when you have thirty-six tattoos, I'm thinking you've exceeded what's considered "special" and are now just a raging douche bag poseur. And Katy herself was trying to come across as funny and deep, but just sounded like yet another self absorbed tart obsessed with her own celebrity....DOUCHE BAG.

So, what did I take away from this? What I took away from it was that douche bags are not limited to our rich and powerful people of influence. That was me being a closed minded....well, douche bag...for being such a class hating dweeb. Douche bags are all over, and are also thick in the so called arts and culture scene (which, had I thought about it for two seconds, is a real "no duh" idea). Point being I guess is rather simple...appreciate the non-douche bags in your life. They are to be cherished, because the douche bags of the world are multiplying across all social strata at an alarming rate, and soon, will completely take over the earth. I fear not the coming Apocalypse, or Muslim/religious fundamentalists, or high fructose corn syrup, trans fats, and carbs. No, none of these keep me up at night. It's the ever increasing prevalence of the raging, narcissistic, self absorbed, douche bag that worries me.

Pet Peeves

Well, I haven't had a blog in a while where I vented a good bitch or two. So, in order to preserve the calm mental state I have been enjoying as of late, I'm going to purge a few things here:

1) Work place refrigerator cola thieves-I about blew a gasket the other day as a result of this. At 6pm I had put not one, but TWO cans of Coke in the office refrigerator. At 10pm, deciding that a frosty, caffeinated beverage would hit the spot, I go to the fridge and....hmmmmmm, where's my soda? Must be behind this guys burrito....no....oh, it's behind the macaroni salad.....no....WTF??? Ordinarily, I would let this go as maybe a one shot mistake. But this is the fourth time this has happened, and it was TWO COKES that were pilfered from the refrigerator. My question is this: WHAT KIND OF SOCIOPATH DOES THIS????? How do you open a refrigerator, see beverages and other food stuffs in there that are CLEARLY NOT YOURS, and take them? Do you have the following conversation in your head:"I know I didn't put those sodas in there, and I didn't pay for them, but since I'm the only person in the universe and my narcissism knows no limits, they were clearly put there for my sole enjoyment." How do you STEAL something and not give it another thought? Or are you still in some sort of childlike state where you think magical office refrigerator gnomes lovingly restock the refrigerator with your favorite food items? Or are you the same type of person who tortures small animals, doesn't give a shit, and is one step away from being a thrill kill serial murderer? Yes, that's right, I just equated a soda snatcher with Jeffrey Dahmer. And yes, I think a person who can continually steal foodstuffs from a community refrigerator is as equally disturbed,and they need to be removed from society...or at least castrated. Want to know what the kicker is? The kicker is this: right next to the refrigerator is a SODA MACHINE. Can of Coke? 65 cents. It would seem a small price to pay for a clean conscience, wouldn't it? Oh, that's right...a sociopath has no conscience, which is precisely my point about these people.

2) Putting me on hold when you're the one who called me in the first place-if you take the time out of your busy day to call me just to say hello, I'm touched and appreciate the gesture. If you take the time out of your busy day to call me just to put me on hold after two seconds because the person you really wanted/needed to talk to called you back, I would feel no guilt if your mobile phone instantly gave you a brain tumor. If you're going to call me, please make sure you can devote at least 3-5 minutes to a conversation. All kind meaning taken from a phone call turns into a steaming pile if you reach out to me just to blow me off. "Hey John, how 'ya doing? Just thought I'd give you a call to let you know you're not worth talking to. Ciao!" What a dick move. My promise to you is if you call me, no matter how busy I am, I will stop what I'm doing and make a few minutes for you. I wasn't always like that, and I used to be kind of an ass if you called me and I was busy, like if I was cleaning my pool I'd act all shitty if I was interrupted. But I have grown and learned I was being a bit of a jerk. If I am legitimately super busy, I will immediately tell you I'll have to call you back, which I will do, usually pretty promptly. It would be nice if others learned that same lesson.

3) SUV's and speed bumps-so you're the type of person who drives a 36,000 pound SUV with an all terrain suspension of an M1A1 Abrahms front line battle tank, and yet, for some reason, you feel the need to slow down to .0000000001 MPH for a six inch speed bump. In fact, if you're this type of person, your favorite move is this one: make a left turn into a parking lot off of a busy street, and I follow right behind you. As you enter the parking lot, you notice there's that deadly speed bump directly ahead, and despite your behemoth of a vehicle being equipped with the "V8 mountain crushing deforestation package with brush guards, winch, and small woodland creature killing studded tires", you immediately slam on your brakes in order to negotiate this Mt. Everest in front of you. Since I'm behind you, this of course hangs me out to dry in the oncoming lane of traffic, so I can take a broadside hit from a distracted, mouth breathing, high speed teenager in a 1983 Corolla who is yakking on their cell phone and looking down trying to find the remnants of the joint they've just dropped. Clearly, if you're this person, you have merely purchased this freighter sized vehicle because you're a douche bag. OK, that wasn't fair...you could just be merely retarded. My apologies.

4) Old people in economy cars-back in the day, old people drove cars like 700 horsepower Cadillacs and Lincolns. Now matter how slow they WANTED to drive, these cars had so much asphalt shredding power that the simple act of just lifting your foot off of the brake pedal resulted in a 0-60 mph time of 3.8 seconds. Now? Now old people drive the 22 horsepower Prius and Yaris. These vehicles, from what I have seen, appear to have a built in safety measure that once you hit the gas pedal, there's a 45 second delay before the car actually accelerates forward. Couple this delay with the typical octogenarians reaction time as a red light turns to green (approximately 25 minutes), and you can now see why our commutes are getting slower and slower. So, because of this, I'm thinking we petition the government to provide senior citizens with 500 horsepower Shelby Mustangs or Chevrolet Corvettes. It will help out the American auto manufacturer, AND shave ten minutes off of my commute. It's a win-win.

OK, thanks for letting me rant a little bit. I now feel centered again, and the universe, once again, makes sense...except for my inability to locate a dark chocolate peanut butter cup in any Fresno area grocery store. That makes no sense at all.