The War Project Versus the Nice Project

The War Project is interfering with the Nice Project. Here I am, sitting and practicing being nice while no one is around in the middle of the night, and memories of war shake in my bones.

Upstairs, it's the War Channel. It's on most nights. Screaming and yelling bloody murder. Hate and rage, crashing and smashing, mad screams of insane people. This is normal. The War is normal.

There's an Hispanic couple upstairs who are at war. There may be others at war too. I think people are on drugs. I hope no one is armed. I hear them screaming and yelling bloody murder at each other, crashing and burning across the room, like a herd of antelope on an African plain. The cops got called. A couple of times.

Inquiries are met with smiles. There are no blows exchanged, the woman is a fighter, everything is fine. Don't believe it. When people scream like that, fists and objects fly. They are trying to kill each other. Nothing will happen until some day, someone may end up dead. This is how these things tend to end.

Next to them, upstairs, are Black people. A young Black woman and her huge Black boyfriend are trying to kill each other, or at least trying to beat each other up.

It was on earlier tonite, the Fights. You can turn on the Fights here just about any nite. Just open your ears.

The war went on on the sidewalk before, earlier in the night, but I looked outside and could not see. Only voices, I heard, disembodied voices. Fighting, fighting, yelling and fighting.

The war went on outside, earlier in the evening. The police pulled up outside my window, three cars, stayed there half and hour, talking to some young Hispanic men. I opened the window and watched the friendly people in blue.

The news just came in, two local kids locked up, the War goes on, two soldiers off the streets. You cheer for the blue men who take away 16 year old POW's. Where? Anywhere but here. Anywhere.

The gangster rap pounds away a good part of the day, from computers and radios. It's not exactly a message of peace and love. It's a message of hate, rage and crime, sociopathy packaged as art. It gets into your bones if you're not careful, your inner psychopath emerging in your tensing veins.

You shut all the windows and tell everyone not to look outside. The world out there and the world in here, and never the twain shall meet, or at least not tonight.

Dammit, I'm trying to be nice.

How can anyone be nice in a place like this?

Video killed the radio star, and the War Project is killing the Nice Project. What's a guy to do? Pour another glass.

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I Stuck Gumby Christ On the Wall

The latest death toll figures from Hurricane Katrina can be seen on this website here. The famous Russian neo-Nazi video is on this blog here.

Updated April 12:

I put Gumby on the wall. He's a Christian Gumby now, a Christ Gumby and a Jesus Gumby and he's up there to writhe and squirm for a long time.

I don't know why I did it. All I know is it was late at night, I was seriously wasted, and I saw Gumby smiling and I thought as usual he was laughing at me and my idiotic life. This time I got so angry that I grabbed Gumby by the throat, grabbed a hammer and nails, and nailed the sucker to the wall where he can laugh at me no more.

I have Gumbys all over my apartment. Pokies too. And plastic dinosaurs. There's stupid plastic cows and a plastic Batman and Robin the Boy Wonder (except my toy Robin is not homosexual like the real one), all real tiny, appropriate for a 50 year-old manchild.

I really want me some little tiny armymen. Then I am gonna line those suckas up on my top shelves and get some rubber bands and play Shoot the Armyman.

I'd like some creepy crawlers but I can't find any anymore. We used to make em with Plastigoop. It was good times. Then they would go on creepy crawler marches all over the whole house, only moving a few crawlers at a time, and then moving each crawler a few steps forward. In this way, the insipid marches could go on hours and hours.

There were two leaders of the crawlers, Horny and Hornet, and they were two green horny toads. They were husband and wife, but I never saw them have sex or anything. My leader was Tim, a red spider. I'm ashamed to admit that I still love Horny, Hornet and especially Tim more than any girlfriend I ever had, but maybe most guys are like that?

My Mom stood there and laughed at us like we were so stupid. "Why do you only move a few at a time?" she asked. You know females always think they are superior to us guys, but they don't get it.

The crawlers were in formation and they were a marching army dammit. Plus we got to crawl around on all fours and that's always fun. I still do it sometimes. I will even bark at you and pretend to bite your heels if you give me enough alcohol.

Plus, all males come from creatures that walked on all fours. That part of the collective unconscious faded in women, and it's now a distant memory they only remember painfully while they are cleaning the floor like they ought to do when they are not getting us beers from the fridge. But with guys it's a real thing. Bipedalism is a new thing to us, as is rudimentary speech. Many males still communicate mostly in grunts to this day.

Well, Gumby Christ has started people worrying in the complex where I live. Some of them still think I am a criminal, but it's good for people to be scared of you around here in the Hood. Now there is a rumor going around that I am insane because I stuck Gumby Christ on the wall.

As long I don't start worshipping him, I think I will be ok. When I start bowing down in front of Gumby Christ and yelling, "He died for my sins! For yours and his and hers and Pokey's too!" I promise I will try to seek help.

I admit I was seriously deranged when I crucified him yesterday but it had to be done. He was leading all the toys around here astray and fomenting rebellion in my apartment. I'm the High Priest in this damned apartment and I won't stand for any rebellions, so I killed Gumby, and that is that. Go make a religion and say he died for your sins if it bothers you so much.

People look at the Gumby on the wall and they say man, that is so stupid. I agree. That is why I did it. I normally never decorate walls because guys leave walls bare, and also I'm usually too neurotic and terrified to stick stuff up. I'm afraid it won't look right.

Gumby has two old paintings on either side of him that don't really match. On another wall is a Jesus mask from Guatemala with two Guatemalan knives on either side framing it. People think that is weird too, but they need to be quiet about it or I will pull off one of the knives and show them how sharp it is.

People see all these Gumbys around here and they start laughing. There's Pokeys around too, a gum-man's gotta ride something, and this is before the iron horse. Hardly anyone around here seems to be on my side, except maybe these friends who keep coming over, but I even wonder about them sometimes. I figure Gumby's on my side at least, so there is some comfort.

Sometimes Gumby does ride Pokey around here for everyone to watch. Also sometimes people come over and Gumby and Pokey might try to have sex with each other, as much as a man and horse can do that without the guy dying. People think that is childish too, and it is, I admit.

People see these stupid Gumbys and and ask me if I like Gumby. I say no, I hate Gumby. Then they ask why do you have all these Gumbys. I tell them I don't know.

On another wall is an evil Devil mask from Guatemala. It has two worthless university degrees on either side. Everyone hates it and says it's evil and gives off bad vibes wants it taken down, but that's why I put it up in the first place.

When they object, I just laugh diabolically and tell them I am the Devil, and ramble off a bunch of other names for him like Beelzebub, El Diablo, Shaytan, Satan, and especially The Evil One. I say, "The Evil One", really evil-like, and then I laugh real loud and say, "That's my name!" People get disturbed when I do that, but that's why I do it, and anyway, it's pretty funny.

I went over to see a friend the other day at his store. He was doing carpentry in the basement. I walked into the basement and asked, "Is this where you store the bodies?" He didn't think that was funny at all and I had to apologize. Some people just can't take a joke.

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A Good Host Assaults His Guests

A few years ago, I used to be really nice, and for a long time, no one much came over. I'd socialize with the guy downstairs and with my roommate, but that was about it other than trips to the coffee shop. No one was coming over all that much. There was me, my roommate, and my computer. Long nights writing. It's true I didn't have much of a social life, but I rationalized it all away.

I had friends, but they usually didn't come over, and I did not go over there. I was living a pretty normal introverted life that a lot of writer-types probably lead, but it was dissatisfying.

There is nothing wrong per se with people keeping to themselves, being introverts, having a few friends, or maybe even having no close friends outside of family. Thing is, I'm a bit of an extrovert in a way.

Introvert though I am, I do like to be around people. Visitors coming over every day is a great thing. And it's a good day if I went and knocked on a friend's door. It's nice to hear the cell phone racket ringing with my friends at all hours of the day and night, and it's nice to call a friend on the phone.

All of these things are values, that when lacking, make life seem to me somewhat impoverished and ridiculous. If you go out somewhere, it's better to have at least a somewhat warm interaction even with a clerk or someone in a waiting room than a cold or unfriendly reaction. I even go out every day to a coffee shop just to get my human fix, and hopefully it's not totally unpleasant and rejecting.

So here you have in me a peculiar mixture of introvert and extrovert, which is probably what most folks are. Loners are fine, but it's unsatisfying to me. And extreme extroversion is exhausting to me. I like people around a good part of the time, and then I like to be alone. I'm reading and writing, but others are in my home. It's paradise.

What is odd is that recently I have taken to assaulting my houseguests, and now I have more folks coming over than ever. Plus I went and banned a bunch of people who used to come over, often on relatively minor grounds. Now you have to be 18 to walk in the door, and there is a good-sized ban list. You would think I would be a pariah, but everyone wants in the door, even the underage and the banned. Go figure.

I also made a really hardass, Nazi rule list that everyone knows about. Violations can get a harsh warning or even a temporary eviction. The rule list is not hard - it just asks people to act like humans and not wild animals - but a lot of folks can't seem to manage that these days.

In addition to bans, age limits and rule lists, I have also start to assault guests when they violate the rules. It would be better if I would just assault them at random for no reason whatsoever, but I am not so good at being totally crazy at the moment.

So when guests violate the rules, I assault them with a squirt bottle. Unfortunately there are a couple of squirt bottles around, so the guests arm themselves and fight back. Throw in some intoxicants and it's good immature fun for kids of all ages. You have grown adults hiding behind chairs and leaping out to ambush other grownups. Sometimes nothing beats regression.

Lately I have decided to up the ante. I have a small writing table. In response to some rule bans by my slob house guests, I picked up the writing table, charged across the room, and threatened to assault the violators with it. I didn't actually hit them of course, but the threat alone was a barrel of monkeys. I was hoping they would call the cops, but unfortunately they never did.

Funny thing is since I have been attacking my guests, I have more company than ever. One wonders if folks just need to get attacked every once in a while, either due to a psychological need to just to keep them in line.

I do recommend that you assault or threaten to assault your guests on occasion. Even the best guests get out of line, and a good host runs a tight ship. Anyway, folks can't seem to get enough of it.

Check out the article. It's now a therapy, Mean Therapy. I love it; how do I become a counselor? Let's hope it sweeps the nation. Uncover your inner jerk today!