Scan You Believe It? (WITH PICTURES!)

The Safety Assholes have implemented a new "security" procedure you will be forced to partake in the next time you decide to fly instead of drive to Vegas.... OOOH, LOOK AT THE HIGH ROLLER! Between a dose of radio waves shot at your carcass - in hopes of finding that bootknife ticked nicely 'neath your man-teat, or perhaps a few extra ounces of Pert you think you can't live without in Iowa - or gruff pat-down by a TSA uniformed person who passed their most-recent drug test, we, as American travelers, are safe at the security checkpoints. I would like to believe these agents are all cast-offs from the CIA, having missed that Director position by just the sliiiiightest of drug tests. They needed someplace to go, someplace to work for and with the United States of America, and the TSA is way better than work-release programs. Usually.


Due to an unplanned interaction with a very sober motorcycle being ridden by a very intoxicated assclown in 1998 and my left tibia, I have a rod in my leg that sets off airport metal detectors. It has done so in all but 1 scanner I've gone through since 1999 (Oakland, CA, 2006). I'm pre-9/11 "Homeland Security" Agent-bait; white guy who usually flies alone in coach with one unchecked bag. Oh yeah... Danger. By now I should be in a database when I check-in for my boarding pass that says "This guy's got a rod in his leg, and acts like it's a stick up his ass. Take it easy."

Usually I get pulled aside, stood in the glass corral and made to wait until the "Male Assist" shows up to frowningly lead me to another area where he waves a wand over my entire body to make sure I'm not lying when I say my body has a rod that cannot be trusted. Takes a minimum of five extra minutes each time. The wait is entirely dependent upon how quickly the Male Assist makes it over to the pen to lead me past other travelers wondering why I'm getting yanked aside, do NOT pardon the pun. It's not fun. It's a nuisance. And it's usually me or some old broad with a re-built shoulder waiting to be given back our effects and get to some airport DRANKIN'. There's a brief pat-down of my bod, then I get to put on all my shoes and belts and grab my stuff and think of jokes to write about how lucky I feel to be getting on a plane where I won't be troubled by dignity. It sucks, I understand why it's done, and issuing me some sort of government-approved card/bar scanner with my photo-ID that says "Cleared, leg/ass-rod" is not an option, because eventually somebody will F up and try to smuggle some beverage on-board instead of just buying the $6 Skyy.


The new TSA scanners grab pics like this one:
This is a test-photo wherein the scanned woman (I believe it is) was digitally reduced to a glowing white, giggling, .22cal-packing ghost. She was not allowed onto the plane in this state of being, deemed by Virgin Airlines as "underattractive." Sorry there, Backfat, better luck on Southwest.
The scanners emit 10,000 times LESS radio activity than your average cell-phone conversation, which is still 100,000,000 times longer than mine, I'm sure. Still, you should be opting-out for the pat-down. And YES, it will include a feel between and under the lady's breasts, and a firm-but-fair hand-saunter through your undergarden. Grandma needs a go, I guess. You're welcome. MEN, if you're truly worried about the radiation, do the right thing: TUCK YOUR FUNDLE UNDER & BACK.

Or if the pat-down is your thing, just sit back, and with a blissful look on your face, repeat the words to the 4th Amendment of the Constitution (link there is for a t-shirt version you should wear):

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

I do believe that a "reasonable" (i.e. a pre-targeted and ethnically-profiled) search of people getting on a plane is perfectly fine and legal.

We do complain about being REACTIONARY instead of PRECAUTIONARY, going all-out post-facto before the fan stops spinning the shit off itself. However, after 11+ years of groping and wanding and extra time sliced from my calendar with these measures, I have but one thing to say...

http://artsytime.com/x-ray-by-nick-veasey/

Nobody wants to look at your ass any more than you want to have it waxed AGAIN, you beast.
Get the fuck in line and shut up. I've been living this crap for over a decade, and nobody came to my defense, not one time.

And another thing, when you DO go through every metal detector's buzzing alarm and you get used to it time after time for 49 years... that ONE time it does NOT go off... don't say "Sweet, it didn't go off!"

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MC, HOST, CORPORATE, COMEDY, SEATTLE, GEOFF, LOTT

NiceHoles

NICEHOLE: Any person who, while "just being themselves," and not necessarily being rude or mean, still manages to bother the living shit out of you.

For example:
The Feeder: Any NiceHole demanding that you 'have a bite, just a bite, take some, take some food, EAT SOMETHING!" even if you are hunched over in front of their toilet, throwing up after a frosting binge. Should you deny their culinary advances, YOU are the rude one.

The Knowblivious ("no-bli-vee-us"): This NiceHole knows something about everything, and will start a pointless conversation merely to tell you something about it.

WhistHoler: This person whistles indoors. Like a gigantic asshole. Because there's no music. And there's no music indoors for a reason. And they're a gigantic asshole and have to make noise. And when you blow, you suck.

The TimeJacker: Often starting in Knowblivion, the TimeJacker is a master of the circuitous route to NoWhereberg.
While the topic may start with something you didn't want to talk about, the trip from "A good place to eat" winds through "the time he ate BBQ in Tulsa" to "the best place to buy a banjo" to "streetracing in the 1970's" to "the Coast Guard has a boat with a gun that shoots lasers" to "why he makes his own cheese" and ends with tips on "owning your own alpaca farm." Everyone works with this pile.

NiceHoles is now ALL MINE!

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MC, HOST, CORPORATE, COMEDY, SEATTLE, GEOFF, LOTT

IgnoRant: My Dwindling Compassion For Dumbasses

A few weeks ago I performed at the Taste Of Tacoma, an outdoor food faire in the heart of Pierce County. For those not in the know, or "out the do' on the kanizzle" as we say in tha streetz, Tacoma is a town better know for its paper-smelting aroma (hot-car broccoli gas), random shootings, faux gang activity, and a nightlife mixture of Blade Runner and the Mos Eisley cantina, but with baby-mama drama. It's all very classay. Yes, "-ay."

To this very moment, I describe the Taste as "the most beautiful, painful, and ignorantly, brazenly sad sea of humanity to ever grace Point Defiance park." Let's run it down:

1. Horrible tattoos? CHECK. My favorites included a guy with two revolvers tattooed at his waistband, as if shoved into his overly-exposed boxers, as well as a scapula-covering black&gray pit bull with the words "Mi Vida" in cursive. Makes it classier, because it was, after all, a woman's shoulder. Every tattoo you should never get, from your girl's name, to your boo's initials TO THE HOOD EMBLEM OF A CHRYSLER, all over the meat casings of these walking billboards for late-term abortion. Explain THAT decision to your kids. What happens when the other guy has a "non-tattoo" gun?
2. Huge dogs with bad reputations? CHIGGIDY. See, you MUST represent. Outdoors, hot hot hot weather, kids running around with corndogs at eye-level to a blood-gurgling land-shark known as a pit bull terrier. How could this go wrong? As long as a few people with crappier lives than you think it's cool, hey, you're validated. I don't blame the dogs. I blame the parents for bringing their kids to a place where people be walkin' they dog at, mang. Yeah. That's what it is. Poor dogs. They don't even wanna be with those people.
3. Inappropriate clothing? CHUNDER! I am a proponent of lettin' it all hang out and being who you are... but if who you are has a fair amount of lust for a red tube-top that makes your backfat look like cleavage, and your heels be all sinking in'a groun'? Girl, you GOTTA get some body shame. That person has no real friends. Her boyfriend, guess what? MOUTH BREATHER!

Behold the phenomenon known as "DoubleBagging."

So, I came away from this place realizing that some zip codes should have birth control pumping through the water supply. Conversely, if somebody is smart enough and has the financial means to be using a Brita or Pur water filter, then they have shown they ought to be procreating. Everyone else, I want to make sure we aren't flooding our schools with more and more...

Wait a second... what am I saying???
What do I think I am going to change with this blog? Do I think people will drive better? Will cinemas get my drift and start showing movies On-Demand instead of whenever THEY feel like it? Are people going to STOP bringing their dogs into the store and holding them up like harlequin masques as if to say, "See? I am loved!" What do I expect of humanity?

Who is to blame for it all? The dumb, that's who.
At a point in the lives of dipshits, dorkwads, numbnuts, nerdjobs, fartkings, f*cktards, shitloaves, Lukas, Nickelback fans, and/or idjits, they made decision after to decision to just be Dumb. To stop thinking and start brain-mashing through MySpace and FaceBook and pop culture, they tuned out the voices of Life and said, YES to the voices of living through their technology.

So when a guy blows his hands off after making a pipe bomb to show off to his friends, I feel nothing. I feel bad for the people who saw it, that's a crappy day at the auto detailer, but Stumps Henderson, man, what sucks most is that he's gonna get some sort of disability payment from the taxpayers. He ought to be getting a hammer on one stump, nail feeder on the other. Or a trowel in one hand, seed dispenser in the other, planting trees in the community.

Part of me is so very fed up with the low-thinkers and the willfully ignorant. But truly, they are needed. Our society, as a whole, deserves to be doing better. But as long as people are fat, dumb, and using government stimulus checks to buy flatscreens while their kid's teeth grow sideways out they heads, we'll trudge along towards our next evolutionary step.

22, Bi-Sexual Female looking to Hook Up! Must luv Catts.

AND I SAY "GOOD!"
I have nothing but the highest hopes for all of us. But let's be honest, folks.
The hierarchy of humanity is a pyramid, not a table. There's less room as we near the top. The problem I see with being up there is there aren't very many people to talk to. And people can see up your organic bamboo-thread jammers.

So, nevermind. The people who I want the most to shake from their sugary cola-swilling trough-like Day Coma aren't reading this anyway. But please, Dear Reader, decide that you would like to be up the pyramid a notch or two, and go there. You deserve it. I want it for you. Your loved ones want it for you. And I'm tired of you looking up my kilt.

By the way. The Taste of Tacoma is malt liquor and breast milk.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=

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Sick of It

So... again... at work...

This guy sitting near me, in an office... with a DOOR that closes on hinges and latches and locks... has his door open...
and a now-drying chest cough that spasms in quick, double-bursts every 90 seconds or so. You could set your whiskey shots by it. He works in HR. Imagine.

My problem with people coming to work ill, especially if they are contagious, and ESPECIALLY if they aren't that attractive, is the possibility of spreading their illness. I understand the move if you're the only orthopedic surgeon in the ER for the next 72 hours, or a drywaller who doesn't reek of beer before hanging Hardi-backer in the splash zones. But the HR contact? Dude.

Back in the bubble.

'kA-hhuu, 'kA-hhuu.

But HOW does this message get out? It's the same problem for somebody who is really loud at work, or dresses poorly (not the scooping neckline or short skirt, that's a whole different reason to stay home), or complains all the time. It's a personality flaw, it's in the code of the machine now.

See, in the past I've tried dropping hints, anonymous print-outs, farting in their cube, farting in a drawer in their cube, leaving the water of a tuna can in a cup under their desk, telling them outright, and general embarrassment. The last of those, by the way, is far too underutilized in our society. If somebody is bothering you with any sort of behavior that you haven't paid good money for, it's well within your rights to let 'em know.

I can't handle this. I'm 34. It could go on for Who Knows how long, and dammit, it's time to just do the right thing and tell HR.

Oh right. I gotta say something. Sorry Dude. I'm sick of your sickness.

Another time, earlier this year when I first started this job, I was very ill for a good 48 hours. Some sort of bug that just wracked me. So I decided to stay home for that Monday. When I returned, I was admonished, somewhat "gaily," by a co-worker that I better not be sick and get her sick, dang it!

From the day I started there was a wet, hacking chest cough emanating from across the cube walls, from the same person who was demanding that my presence not THAT FUCKING COUGH, DUDE, COME ON.... that my presence not impact her immune system. Now, my bug was legit. 4 months into the show here, that chest cough prevails, daily, wetly.

It's making me sick. DONE.

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Further Proof That Being Nice To People Is Often Too Difficult

I give everyone a fair chance.

Really, I do. I have few expectations of anybody's behavior, other than thinking that they won't try to hit me or pee on/at me, or at least not until I've paid them.

Sometimes, people just strike you funny. Socially awkward. They call themselves "outdoorsy," while you know they hike a lot because nobody wants them at their party. That sort of thing.

Maybe they say inappropriate things or act in a way that makes other people uncomfortable, squirmy, dumbfounded, or grossed out. They don't see it that way, and nothing is going to turn them around.

Fast forward to now.
Then hit REWIND to about 30min ago.

I sat down at my desk after a brief trip to the kitchen to make a small bag of popping corn, 100-calorie mini-bag of Kettle Corn. Not great, just needed a small nosh before I get on the roads and kill somebody by way of low blood-sugar.

As I get back into my office, a guy, whom we'll call Wordy, is in my seat. I say "Oh hey, I'm back, can I get that from ya?" Very cordial.
He says "Oh sure, just keeping it warm for you."

I jokingly reply "Alriiiight. Weird." I don't know the guy other than a few meetings and emails to and fro.

I sit down with my bag of corn, and he moves to my right with the group he's working with at another desk. I grab a few kernels of corn and start back doing what I was doing at work on MySpace, and believe it or not, that happens at work, too!

About, oh, heck... 2 minutes later, Wordy circles his group, makes his way around me, grabs my bag of popcorn and begins to stick his hand in it. So I say "Uh, you're not going to put your uninvited hand in my popcorn, right?"

His response?
"Hey, I'm giving you material! How are you gonna write blah blah blah..." I tuned Wordy out mostly because I was shocked at the forwardness and lack of boundaries. It was like something out of "The Office," but unfunny.

"You're giving me material, well I'm giving you a bag of popcorn, bon appetit!" Still trying to be fun about it, but still a little miffed at this basic stranger sticking his hand into my snack.

Not that I wouldn't share, but I wasn't going to interrupt their convo to offer corn.
Nor should their work be interrupted for a guy with corn needs that overshadow his manners.

So we go back and forth while he's trying to make it look like I "don't get it," and that "everyone in the midwest shares," I shouldn't be at all upset about having to share. I keep saying "Wordy, it's about boundaries. You don't stick your hands in people's food, right?"

By the way, a lot of people in the midWest live very near to corn, and I am hearing more and more reports about the proliferation of ignorant, slow-talking, chain restaurant-eating idiots that live between the Rockies and the Mighty Miss'ssip Rivah.

Bottom line is, my corn, like my boundaries, were violated, and then there was an attempt to make ME feel like I should just accept it or admit I'm being an ass's hole.

Stranger's hands in my food, and I'm "missing the point."

I mean this in the nicest way possible, but that guy is a f*cking re-nard.

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