This week's SFist reprint

Staggering Through Fog

A once-a-week trip and fall into the Champagne pyramid known as the San Francisco bar scene. By Andrew Lowder

At the risk of turning this column into 'I love the '90s', remember when we couldn't get enough of anything Australian? You could take medical waste, slap a Koala bear on the front of it, get some muscle-bound Yabbo to shout 'OY!!' next to it and people would be lining up around the KMart to buy it.

Now we've been around for awhile and we've seen our share of Australian surfer-themed bars. From Toe's Tavern in Canoga Park to the Australian Beach Club in Tustin, they're usually terrible. Nothing more than a mish-mash of flourescent surfboards and Jager shots. Kind of like being a Savage Steve Holland movie but without anyone cool like Curtis 'Booger' Armstrong around to make things fun.

Bender's, the latest inhabitant of 800 S Van Ness Ave, tones down the stereotypes of Australia so well that it doesn't feel like a theme bar at all. Apparently named after an actual person and not the robot from Futurama, Bender's is super friendly, easy to hang out in and eager to please. And even though the weather's a-startin' to turn, they've also got a great back yard area.

So we recommend that you head down to Bender's or bite our shiny metal asses.

Liver...Out!!

Sacri-Licious

Our Papi, Who art in Fenway
Hallowed be thy team.
Thou kicketh ass,
On Yankee grass,
And at home, as you did in the Bronx.

Give us this year our shiny rings,
And forgive us our talk of curses,
As we forgive those who talk of curses against us.

And lead us not into extra innings,
But deliver us from errors.

For thou art the Schilling,
And the Pedro,
And the D-Lowe,
For ever and ever.

Damon.

(thanks Mike, and have fun in hell)

Bill O'Reilly a Pompous Hypocrite??

In celebration of Bill O'Reilly 'settling' his lawsuit and basically admitting he's a complete douchebag, let's see some compelling evidence that FoxNews should fire his ass;

Here's an excerpt from 'The Factor' earlier this year (special thanks to DailyBeast.org).

When Ohio TV anchor Catherine Bosley resigned after photos of her participating in a wet t-shirt contest were posted on the internet, O'Reilly thought she should be let go (1/23/04):

"Let's be realistic. Politicians, news people, clergy all have images, and all depend on the trust of the public to succeed. So we have a young woman here who -- anchoring the news, and her pictures are all over the Internet..... So it intrudes on her ability to communicate the news, does it not?"

"The station has an obligation to put on people who are going to bolster their news image. This woman, in a community like that particularly, but in -- I think in any city in the USA, becomes a joke, and, therefore, the station becomes a joke, and you can't be a joke if you want to compete in the news area."

"Are you aware that in every newscaster's contract, there's a moral clause that says, if you embarrass the station publicly in any way, they can let you go.... Once you go public and do something like that, although it's not illegal, it embarrasses your employer because your employer operates on credibility."

So naturally, I expect O'Reilly's forced resignation from FoxNews any day now.

Keep Your Mouth Shut Jesus Freak!!

Curt Schilling apparently went on Good Morning America this morning to tell everyone how important Jesus was to the Sox winning the World Series and tell everyone to vote for GW Bush.

Now I'm torn between wishing Schilling well and hoping his ankle gets Jim Henson disease and falls off.

Hoo-Friggin-Ray!!!!!

It's a great day to be a non-asshole human being. Hopefully every meat-head jag-off that's ever roamed behind the bleachers chanting '1918' at a Sox away game feels like the unclever douchebag that everyone else in the world already knew they were.

Typically, Yankee fans are crying and moaning like the babies they are, weeping aloud about 'maybe now Sox fans will finally shutup' and 'only 25 more to go'. I think it's pretty goddamn hilarious that Yankee fans are calling for anyone to shut up considering for 50 years, they haven't been able to close their own pie-hole long enough to be mistaken for having any class at all.

In short, my response to any and all Yankee fans is 'Hell no, RedSox fans won't shut up because you've got 86 years of childish taunting that is owed to you.

"Two-oo-thousand (clap-clap-clap-clap-clap), Two-oo-thousand (clap-clap-clap-clap-clap) !!!"

P.S. I have never seen so many bad moustaches on dull-looking white people as there were at Busch stadium in St. Louis last night. It seemed like every time they took a shot of the crowd it was some guy who looks like he's in sales still trying to pull off the 'Magnum P.I. look.

Taking the Torch from Lebowski

You've probably seen or heard about the phenomenon of getting photographed in various places wearing an 'Achiever' shirt and holding up a sign that says "Lebowski 6:19". You haven't? Well, you pretty much entirely missed that trend, but can now hop on the next one.

"Pulling a Lynndie" involves adopting the half-sneered cigarette dangling pose of one Lynndie England, that white-trash, bulldyke of an idiot who posed with Iraqi prisoners at Abu-Ghareb prison, thereby causing us to completely shitcan the precious little credibility the U.S. had left in the world. But all that Hooba-Joo aside, 'pulling a Lynndie' looks like fun and I plan to make it a part of all future travel plans!

Two current funniest people alive

Eugene Mirman (MIRMAN! MAN OF THE SEA!) has a new album out called 'The Absurd Nightclub Comedy of Eugene Mirman' that is totally worth a listen. Please buy it or, if you must, download it off the internets.

Something Awful.com, an otherwise only marginally funny website, has a column called 'Your Band Sucks' that is consistently fucking hilarious. Recently, he published a guide on how to be a music snob that completely nails several people I have known over the years (I'm looking at you James McCaffrey). He recently published a follow-up consisting of letters by readers with even better ideas for fake music snobbery. Check out the Frank Zappa section and see if it reminds you of anyone you know. If it doesn't, get out more often!

No One Talks Shit about The Special Olympics!

The name Arnold Schwarzenegger came up the other day on some current affairs program (Ok, it was The View) to which someone remarked, "He's actually doing a much better job than I thought he would do.".

It suddenly struck me that the republican party are geniuses! Here's the plan;

1) Create or wait for political campaigning to turn into nothing but negative attacks. Sure, there's always been more than a little negativity, but the last several elections have really raised the bar.

2) Find a candidate that's basically an idiot, making him practically immune to attack. After all, it's just unseemly to run an attack campaign against someone who's obviously 'a little special'.

3) Once your idiot is elected, everyone will be so impressed every time he appears in public without shitting his pants or even remembers to wear pants at all that they'll admire him. "Sure, he's a complete fool, but he's not beating off in public and screaming at phone booths like I thought he would".

4) Bingo Presto! Your candidate is re-elected mostly on the grounds that public sentiment was wrong about him being retarded when he actually only has down syndrome.

The best part about this master plan is that while finding an incredibly intelligent, thoughtful and reflective person to run for public office is almost impossible, complete morons are EVERYWHERE! Hell, reality television is chock-full of near-drooling, vacuous mental midgets who would line up for days to have Simon Cowell and Ryan Seacrest audition them to be president.

Get my agent on the phone!!

This week's SFist reprint

Staggering Through Fog

A multi-layered 'Pousse-Cafe' of a bar review column by Andrew Lowder

We've been hearing for quite some time now that 'Pirate' is the new 'Tiki'. This hasn't really come to pass, however, and I'm starting to think it never will. After all, there's not really a 'lounge' aspect to pirate culture. There's no fond hipster memories of Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr. donning eye-patches and singing "What do you do with a drunken sailor?". So as much as some would try and have you believe, I think pirates pretty much peaked with Hagar the Horrible. Now let's check out this week's barrrrr (Sorry, I had to) ...

Il Pirata, on 16th Street just across from the Old-Safeway-Jamba-Navy-Juice Complex is a classic example of a concept bar that never really bothered to follow the concept. Don't misunderstand, however, this isn't neccessarily a bad thing. Il Pirata will never be in danger of being filled with children's birthday parties or bridge and tunnel crowds eager to overpopulate that 'crazy new pirate bar in town'. Nope, the closest thing you'll find to pirate culture here is loud drunks, forced to walk the plank out of Young's or Sadie's Flying Elephant.

That said, Il Pirata probably isn't the right bar for most people. It seems to consistently be just barely on the wrong side of the razor-thin line that seperates 'fun-dive' from 'Oh god, he's coming over to talk to us-dive'. So unless you're desperate for conversation, enjoy playing 'find the smell', or doing research for a blog, you may want to think twice about the Pirate. Now if you'll excuse us, we have to go get our timbers shivered.

Liver...Out!!

Wait a minute! You're all NERDS!!

Funny thing happened in the political blogosphere (which, BTW, is my wife's current least favorite word. Mine's probably 'portcullis'. But I digress), this week's political blogs all completely forgot that there's 2 weeks to go until the election they've been hyping for four years and all wrote staggeringly long, boring analyses about baseball.

Look, I know y'all want to be George Will, and it's great to be a fan, but if I want ten paragraphs on Albert Pujols' slugging percentage, there's many more interesting sporstswriters to get it from.

Before anyone cries 'hypocrite', this isn't a political blog, I don't pretend to be an expert on anything and...er... uh.... Shut Up!!!

Hey, what's your favorite Sports Teams?

No one's ever asked me this question, but screw you, it's MY blog.

I've decided to allow the selection of teams that don't exist anymore as well. I'll go in order of favorite sports, starting with the Stern B.A.;

Basketball - Seattle Sonics, Boston Celtics, San Diego Conquistadors (ABA), Washington Bullets (but not the Wizards), Skipper Bologna (Italian league).

English League Soccer- Manchester United, Everton, Chelsea, Queens Park Rangers, Sheffield Wednesday

Australian Rules Football - St. Kilda Saints, Carlton Blues, Collingwood Magpies, Melbourne Demons, Fitzroy Lions

Ice Hockey - New York Rangers, Toronto Maple Leafs, Boston Bruins, Minnesota Northstars, Hartford Whalers

Football - Seattle Seahawks, New England Patriots, Miami Dolphins, Tampa Bay Buccaneers (back when they wore 3 shades of orange), Boston Breakers (USFL)

US Soccer - Seattle Sounders (NASL), New York Cosmos, New England Revolution, Portland Timbers, Tampa Bay Rowdies

Baseball - Seattle Mariners, Boston RedSox, Oakland A's, Chicago Cubs, Orix BlueWave (japan)

Miscellaneous - Otago Highlanders (NZ Rugby), Dutch National Soccer team, FC Barcelona (Spain's La Liga soccer), Fiorentina (italian serie A soccer), Cruz Azul (mexican soccer).

Oh well, that's it. Back to bitter shit about people and politics I hate....

Big Game Hunting

One of the ways I spend my spare time is by pissing off blow-hard republican assholes online. One of them is some guy in Florida (of course) who runs a blog called Mr. Blonde's Garage. He thinks he's smart because he uses words like 'strawmen' and 'clashpoint'. He's also a huge Yankees fan, so yesterday was great for even one more reason. Here's part of his response to the Yankees loss last night and my response to it.

"Was this the biggest choke job in the history of sports? My answer: No. I’ll explain later."

Look at you Jay. It only happened hours ago and you're already spinning. OF COURSE it's the biggest choke of all time. No team has ever done this before (and dont' tell me about the 1942 Maple Leafs, that's garbage). The best part is that this record can never be beaten, only tied!! Better start hoping they extend the ALCS to a best-of-nine or the Yankees will forever be known as the biggest chokers ever.

I think the turning point of the entire series was that bush-league bitch A-Rod sissy-slapping the ball from Arroyo. From that point on, the Sox knew that the Yankees thought they had to cheat to win. It's kind of like this year's presidential race. The turning point was the Swift Boat veterans. Once they were exposed to be nothing more than partisan liars, people realized how low the right wing wouuld go and combined with three drubbings in the debates, people are flocking to Kerry. Looks like it's gonna be a rough couple o' weeks for ya Jay...

And how does it feel to get beat by the two guys that ZERO Sox fans would've bet on to be heroes, Damon and Lowe?

More Scary than A Radioactive Super Halloween

I'm a little late to the game here, as this article came out last week, but Ron Susskind's article in the New York Times, click here, is the single most frightening thing I've read in a long, long time. The article, entitled 'Without a Doubt' details president Bush's belief that he is chosen by God to run the world, and that reason and intellectualism mean nothing because Jesus Christ himself tells him what to do.

Those of us who take the time to think things through and live hedonistic 'secular' lives even have a name in this twisted little theocracy we live under. We are living in the 'reality-based community'. In the following quote, one of Bush's aides talks about the death of analysis, plans to lock up the scientists, hang Gallileo, bring back the Inquisition etc.;

"The aide said that guys like me were ''in what we call the reality-based community,'' which he defined as people who ''believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.'' I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ''That's not the way the world really works anymore,'' he continued. ''We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.''

That's one of the PRESIDENT'S AIDES. David Koresh himself wouldn't have believed in anything this nutty. If we continue down this path, the rest of the world will see us as nothing more than Rajneeshies, blindly following our cult leader and buying him Rolls-Royces. With one slight difference, I dont' believe the Baghwan ever had his finger on the button.

Save us Jeebus!!!

The Death of Debating

"Yeah, well Kerry's just a better debater". I've heard this said about a million times since the debates by republican apologists as a way to concede the debates, but then cheapen that victory at the same time. Rush Limbaugh referred to John Kerry as "A Slickster debater". All of the sudden, to be good at debating is a bad thing. It makes you part of the 'liberal over-educated elite'.

What the fuck is going on with this country when debating, DEBATING is viewed as something a presidential candidate shouldn't be good at? What the fuck do you think presidents do? It's not like plumbing or tricking out a '66 Impala. Presidents actually benefit from being articulate.
You see, presidents engage in discussions with other leaders of the World in order to try and reconcile conflicts and make everyone safer. Personally, I would like the person in this position to be 'smart'. Yes, maybe even smarter than me! Why in the holy name of fucking christ would you allow jealousy over someone's 'book-learnin' and debating skills to cloud your judgement over who should be running the country.

Some advice for you morons out there that are going to vote for him; The rest of the world isn't impressed by George Bush's idiocy the way the retarded, mouth-breathing right wing of this country is. The rest of the world isn't 'charmed' by his down-home, no nonsense method of speaking. The rest of the world doesn't admire his strong faith that prohibits him from admitting mistakes. The rest of the world is frightened that the largest military on the planet is controlled by someone who can't string together 5 words that make sense if his life depends on it.

Memo to Coors Light

Hey Adolph Coors, if that is your REAL name (I assume it is. Who would change their name to Adolph?), about your nonstop television and radio advertising for Coors Light, I just want to say, We get it. We completely understand that Coors Light is a beer made for complete assholes. Yes, yes, If you're a 30-something former frat guy trying to drown out the memory of the time when you sucked off four pledges as part of 'initiation', then we understand that Coors Light is the memory inhibitor of choice.

Here's a current radio ad that runs at least 3 times an hour on sportstalk radio;

To the tune of 'Take me Out To The Ballgame', which is already the most annoying song of all time.
"Take me out to the party, Take me out to the bar, buy us some pitchers of cold coors light, I hope I got her phone number right, cause it's those blondes, brunettes and those redheads, with rings in their bellies and ears, Cause it's 1,2,3 nights a week with my Bro's and Beer".

Every single word makes me want to vomit in my own mouth. It certainly makes me want to never even consider drinking Coors Light ever again, which isn't so hard since it tastes like cold-filtered urine anyway.

Seriously though, if this advertising (which includes the equally awful "...And Twins" campaign) appeals to you in the least, please take the next available opportunity to drive your Camaro into the brick wall that surrounds the planned community you live in.

This week's SFist reprint

Staggering Through Fog

A heaping helping of loudmouth soup to try and help you pick a San Francisco bar that doesn't suck. By Andrew Lowder

Think of all the things that come to mind when youthink of Wales; Anthony Hopkins, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Dylan Thomas, The Village from the old TV show The Prisoner... Um, Did I say Dylan Thomas already? Ok, only four things. And even though it shames us that we didn't know about the Welsh tradition of Nos Galan Gaeaf (Halloween), and have never been invited to an Eisteddfod (party), that won't stop us from checking out this week's bar.

Dylan's - This place is very, very necessary in the heart of the otherwise hipster/biker-overrun Mission. From the bolted down stools to the tiny, uncomfortable tables, this place has that certain aura of dirty alcoholic bliss about it that can't be created on purpose. The bartenders are always cool and talkative and it's just a great place for early evening hanging out.

The beer selection is also very good, with some of the most professionally poured Hoegaarden in the city. This place definitely goes on our shortlist of near-perfect bars to bring out your inner degenerate. So grab a pretentious-looking novel, put on that cardigan that smells like feet and head on down to Dylan's!

Until next week, when we promise to investigate a culture with more easily pronounceable words,
Liver...Out!!

Eugene Mirman & David Cross Get Wasted, Discuss Indie Rock

Eugene Mirman and David Cross go five rounds with Entertainment Weekly's Laura Gilbert.

ROUND 1
EW (Heineken): How long have you guys known each other?
Mirman (Dewar's neat): I moved to New York four years ago, and we met maybe a year after that.
EW: So why's David here tonight?
Mirman: I've guided him through hard times -- but more specifically because I opened for him in D.C. for the recording of his album, and he did the liner notes for mine.

ROUND 2
Mirman (Irish Car Bomb [a shot of Baileys and Jameson dropped into a pint of Guinness]): We drop the glass in here?
Cross (Irish Car Bomb): Then chug. [Drinks] Belch.
EW (Irish Car Bomb): You opened for the Shins, right?
Mirman: Yes, I toured with Modest Mouse, too, and I'm about to do a tour with Yo La Tengo.
Cross: How'd Modest Mouse go?
Mirman: Fun. Most audiences were cool, I do a lot of videos, so people are hesitant, but then you do a video and they pay attention, then people are excited. On one, I edited myself in the Mötley Crüe Behind The Music. So it's Mötley Crüe talking about how fucked up everything is, and then I'm like, "I woke up with 17 girls inside my dick!"

ROUND 3
EW (Irish Car Bomb): When did you move here from Russia?
Mirman (The Macallan neat): When I was about 4 ... I'm pretty drunk.
Cross: I heard the Von Bondies did this Five Rounds thing and didn't even drink all their drinks.

ROUND 4
EW (Heineken): What albums should someone buy if they wanted to fake being a hipster like you guys?
Cross (Heineken): Get one electroclash CD, whatever it is, then pretend you don't listen to it anymore and you hate it. And you have to have something on the Vice label, the Streets or Death From Above 1979.
Mirman (The Macallan neat): It depends. Just how cool do you want to be?
Cross: It's like when The New York Times writes about hipsters and they're always a year and half behind. I swear to God they just wrote an article about the Blackberry. "Outside of hotshot office people and metrosexual people, most people don't know about it." What?!?! It's been around for fucking years. Years. Not months, years! Several years. But "Hot off the press!"

ROUND 5
Cross (Heineken): Let me tell you what happened in London. It's been several years since I puked from drinking, but in London we went to Crobar.
Mirman (dirty Tanqueray martini): Is that here?
Cross: In London, England, not London, Arizona. I said London like three times! Anyway, I did Irish Car Bombs, then Jägermeister shots and more beer. I woke up the next morning really out of it, with my glasses on the ground, stepped on. I go to the bathroom and there is a deep red, bloody purplish, massive amount of puke on the side of the walls, the side of the bowl, in the back of the bowl...
Mirman: And that's when I remembered I murdered a kid! I never feel sick. The only time I'll feel sick is if I have a lot of water.

ROUND 6
Cross (Irish Car Bomb): It's "Five Rounds With..." but it didn't say "Only Five Rounds."
Mirman (Irish Car Bomb): Wow. We just fucking put the Von Bondies to shame! Let's break a a record, too! I will be the first to start ... with another Diet Coke!

SIDEBAR: EW stole Eugene Mirman's iPod, put it on shuffle - and confronted him with the results...

"Pink Triangle," Weezer
(from Pinkerton, 1996)
Mirman: I loved this when I was in college. I was never in love with a lesbian, oddly enough, but I'd be like, "If I was in love with a lesbian, I bet this is how I'd feel. But I'm not, so I guess I feel ... differently."

"Executioner," Robyn Hitchcock
(from Eye, 1990)
Mirman: A lot of people think of him as eccentric, but I find he's either very straight-forward or his absurdity is sincere - something I also try to do in comedy.

"Track 17," Eugene Mirman
(from The Absurd Nightclub Comedy Of Eugene Mirman, 2004)
Mirman: This dance remix of my jokes just happens to be in my iPod. I'm not like, "God, I am really making a different with my song jokes!"

"I Saw Nick Drake," Robyn Hitchcock
(from A Star For Bram, 2000)
Mirman: I guess I have 1,000 songs and 400 of them are Robyn Hitchcock, so he's going to come up a lot. Nick Drake is awesome. You can ask anyone at Volkswagen. They'll back me on this.

* * *

More Anti-American Hoo-Ha...

Pure capitalism does not work. If you think this statement is wrong, or unpatriotic or the ramblings of a lazy bastard, then you are either an idiot, in upper management, or more likely both.

I bring this up because as more and more people are forced out of jobs with small businesses and have to go work for Wal-Mart or Honeywell or whatever, they wind up buying into the complete and total 'hooray corporate America' bullshit that they are fed day after day after day. And then, after years of being brainwashed into thinking that their laughably small stock buy-in is going to enable them to retire rich, they vote republican in a completely misguided attempt to make their .0001% into .0002%.

Every single day, hundreds more people are thrust into this environment which is nothing more than a culture of fear. Total panic, combined with the natural human instinct to 'belong to something' turns these formerly independent thinkers into mindless drones that half-heartedly convince themselves that they're still rebellious because they go nuts on Smirnoff Ice's every weekend with their fellow scared-as-hell coworkers. Even people who hate their boss and complain about him/her constantly maintain the mistaken belief that they're 'lucky to have a job' and that eventually the company will reward their efforts.

Large corporations employ huge Human Resources departments whose main job is to sell the employees the absolute lie that the corporate machine gives two shits about their workers. Corporations want two things from every single person they employ; Work harder and accept less money than you deserve. If there was any way to do it, most corporations would pay their non-management workers $5 in cafeteria food credits per day and require that everyone sleep in the warehouse. If you disagree, tell me how it's much more humane for a company to close their American plant entirely and move overseas where they can get away with $5 a day and don't even have to let people in the warehouse at all.

This is what infuriated me about George W Bush during last night's debate. When answering the question of companies shipping jobs abroad, he said, "We need to educate people for the 21st century jobs", he then repeated this simple notion chimp-like for 2 minutes. So what do you tell the computer programmer that just lost his job to someone in India? Does computer programming not count as a 21st century job? I think by 21st century job, Bush probably means pool cleaner and BMW mechanic. And this is all on purpose, because if everyone thinks that there's rapidly becoming no middle class at all, they're going to work like dogs for next to nothing to try and get on the right side of the 'everything/nothing' careerpath. Later in the debate, Bush answered a question on minimum wage with the same stupid education mantra, basically saying that if your company is fucking you over by paying you $6/hour or moves their whole operation to Bangladesh, it's your fault for being so damn stupid. Welcome to C-student Bush's 'new age of responsibility'.

One thing's for sure, when you remove any and all restrictions from big business, as is the neo-con battle cry, you wind up with sweatshops. You wind up with garment factories like there were in New York in the early 1900s, where everyone is locked in, bathroom breaks are forbidden and fire exits are sealed shut. People act as though sweatshops and horrible working conditions can only occur in third world dictatorships, but unchecked capitalism can create them just as easily.

So the next time President Bush or some other Neo-con asshole talks about 'trickle down economics' or corporations being able to 'self-regulate' themselves on environmental policy if they could only make more profits, remember that it's a complete lie. A lie devised and perfected by teams of former frat-boy salesmen who've never had anything close to a personality no matter what the personalized plate on their Corvette says. We've been down this road before. Unions and regulations were created for a reason, and the reason is that corporations cannot ever, ever, EVER be trusted to self-govern.

I'm a sucker for the big comedy moustache.

All Americans must watch this video before you vote. Think about it. It's ALL true!! Especially the part about Chuck Norris!

Link to the truth the Moonbat lefty pinkos don't wan't you to see.

Sample the Vote!

Saw a clip of P. Diddy on This Week with George Stephanopolous (or however the hell you spell it) talking about how he knows that blacks will come out and vote in force this election because he 'knows his people'. Good for him, I guess, for getting involved.

The quesion that immediately came to my mind was 'What kind of weird fantasy world does Mr. Daddy-Diddy live in that he thinks poorly sampling other people's music several years ago places his finger directly on the pulse of the African-American community?'. It's kind of hard to be so 'influential' when you rip off other people's music for a living. I know that he used to run a record company or something, but what exactly is it that Sean Combs does for a living these days? He's spent the last few years just degenerating into one of those 'Charo' level celebrities that exists only to appear on bad game shows and occasionally show up on the back page of the Enquirer when they go broke and the IRS shows up to tow away their Escalade.

So enjoy being on actual news shows for now, Mr. Diddy. I look forward to seeing you trade barbs with Burt Reynolds on the all new 2006 Super Password.

Bedsores Are Like His Kryptonite

R.I.P. Christopher Reeve. You may go down as having lived the single most ironic life ever. Other contenders include Leader of the Free World George W. Bush and all the citizens of Liberia.

Berts of the World Unite!

Perhaps more so than even the mullett, having a big giant unibrow will cause people to assume that you are a semi-retarded mouth breather.

check it out HERE

Who the Hell ever Said Sunday was a Day of Rest?

Oh yeah, God. (By the Way, the picture's got nothing to do with anything contained within. I just wanted to bring in a younger demographic. They like the crack, right?) Anywho, I think I'm gonna start reprinting my weekly column for SFist.com here on Sundays. That way, I can increase my laziness potential and participate more fully in the ancient homo-erotic ritual of watching football with the guys. So here goes: (keep in mind that the SFist has a certain writing requirement that may read a little odd at first. They frown upon first person writing, which is basically all I've got)

Staggering Through Fog, a weekly Bushmill's-soaked confession on bar culture by Andrew Lowder.

Union Square is probably the one place in San Francisco that feels the least like San Francisco. It's as if you dumped the people of Hollywood onto 5th Avenue in Manhattan. And since we're not big fans of shopping for $1000 Louis Vitton bags or nibbling on mediocre, overpriced appetizers in hotel bars full of tourists and salesmen, we tend to avoid the Square as much as humanly possible.

But if we're anything at the SFist, we're masochists. Every now and again you've got to plunge back into an area just to make sure it didn't become interesting while you weren't looking. And so, being very careful and trying to keep an open mind, we paid the $12 parking and plunged right in.

Here's the first problem, everything closes at ten o'clock! Aside from the mildly entertaining but horribly over-crowded Gold Dust, it seemed as though all other bars locked their doors about 5 minutes before our arrival. Even legendary haunts like the Owl Tree called it a night at 11. Finally, after what seemed like 2 hours of pulling on locked doors, we found a place willing to stay up past sunset.

Azul - 1 Tillman Place, just northeast of Union Square. Located at the end of a little alleyway, this spacious, after work meet market tries way too hard. From the twin plasma screens showing Barbarella to the impractical 'mattress outlet' style seating, Azul is a tapas menu away from the annoying yuppie trifecta. Drinks weren't ridiculously overpriced, but seemed a little weak, and the overall 'scene', while certainly not being the most annoying in the city, was still far too stifling to warrant staying for more than two.

So while it's always good to occasionally get out of your 'comfort zone', just remember that doing so will probably result in being uncomfortable.

Liver....Out!

And it goes on like this...

Everyone seems to think it was quite a spirited debate last night. Oooh, the zingers! Body blow! Uppercut!

In reality it was about as exciting as watching two people say the exact 4 or 5 sound bites they've been saying for a year or so now over and over and over. Bush didn't walk out with shit all over his hands and ask Kerry for five bucks, so the right wing community is falling over themselves proclaiming victory.

Not since the Special Olympics have I seen so many people impressed with so little. Just because 'Corky' Bush didn't crap his pants at the starter's pistol doesn't mean he won. As soon as the debate was over, my wife was amazed that I thought it was essentially a tie, but I was taking into account that for Bush's base, a perfect debate is one where you don't choke on a pretzel or pee on the bible. According to them, he did a great job showing off his 'passion' without confusing everyone with facts and nuance.

The best response to Bush's nonstop claims of Kerry's flip-flopping came from one of the pundits afterward (I forget who). "Kerry changes his opinion to suit the facts, and Bush tries to change the facts to suit his opinion'. I'll just leave it at that.

Do The World A Favor And Kill Yourself #3

Time once again to dole out some hate to ordinary, everyday Americans who would make life better for everyone else if they hurled themselves off the bow of a Disney cruise.

ANYONE IN A HUMMER

No, really, anyone (Ok, military personnel excluded. Gotta support the troops!). If you have any desire whatsoever to own one of these gas-inhaling, 3 lane-wide, asshole-mobiles, than not only do you deserve to die, but we should also get to kill your parents for not buying you enough Tonka trucks when you were a kid.

In this exact time in history, when gas is $2.50 a gallon and moronic presidents whose dad's friends are all Saudi oil barons cause he's too big an asshole to have American friends so off we go to war to line all their pockets with fuckwads of cash, what possible legitimate reason does anyone have to drive around a truck thats only message is 'Go fuck your mother, I'm rich and can afford to fill this behemoth up'?

Unfortunately, unlike the Harley-ridin' shitbag featured in DTWAFAKY #1 (a very rare issue, I might add), you will probably not die behind the wheel of your silly-ass gangsta-tank. Therefore, I'm forced to hope that your cologne-stinkin', mullet-enhancin', jeep-for-assholes has been infected with Gulf War Syndrome, and that you will die alone in a V.A. Hospital next to a REAL soldier who makes you give him blowjobs to test if any feeling has returned below his waist.

Boise Sucks!

How's that for an attention getting headline?

Every once in awhile, I hear about someone reading this piddling little bit of retard-scrawl that really surprises me. The other day, I heard that a friend of mine that I haven't seen in a long time (We'll just call her Susie C. , No wait, that's too obvious, we'll just call her S. Crain) reads this thing daily, and was really upset when I didn't post for a couple of days during my trip to southern California.

Let me just say that I really do appreciate the kind words and such that people have said to me or through friends. The idea that anyone would be disappointed when I don't post (even if that's a complete and total lie) is probably the only thing that kicks my ass enough to continue to post, if that makes any sense.

I really can't tell if this is a self-serving, humble or just plain weird topic. Perhaps the answer lies in drinking more beer...

I've gone mad with my very limited POWER!!

SPECIAL 'EDITED' BY THE MAN EDITION

As if cued by my recent post about how (a nameless DVR device) has consumed me and that I must cut back on the amount of (certain activities), I got a call the other day from the (censored) Corporation. Yes, THAT (censored) Corporation, wanting to know if I'd be interested in participating in a program wherein they (do something of an undisclosed nature).

Of course I said 'shoot yes'. If there's anything I can do to make the executives at Adult Swim richer and try to put an end to the career of Jim Belushi, then you better goddamn believe I'll do it! If I can somehow play a small role in destroying ABC's TGIF lineup or prevent another CSI or Law and Order Spinoff, then I'm as game as Parker Brothers.

With any luck, someday I'll pass by a homeless Charlie Sheen and I'll be able to let him know that it was ME who got 'Two and a half Men' cancelled. HAhahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!

Music, Response...

I'm sure everyone's dying to know what kind of music I'm currently listening to, so here goes;

Scissor Sisters - Fun, gay, retro, kind of a mix between good Elton John, fucked-up BeeGees and that 'Debra' song from Beck's Midnite Vultures CD. Great music to play while driving around.

Fatboy Slim - New album 'palookaville' just came out, and unfortunately, in my opinion, it kinda stinks. Too much Bootsy Collins and not enough danceable music. I always thought that Weapon of Choice was the worst song off his last album, but unfortunately Mr. Slim thought the opposite.

Prodigy - Despite a great title, 'Always outnumbered, never outgunned', thier new album doesn't nearly compensate for 7 years of waiting. There's a few strong tracks, but overall, it feels like the experimental album they should have released 7 months after 'Fat of the Land'.

Mint Royale - 'Dancehall Places'. A really great dance album. Sort of a cross between early Chemical Brothers and slightly more obscure stuff like Bentley Rhythm Ace. Once you hear the chorus of "I'm the sexiest man in Jamaica" you won't be able to get it out of your head for weeks.
Well, that's about it for now. Just thought I'd try and break up the monotony of non-stop bitter political posts.

We don't need that ding-dang rest of the world!!

I was recently reading some comments on a right-wing blog about last week's debate. Among the sea of posts spinning it as 'a victory on style but not on substance' was this gem;

"The War On Terror is not a war on al Qaeda as John Kerry keeps trying to say with his point about getting Bin Laden. It’s about destroying anyone that would use terror to advance a political view, especially the ones who have a beef with the United States."

…and it’s not alarming that Bush’s policies create more people who have ‘beef’ with the U.S. every single day? At this rate, in 100 years, when we’re still fighting the poorly defined WOT (and therefore, are still not allowed to criticize the president or anyone more to the right than John McLaughlin), we should be engaged in a war with most of the 15 to 20 billion people not intelligent enough to be Americans.

They’re all exactly right when they say ‘we don't have to ask permission of the rest of the world to do anything’. But have you ever considered that since most of the world’s nuc-u-lar weapons are outside the United States, that it might be a good idea not to be complete assholes to the rest of the globe? This line of thinking is great for someone who sits on their porch in West Virginia with a loaded shotgun to keep people off their land, but what about the rest of us who actually would like to travel somewhere besides Las Vegas?

More Cathartic Horseshit

"Jack of all trades, master of none". Yeah, I fucking wish! I would say up to this point I am a 6 or 7 of all trades and lack the persistence or attention span to reach the level of Jack.

At any given point, there's about a hundred things that I'd love to do really well. Speak spanish, fix old cars, DJ, make movies, argue politics or religeon from a really well educated stance, cook well, have a successful career, learn real computer stuff and not just be able to dick around on the internet, get in shape. You fucking name it, and I've probably spent some small part of my life screwing around with it.

The repeating pattern, however, is that at the exact moment when I either need to choose to stick with it and get good at it or give it up, I convince myself that I probably wouldn't enjoy it for very much longer and then would be saddled doing something I didn't like (Or, to translate, I'm too goddamn lazy to actually see it through). It takes an incredible amount of self-denial and complete bullshit, but that's something that I actually have taken the time to master. I could enroll in a class to become manager of chocolate factory staffed with big breasted hookers, and I would probably drop out after a few weeks because I wouldn't want a job to ruin my love of chocolate and breasts.

As I creep closer and closer to the big 3-5, it occurs to me that I've got to choose something. There aren't many 60-year old warehouse temps out there, and I'm pretty sure that's not from a lack of looking.

Maybe I'll enroll in a class on how to get paid for pissing away spare time. Nah, then I'd just develop a hatred of time-wasting....

You Had a Life, Now Tivo's Got It

"I received Tivo as a gift, and it's the greatest gift I've ever received. Greater even than the gift of LIFE!!" - Patton Oswalt.

Tivo's advertising slogan is, "You have a life, Tivo gets it.". That's all well and good, but I really think that it should come with some sort of warning that if you are a lazy, slovenly person who watches way too much TV to begin with, Tivo is like hooking up a heroin addict with a remote-controlled smack delivery system. Since acquiring this demon box, I'm now commited to watching Around the Horn, Pardon the Interruption, I, Max, Letterman, Conan, most reality shows, Alias, Lost, 24, Dinner for Five, Jeopardy, Simpsons reruns I've seen a million times, Aqua Teen and Sealab reruns I've seen 2 million times, Al Franken's radio show on Sundance, English Premier League highlights, Aussie Rules Football highlights, Sportscenter, Monty Python, The Prisoner, Arrested Development, lots of shit on the Trio network, and the Daily Show.

I feel better now that I have at least reached the acceptance stage. Listing all those shows was very cleansing, like a crackhead finally being able to see the damage done by all those harmless looking little white rocks. Do I really need to watch Sportscenter, the Horn, PTI and I, Max? That's 3 1/2 hours of daily television related to one day's sports topics! I could probably live without either Conan or Letterman as well, and I've got to stop watching the Simpsons. I know all there is to know about it already. It's starting to push out other information that I might actually need someday, like remembering how to steer a car or operate a drinking fountain.

Well I'm glad I could share my horrible, horrible addiction story. Learn from my mistakes and use your Tivo wisely or else suffer the same fate as me. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to find out what happens this week on Oscar DeLaHoya's reality boxing show...

Forensics Ahoy!

There was a theme running through last night's debate. "This president thing is harder than mismanaging a baseball team and oil company put together!". You can pretty safely assume that whenever GW says "hard work", he's just expressing frustration that he has to do any work at all.

Observe these actual, non-fucked with excerpts:

"In Iraq, no doubt about it, it's tough. It's hard work. It's incredibly hard."

"It's-and it's hard work. I understand how hard it is. I get the casualty reports every day. I see on the TV screens how hard it is. But it's necessary work."

"We're making progress. It is hard work."

"You know my hardest, the hardest part of the job is to know that I committed the troops in harm's way and then do the best I can to provide comfort for the loves ones who lost a son or a daughter or husband and wife."

"Her husband, P.J., got killed-been in Afghanistan, went to Iraq. You know, it's hard work to try to love her as best as I can knowing full well that the decision I made caused her, her loved one to be in harm's way."

"Yeah, we're the job done. It's hard work."

"Understand how hard it is to commit troops. I never wanted to commit troops. I never - when I was running - when we had the debate in 2000, never dreamt I'd be doing that, but the enemy attacked us, Jim, and I have a solemn duty to protect the American people, to do everything I can to protect us."