Thoughtless for the Day

Quote of the Week

As Americans, it is our DUTY to demand that innocent men are not shipped off to foreign countries and tortured for a year to lower the insignificant, tiny chance that we might get killed by a terrorist by another insignificant, tiny fraction. And anyone who can't perform that duty is a coward, a quisling, and a traitor.

That guy over at You Are Dumb

Dear Hugo Chavez,
I don't think I really need to introduce myself since, as a rabid Marxist who loves nothing better than to denigrate George Bush; the odds are pretty good that you've been reading my blog since the late 90's. In fact, if I'm not mistaken, you regularly post in the forum under the name of "razlerja".

As a regular reader you're no doubt familiar with my regular bouts of depression. As a matter of fact, I deep into one of these fits of depression just yesterday afternoon. You see, I had driven down to Barnes & Nobel to eat lunch and browse the books and magazine. So there I am, strolling around the store when my eye caught a copy of a 2007 guide to London. Hugo, I almost burst into tears right there on the spot.

I don't know if you've ever been to London in late September but, with the possible exception of Paris in the spring, there's no better place to be. To put it frankly: It's certainly no sweltering jungle shit-hole like Venezuela. Just thinking about London in the early fall and how, thanks to my obligations (read: job), I won't be seeing London for a very, very long time - if ever again - made want to jump in front of a bus (Only this was in Wilmington and the average speed of a DART bus is roughly three-miles-per-hour. I swear to fuck that I once saw a guy with a walker outrun a DART bus.).

I probably would've remained in a deep state of depression for the rest of that afternoon (and, indeed, for many afternoons to follow) had not I then noticed a table covered with multiple copies of single book - a book to which I had contributed!

Now, you're most likely saying to yourself in that odd Speedy Gonzales voice of yours "Madre con Dios! I am to be reading RATYHTL all the day, yet I am unknowing that Senor Anonymous to a book has contributed. I feel so empty: like I am stricken with Montezuma's Revenge."

Don't feel left out, Hugo. I haven't told any of my reader about the book yet. No, this is not due to any feelings of modestly that might have somehow remained intact after a decade-long career in music. It's just that I was sort of embarrassed. You see, the book is called Weird Hauntings, and it's not the sort of book that I usually promote on my web site.

Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad book. As a collection of modern folktales goes, I think it's fascinating. And I'm honored that Mark & Mark of Weird New Jersey fame were kind enough to include me in the project as I've been impressed by their work for years. And I'm pretty damn pleased that, while the version that ended up in print is a pretty heavily edited version of the draft I submitted (this is OK as I told the editor to do with it whatever she pleased), my piece is the only one that offers logical explanations for the weirdness encountered. Sure, it's not the Paris Review, but it's something; right? In fact, it might just be something to be proud of!

And that's the thought that came to me, like a ray of sunshine, standing in that bookstore on Tuesday afternoon. I was, once again, smiling. But I still wasn't any closer to London. And that's were you come in, Hugo.

I noticed that during your speech to the UN today, you plugged a copy of Noam Chomsky's Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance. While that's a mighty fine read, I'm sure you realize that Professor Chomsky has enough cash on hand to visit London whenever he damn well pleases. If you're really interested in helping out the underprivileged, then you might want to spend the month or two that you have left on Earth before the CIA whacks you plugging Weird Hauntings. You could do a lot worse.

Yours in Christ (which is to say "Yours in me"),

Rodney Anonymous

PS. Be sure to tune in Friday night for Blair's latest E-letter.