Bored and sick, I thought I might just have a little fun on Craigslist. Now, granted, "a little fun on Craigslist" for most people usually involves buying teal-colored teacups or cruising the "causual encounters" section for some pretend action, but I thought I might try a little social experiment.
"What if I post a repulsively surreal ad, but use an attractive picture of a woman; who would respond?"
Well, sadly, the CL community is quick to flag posts, so my various attempts at posting surreal, entirely offensive personals were largely unsuccessful. ("read me the bible while I call you Uncle Steve" just didn't fly)
This was the best ad that I could come up with that was able to remain up for more than 15 minutes (it was up for about an hour):
What did I find in the responses? Well, first off, most people online either can't spell or aren't interested in spelling correctly (who knew so many words were spelled with numbers?). Second off, it appeared that most people were typing with one hand/while orgasming.
Not a shock there either.
Out of about 70 or so, here are my favorite responses:
1) THE CHEF: Look out for his Joycean prose, especially in the line "soooooo good like a cornicopia of wonderful herbiliciousness".
2) MR. PUT U TORKEY IN THAN OVER LIKE 2 HURS: Mmmm...just say it out loud with me: "put u torkey in than oven like 2 hurs"...if that smooth talking doesn't get you sizzling hot, I don't know what does...
3) THE GAMBLER: There's B, who wants to meet me at Granny's Doughnuts so we can take the bus to a casino together. Mmmm...doughnuts, a bus ride and an inveterate gambler...what could be hotter?
4) THE SWIFTIAN WIT: Why this man isn't writing for The New Yorker is beyond me...
What else did I find?
1) More wangs than you can shake a stick at, if that's your idea of a good time. 2) A lot of "military servicemen" are trolling CL for hot action. They all have six packs and a tongue like an electric eel. 3) A lot of earnestly horny people who will look past the fact that this odd, obviously fake woman wants deli meats rubbed all over her body for sexual pleasure.
As a statement of our life and times, this ranks slightly below "TMZ".
Here are three more great sitcoms that you probably haven't seen, unless you're me, in which case you should definitely get out more. Oh, and get that weird thing checked out. You know what I'm talking about.
4) PEEP SHOW (2003-present): "Peep Show" is probably the most innovative sitcom to come about since "Seinfeld"...at least up there with "Arrested Development" in terms of sheer originality.
Sure, it's got all the trademark awkward ingredients of a 2000-era sitcom; uncomfortable sexual situations, characters doing extremely embarrassing things, et al...but unlike other single camera "awkwardfests", this show does something unique: it's shot entirely from the point of view of the characters. This, combined with a good deal of "uncomfortable internal monologue" voice over, makes for a suitably original show that really allows you to understand, identify and empathize with the main characters.
Also, the dialogue is pretty fucking sparkling. I'm glad it's lasted as long as it has. US stations have tried a few pilots, but it was never picked up. Surprise! Can you imagine a major network taking a risk on something like this?
Again, like "Black Books" embedding was disabled on all youtube videos...so this was all I could find...
The premise: one of the characters wants to trip on acid with a bunch of his friends, while his roommate is sick and needs the living room to watch training videos to prepare for a big conference. Solution: he drugs his roommate and contemplates raping him.
5) ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT (2003-2006): OK, you've probably seen this, thought..."hey, this is funny", then turned it off and forgotten about it. Seriously, this might be one of the top three or four sitcoms to have come around in the last 20 years.
What's so amazing about it? Well, first, the cast. Each and every single actor is hilarious. Even the kids; sure, everyone thinks Michael Cera is guffaw-inducing now, after "Superbad", but he was even funnier as the awkward George Michael. Jason Bateman? Who knew that one of the "Hogan Family" would end up being so naturally jocose.
Second, the scripts: as tight and plotted as a late-season "Seinfeld", but with enough room to allow the actors to improv and squeeze every last bit of funny from each quip. The jokes felt natural without that sickening "babbling improv" crap that most single camera comedies have now.
Third, the style; yeah, almost every sitcom on TV is single camera now...but that wasn't the case in 2003. Why are shows single camera now? Because...it's what's popular. Why was "Arrested Development"? Because, narratively, it was a mockumentary. The verite style MADE SENSE with a single camera. Why is "Kath and Kim" a single camera? Because 3 camera shows don't sell anymore.
Much like Jesus, "Arrested Development" had to die in order for lesser single camera shows to live. Watch this clip...but better yet, catch up with this show on Hulu. I believe every episode is available.
6) SPORTSNIGHT (1998-2000): Aaron Sorkin's version of a network sitcom. To my knowledge the absolute first single camera "situation comedy", although it felt much more like a dramedy than anything else.
Kind of like a funnier version of "The West Wing" the show never really felt long enough, but on the plus side, it made you always want more. Intellectual, emotional, and occasionally overwrought; this was a show about 10 years ahead of its' time.
Put it on now, and it's a thinking man's "30 Rock". 10 years ago, it was just super confusing (is it a comedy, is it a drama? why aren't there 3 cameras?). So confusing, in fact, that ABC thought it needed a laugh track ("see, this is supposed to be funny!"). Can you imagine a single camera show having a laugh track now? Thankfully, it was removed after a few episodes or so.
In any case, totally worth Netflixing, if just to get a lesson in intelligent, witty dialogue. Thank God Sorkin was still on the crank when he was writing this!
What I truly love about Sorkin's writing is that he's able to squeeze mini tangents into his dialogue. As a writer, you're tempted to put something off-topic, but interesting and amusing into your conversations, even if it's not germane to the scene. Invariably, you take it out because...it's not germane to the scene.
Sorkin, somehow, manages to keep them in AND make them germane to the scene, at least emotionally. Take the "what's not an insect?" line in this scene. What does that have to do with the conversation? Nothing. Is it a cherry on the delicious conversation cake? Definitely.
I promise to never, ever refer to anything as a "delicious conversation cake" again...
Well, I hope if you've read this far, I've managed to pique your interest in at least one of these tasty shows. If not, EPIC FAIL...as the kids these days say.
A lot of the dreck that passes for comedy theses days makes me vomit uncontrollably inside my mouth, which in turn makes me cry, which in turn makes me vomit some more.
There's a lot of stuff most Americans have never seen which is pretty friggin funny (and smart) and would blow certain unnamed, wretchedly unhilarious shows out of the comedy waters. Here are a few to get you started.
1) THE YOUNG ONES (1982, 1984): Without hyperbole, this is the greatest show of all time. OK, that was plenty of hyperbole and it's probably not the greatest show of all time. It is, however, the most wickedly insane situation comedy of all time. The show is basically indescribable, but the essential premise is that four college students live in disgustingly wretched student housing together. There are 4 archetypes; The Hippie, The Punk, The Cool Guy and The Poet Socialist.
The brilliant people behind "The Young Ones" discovered that variety shows got bigger budgets. So what did they do? They turned their sitcom into a variety show. A regular 1/2 hour will contain a wildly odd sitcom plot...and also a musical performance (from some great 80's bands), stand-up comedy, puppet asides and general madness. This, combined with the unrelentingly surrealistic situations (including a lion tamer moving in, a vampire sent in the mail, the house being transported back to the middle ages, etc) make for a wonderfully entertaining, yet compellingly unique, viewing experience.
2) BLACK BOOKS (2000-2004): If you think alcoholism, surrealism, narcissism, and people being really fucking awful to each other is funny, than this is the show for you. A situation comedy set in a tiny independent bookstore run by an alcoholic, chain-smoking Irishman named Bernard Black, it's kind of a 21st century "Fawlty Towers".
I'm always a big fan of big, broad surrealist comedies with an intellectual bent and plenty of self-loathing from the characters. Bernard Black is the ultimate alcoholic/comedic anti-hero. He just wants to read, drink, smoke and be left alone. Don't we all?
Why this isn't on TV more, I'll never know. From the same group of comedians that brought you "Shawn Of The Dead" and "Hot Fuzz".
Here's a clip (unfortunately, some evil soul went on to youtube and blocked any clips from this show from being embedded. Here's a whole episode...skip to about 5 minutes or so if you want to get a feeling of the humor):
3) NEWSRADIO (1995-1999): There was a palpable alternative comedy movement going on in the states in the 1990s represented by shows like "Mr. Show" and "The Ben Stiller Show": Newsradio is the culmination, and only mainstream example of this type of alternative comedy. How it lasted as long as it did on network TV is beyond me.
Basically creator Paul Simms hand-picked some of the best and brightest comedians of the 1990s (SNL's Phil Hartman, "Kids In The Hall"'s Dave Foley) and put them together in an office sitcom. Sure, most of the standard archetypes are there, but the characters and humor were original, unique and often absurd.
Take one plot from the final season; office dullard Matthew is given a drink that was invented by the office handyman to make him smarter. It does make him smarter, however the drink is just a placebo...he's just so stupid that he only becomes smarter because he thinks the placebo is the real thing. Paradoxical logic like that is always comedy gold.
That sort of humor combined with the fact that Dave Foley is one of the greatest straight-men of all time and Phil Hartman was one of the greatest funny-men of all time mean that there were a lot of memorable moments.
This is definitely a show worth revisiting, and now, thanks to Hulu, most of the episodes are available online for free.
Here's a quick clip; the premise of the episode is another one of those delectable, illogical situations: the boss wrote a book, had it translated into Japanese, then had it translated back into English...then had a public book reading.
Also, Ron Jeremy is in the audience as the book is being read. Delicious.
It was late 2005. I was sleeping in my warm, comfy bed in an extremely reasonable sized apartment in Astoria, Queens.
My eyes shot open.
"I'm going to die and there's no afterlife".
This was probably the first time that I grasped the full enormity of that statement. Sure, I tacitly understood it somewhere deep down inside me, but I never really digested it fully.
But there it was; obvious like the Octuplet lady's disfiguring plastic surgeries. Sitting there like a moist pee stain on the crotch of a homeless man on Sunset Boulevard.
Life is one big ball of nothingness. Unimportance, insignificance, week-old rice pudding.
The next day, I went to my weekly poker game to discuss the previous evening's epiphany. After a chorus full of "yeah, duh, obviously!" (I was in NYC, after all), I began to realize; this was something I needed to accept.
Have you accepted it? Do you agree with me in the first place? Am I randomly inserting questions in the middle of a blog to give me time to think of what to write in the next paragraph?
Life is probably a long journey to answer a single question; "what is life's long journey?". While the accomplishment of personal and professional goals are nice...they are not the solution; just the distraction; things to keep us busy while avoiding thinking about the greater context (or lack thereof) of our own lives.
My 98 year old grandmother passed away last year; and perhaps she gave me the greatest insight into an answer for the seemingly unanswerable.
In our last conversations, she provided me (and herself) no great wisdom, just a lot of love. But there was one thing; she was ready. Ready to accept life's ultimate fate. There was no if ands or buts. It was her time.
Maybe that's what it's all about. Acceptance. Understanding. Welcoming.
I'm certainly not there, or even close to being there. I doubt most people are, but perhaps to truly live a full life, you must accept that it's over. Accept that your time has come.
So love a fuckload, live a fuckload and enjoy a fuckload, because it's a pretty good distraction.
He asked her what she felt about Nietzsche, post-modernism and potato bread. Her answer to all three: delicious.
She was a worn out, run-down, nogoodnick who stole candy from babies and gave it to diabetics. Peculiarly cruel; her idea of 'a good time' was misusing pronouns in polite company.
This is exactly what turned on Schmenderson, professor of Advanced Complicated Things at Columbia University. Sure, they were both married, and he was pretty sure he was gay, but there was just something about her that was a turn on.
Maybe it was the gallon of cheap-swill vodka he drank, or maybe it was the fact she was lying on his bed, completely naked except a dollop of vegan sour cream; but whatever it was, he was about to make a difficult life choice.
He wasn't entirely sure why she was so into him; paunchy, balding and with a penis the shape of a 7, he wasn't exactly a 'catch'. But, he figured, there must be some sort of raw animal sexuality about him. Yeah, something that the ladies love. "LL Schmenderson" is what he was going to call himself from now on.
Then it crossed his mind she might be throwing herself at him because he had said "I will pay you 10 thousand dollars to have sex with me" less then ten minutes beforehand. Oh, right, that's probably it. "LL Schmenderson's Money".
Actually, now that he thought about it some more, he didn't really have 10 thousand dollars to his name. He was so poor that his dinner consisted of eating glue out of a light fixture with a matchstick. He worked in academics, for Christ's sake!
All his thinking made her nervous. What was his game? Was he going to renege on the deal? Does he realize I have crabs? Can I make a California Roll from my venereal disease?
She didn't like thinking, which was a problem because thinking about it gave her a headache. This happened a lot when she went fishing, especially when she caught a haddock.
She was concerned that he might be catching on and realizing that she wasn't quite as smart as she pretended. Her usual 'nod and repeat the last three words he said' works for a few hours, but one can only repeat 'are you listening?' so many times until people realize you're not.
This professor thought he was getting an intellectual, and this dullard thought she was getting money. This is a common theme in sexual relationships.
The only thing left was to come clean.
Him first: "I'm broke, but I think I love you."
Next, her: "Sean Lennon is the least talented of all the Beatle children"
"What?" "I mean, I'm fucking stupid. Sorry, I'm so stupid I forgot what we were talking about. French Maid TV?" "No." "iPhone applications?" "No." "Reality television?"
At this point, Schmenderson realized he wasn't dealing with someone who had a full deck. He slowly backed away, returned home to his wife and watched Gay Porn over and over again in an attempt to remove the image of the vacuous pudden-head that he thought he was brilliant.
"Welcome to the World of Inconsequence and Banality".
What a life we lead! We're lucky enough to have been born, which is a 1-10000000000 chance, so what do we do? Squander our time farting around. "Did you see the latest '24'?" "No, but because I spent last night counting my rancid hangnail collection!".
If we create religion to ease us into death, we create banality to ease us through life. We THRIVE in banality; because, like religion, it distracts us from the inevitable truth that we are about as transient and meaningless as next season's ABC comedy lineup. Whatever happened to TGIF, for that matter? For Family Matters, actually.
Maybe I'm a pessimist, but the only difference between a pessimist and optimist is that one is a realist and the other is an idle dreamer trying to convince themselves that life is more than a deadening spiral of disappointment leading to inexorable pain and loss. That, or a box of chocolates.
In any case, this is probably why bleak humor appeals to me. Dave Foley has always been one of my favorites; so back in college, I thought I would honor him and one of my favorite NewsRadio quotes.
Here is something I did while squandering my time idly farting around. I think I was about 20; I know that there is a sample or two mixed in with a very cheap drum beat that I wrote with my neighbor's very cheap drum machine.
So, enjoy! I spent about 10 minutes making it into a wondrously craptacular video:
Last night, I had some friends sleep over. This morning, instead of primping and glossing my normally perfect self, I jumped out of bed for the requisite Los Angeles Brunch (co-starring super douches!). My sweater has huge rips in it around the collar and my hair looks slightly more barmy than Nick Nolte's after a coke bender.
In any case, 10 hours later (haven't changed or combed my hair), I'm stuck in my house waiting for a 10PM party. I think to myself: what can I do that will kill some time?
I know! A late 80s Doctor Who adventure.
Amoeba has a ton of DVDs but it's about a 20 minute walk away, so I have to sprint over there. After all, I want to see Doctor Who AND go to a party! (that might be the first time anyone has ever mentioned those two events in the same sentence)
Arriving even more disheveled, I pick up some Doctor Who goodness. I get to the checkout counter...
The checkout girl is a Janeane Garofalo sarcastic/monotone-voiced almost hipster, wearing a tight flannel button-down that obscures the lettering on her Ironic Tee.
I speedily saunter over to the counter. She looks at me and laughs. I'm not sure why.
Then she looks at the DVD.
"Oh, I'm kinda into 70s Doctor Who. I don't know much about the 80s stuff".
Surprised and vaguely embarrassed that buying Doctor Who DVDs at 7:30 on a Saturday was part of my routine, I played it naive-like.
"Oh, yeah, I just heard that it was a good show and I thought I'd check it out...or something..."
"Someone told me that the 80s episodes are as good as the 70s, but I wasn't sure if I believed them".
Confusion set it; do I reveal my nerdiness, or do I play it cool? I tried to do a little of both.
"Yeah, I mean, how could it be better than the floppy hat guy with the scarf?"
She vaguely cracked a half smile, as if to ask the question: 'if you just "heard that it was a good show", than why do you know exact references to it?'. I tried to uncontradict my contradiction.
"Uhh...but yeah, my friend said the 80s episodes were good, and I thought it was worth checking out."
That did it; I'm a filthy liar and she knew it. I gave her my credit card and she stared at it for a long while. My guess? The name Manson brought a slow realization that, to her, explained my bindle-lugging hobo appearance and pronounced awkwardness.
She peered over at a bus pulling up next to the store and said: "I love to look at the people in the bus when they look into the store; really confused and miserable. Just how I look on a bus". Maybe she was describing me.
Smirking, she handed me my receipt.
I guess I get extremely uncomfortable sometimes and harp on unimportant minutiae. Maybe that's what makes me such a gas at parties. Or maybe I just pass gas at parties. Either way, there's an empty 10 foot radius around me.
After his 6-pack was cashed, he put some toast in the blender, but sadly it didn't become beer. Also, he probably should have taken the turkey and mayo off the bread before sticking it in the blender.
Disappointed, he went back to bed, where his German wife lay, gently sleeping.
He was Jewish and his mother never quite approved of her; but there's one thing his mother never truly understood. Subconsciously, every Jewish man wants to be murdered by their spouse. If he's with someone who could somehow commit genocide on him, that's even sexier.
Of course her grandparents, Klongdongle and Jewhate, were Nazis, but he forgave; "forgive and forget" that was his mantra. Well, more precisely; "Forgive and forget, but don't actually forgive and forget, just pretend you are if asked; continue to harbor ill will and seething anger. Let it slip out during calm, unrelated moments, like during a discussion over who finished the milk".
He started to caress her as she slept. Sneaky, nasty thoughts popped in and out of his head. Mostly about butterscotch and right wing bloggers, but that got his mind a-thinkin'. Could he get away with it?
She was sleeping, would she wake up? What were the odds?
He pulled out his iPhone and ran the brand new Sexual Situation Cost/Benefit App. These were the results:
Situation:
Benefit:
Drawback:
Gentle Caressing and Deep, Thoughtful Staring
Sweet Emotional Connection
Sweet Emotional Connection
Casual Boob Grab
Boob Goodness
If she woke up, she’d be all like “why are you touching my boob?”.
Penetration
What You've Always Wanted: Sex With Something That Won't Be Horribly Disappointed Afterwards
Jail time, potential prison anal rape
Then he realized something; he mistook boredom for horndoggery. Maybe it was the fact that he was drunk on turkey, mayo and white bread, but he was just so fucking bored that he thought he was interested in the manipulation of the fleshy parts belonging to the opposite sex.
In reality, he just wanted to sit back, stare out the window and wonder why he was so bored. So that's what he did.
Sadly, this made him more bored. His mind wondered and wondered, but it never really reached a destination; it just sorta ran out of gas.
He got so bored, in fact, that his brain started to leak out of his ear. Not knowing what to do, he grabbed the closest thing to catch it as it seeped out. That closest thing was his blender.
After a few minutes the leaking stopped. Unfortunately, he was so dumb from boredom by this point that he grabbed some bread, threw it in the blender and drank a brain/bread concoction.
It might have been the lack of brain cells, but that shit got him fucked up. He got so drunk that his wife found him the next morning; naked, covered in marmalade, and stuffed into a USPS box addressed to Camarillo, California.
She sent him away (he somehow had put the right postage on himself) and casually walked into the bedroom. Her mission was accomplished; she drove her Jew husband crazy by falling asleep early and being German. She immediately went to JDate to begin anew. Drive 'em crazy, send them to Camarillo, California and...well, there's a third step somewhere, but she'd figure that out later.
If you've bought an iPod Touch from a crackhead or some sort of ne'er-do-well in the Hollywood area, looked at the back, and noticed the engraved name "Michael Manson"; congratulations! You've purchased the iPod that was stolen from my car this weekend.
It was a present from my father that I will gladly pay fair market value for, so if you have googled this page, please contact me at: cryingwhilemasturbating@gmail.com.
Also, if that person tries to sell you my gym membership, keep in mind they check your ID at the door, so it's pretty useless.
What did I find in the responses? Well, first off, most people online either can't spell or aren't interested in spelling correctly (who knew so many words were spelled with numbers?). Second off, it appeared that most people were typing with one hand/while orgasming.
2) MR. PUT U TORKEY IN THAN OVER LIKE 2 HURS: Mmmm...just say it out loud with me: "put u torkey in than oven like 2 hurs"...if that smooth talking doesn't get you sizzling hot, I don't know what does...
Posts
