forwards, fat people, music
Jason posted on April 12th, 2006

[Short week, since I'm heading out of town for the Easter break, so you only get a short compilation post.  I will probably post over the break, but, let's be honest - more than likely you won't hear from me until after the weekend.  I'm not neglecting you; I just think we need some space.  And I'm really fucking busy.]

I’m not against forwards, per se.  Anything that will help me waste time during the day is ok with me.

But I am STRONGLY against stupid forwards.  Of course, as most people don’t have as refined a taste in forwards as I do, so more often that not I get "treated" with a stupid ass forward, which makes me wonder what compels a grown, rational person to promulgate such idiocy on the internet.

(Wow - talk about irony.  Me, coming down on those who support stupidity on the internet.  Talk about biting the hand that feeds you.)

For some reason, the dumb forward below really got to me.  A female friend recently sent this to me and about 60 other people.  I have copied the text below, in all its annoying glory, to give you an idea of how absurd it is. 
 
GAS WAR - an idea that WILL work

This was originally sent by a retired Coca Cola executive. It came from one of his engineer buddies who retired from Halliburton. It’s worth your consideration.

Join the resistance!!!! I hear we are going to hit close to $4.00 a gallon by next summer and it might go higher!! Want gasoline prices to come down? We need to take some intelligent, united action. Phillip Hollsworth offered this good idea.

This makes MUCH MORE SENSE than the "don’t buy gas on a certain day" campaign that was going around last April or May! The oil companies just laughed at that because they knew we wouldn’t continue to "hurt" ourselves by refusing to buy gas. It was more of an inconvenience to us than it was a problem for them.

BUT, whoever thought of this idea, has come up with a plan that can really work. Please read on and join with us! By now you’re probably thinking gasoline priced at about $1.50 is super cheap.   Me too! It is currently $2.79 for regular unleaded in my town. Now that the oil companies and the OPEC nations have conditioned us to think that the cost of a gallon of gas is CHEAP at $1.50 - $1.75, we need to take aggressive action to teach them that BUYERS control the
marketplace….. not sellers. With the price of gasoline going up more each day, we consumers need to take action. The only way we are going to see the price of gas come down is if we hit someone in the pocketbook by not purchasing their gas! And, we can do that WITHOUT hurting ourselves. How? Since we all rely on our cars, we can’t just stop buying gas. But we CAN have an impact on gas prices if we all act together to force a price war.

Here’s the idea:

For the rest of this year, DON’T purchase ANY gasoline from the two biggest companies (which now are one), EXXON and MOBIL. If they are not selling any gas, they will be inclined to reduce their prices. If they reduce their prices, the other companies will have to follow suit. But to have an impact, we need to reach literally millions of Exxon and Mobil gas buyers.   It’s really simple to do! Now, don’t wimp out at this point…. keep reading and I’ll explain how simple it is to reach millions of people.

I am sending this note to 30 people. If each of us sends it to at least ten more (30 x 10 =3D 300) … and those 300 send it to at least ten more (300 x 10 =3D 3,000)…and so on, by the time the message reaches the sixth group of people, we will have reached over THREE MILLION consumers. If those three million get excited and pass this on to ten friends each, then 30 million people will have been contacted! If it goes one level further, you guessed it….. THREE
>>>>HUNDRED MILLION >>>>PEOPLE!!!

Again, all you have to do is send this to 10 people. That’s all. (If you don’t understand how we can reach 300 million and all you have to do is send this to 10 people…. Well, let’s face it, you just aren’t a mathematician. But I am, so trust me on this one.)

How long would all that take? If each of us sends this e-mail out to ten more people within one day of receipt, all 300 MILLION people could conceivably be contacted within the next 8 days!!!

I’ll bet you didn’t think you and I had that much potential, did you?

Acting together we can make a difference. If this makes sense to you, please pass this message on. I suggest that we not buy from EXXON/MOBIL UNTIL THEY LOWER THEIR PRICES TO THE $1.30 RANGE AND KEEP THEM DOWN.

THIS CAN REALLY WORK.
 
Stupid as a mother fucker, right?

Stupid as a mother fucker, right?

Unfortunately for my friend, she did something even mo’ dumb: she didn’t bcc the recipients.  So right there, on the forward, were 60 people I could reply to to voice my disinterest in such stupid forwards. 

So I wrote back, quickly typing up a response:
 
POOP WAR - an idea that will work
 
For years, human beings have been enslaved by the paper companies.  We rely on paper for our every day needs: on the job, at home, and, um, on the job.  Without paper, civilization as we know it would not be possible.
 
However, every day, literally ZILLIONS of trees are cut down by little brown people in strange and exotic lands with names like Montevideo and Uruguay and Connecticut.  Without trees, life as we know it would not be possible. 
 
So we are forced to choose: do we want paper or trees?  Paper gives us shit to write on, but trees, in a chemical process known as photosynthesis (by which the environment’s natural air is transferred into oxygen or some shit), give us air to breathe. 
 
I think the choice is pretty obvious.
 
Therefore, I ask that you take part in NATIONAL NO PAPER DAY.  On MAY 1, 2006, I ask that you NOT USE ANY PAPER.  This includes paper, paper cups, toilet paper, construction paper, papier mache (from the French for "paper make"), and rolling papers.  
 
Do not USE any of these types of paper on this day.  The Paper Industry is run by weak-willed and impotent executives with high blood pressure.  Only ONE DAY of non-use of paper will totally flip them the fuck out, sending them into a tailspin of dementia, depression, and ultimately suicide.  When they die, WE will take their jobs and CHANGE THE WORLD.
 
So on MAY 1, 2006 - DO NOT USE PAPER!  DO NOT TOUCH PAPER!  IF POSSIBLE, DO NOT EVEN LOOK AT PAPER!  
 
Change starts with one person (you), telling a bunch of other people (your friends and co-workers).  MAKE THE CHANGE.  DO IT.  DON’T BE GAY. 
 
NATIONAL NO PAPER DAY: MAY 1, 2006.  AFFECT CHANGE!!!!!!!!
 
[By the way, "POOP WAR" has nothing to do with actual NO PAPER DAY.  It was just a way to get your attention.]
 
I was feeling pretty proud of myself, thinking that I got across my message rather clearly.  Even though I only quickly spit it out, I think my idea is actually better than the previous one.  But at any rate, after I sent this email to 50+ strangers (I knew some people on the list) the original sender responded to all: 

Shame on me for not BCC’ing everyone.  There are moms and co-workers and younger people on this e-mail and the "f" word is not appropriate for any of the aforementioned.  My apologies to everyone for sending a mass e-mail, it won’t happen again. 

The moral of the story?  Send me a stupid forward and forget to bcc the recipients and I will respond with extreme prejudice, writing "fuck" to moms and co-workers.  That’s just how I roll.  You have been warned.

****************************

I am constantly amazed at the stupidity of fat people.

I myself am a fat person, but this isn’t some sort of self-loathing thing.  Because while I’m fat, I ain’t fucking real fat.  When I say "fat" in this context, I’m talking about the people who get two Double Whoppers at Burger King, whereas my type of fat only gets one, and maybe a Hershey Sundae Pie.  Big difference there. 

(And now I’m hungry.)

The office building I work in has revolving doors (note: this is not my actual building).  Most Western people are familiar with how these work.  You step into them, push on the door in front of you, enter a tube, continuing both pushing and walking through a quarter-circle, reach the outside, and (and this is important) continuing walking away from the revolving doors so the person behind can escape them. 

As I was leaving the office to get lunch yesterday, I passed through the turnstile and headed to the revolving doors to exit.  In front of me were two overweight women heading outside to grab a smoke.  The first was mildly obese while the second has half-human/half-rhinoceros.  The less fat woman entered the doors, followed by the rhino, followed by me.  

As I was leaving the office to get lunch yesterday, I passed through the turnstile and headed to the revolving doors to exit.  In front of me were two overweight women heading outside to grab a smoke.  The first was mildly obese while the second has half-human/half-rhinoceros.  The less fat woman entered the doors, followed by the rhino, followed by me.  

The less fat woman made it through and cleanly exited, but Ms. Rhino messed it up.  She made it through the doors, but when she left them, instead of walking away from them so that the next person (me) could get out, she immediately stopped to light her cigarette.  The result was that I came out of the doors (there was a person behind me as well) and stumbled into the Rhino, nearly tripping over one of her tree-trunk ankles and making a small scene.

Of course, Ms. Rhino was not happy about this.  In front of the small crowd, she turned around and angrily scolded me, saying, "Why don’t you watch where you’re going?"  The incident happened so fast and I was so flustered that I could only mumble an "I’m sorry."  Then I got a death stare from the Rhino, who continued to mumble something like, "He better watch where he’s going next time" under her breath as I walked away.    

If I had been drunk, I would not have walked away so quietly.  If I could go back in time, I wouldn’t have been so meek about the incident.  Not only because it was clearly her fault, but also because she was morbidly obese.  And I mean that literally - she is so fat that she could die at any moment.  

So I stomped the rest of the way to the lunch place, revisiting the scene in my head, with one major difference: When she says, "What don’t you watch where you’re going?, I respond with something like, "Why don’t you learn how to properly use a revolving door, Fat Chops?  Here, I’ll help you out: next time you come out of the door, pretend like they’re giving away free cheeseburgers across the street.  That should get you moving, Chunky."  Or perhaps I would have still said "I’m sorry", but would have done it slightly differently, like, "Geez, I’m really sorry you stopped walking and caused me to run into you.  So sorry about being right.  And I’m sorry that you have lost all self-respect and are grossly overweight.  As proof that I’m sorry, would you like to take a bite of me?  You know, since you’re really fucking fat and all?  Maybe I’ll go upstairs to the cafeteria and cover my thigh in mayo - would you like that, Chubb Rock?  If not, I think I might have an old Snickers in my bag.  Let me check."

I’m going to be fat for the rest of my life.  My dreams of being skinny ended sometime around 8th grade.  But if I ever get so fat that I turn my fat anger on those around me because I can’t move properly, please shoot me.    

****************************

Six Songs (half edition)

"Release Yo’Delf"  Method Man
Many of you write in to ask, "Jason, what is your personal theme song?"  Others will ask, "Jason, what is your favorite song to make love to?"  The answer to both questions is this song.  Enjoy.

"Can’t Get Enough of Your Love"  Bad Company
Whenever I hear this song, I think of my dad.  He fucking LOVES Bad Company.  I can picture him driving around South Philly in the mid-70’s, when this song comes on the radio.  He’s smoking a joint (naturally) and starts banging on the dashboard of the car and singing along, especially at the end when Paul Rodgers starts freaking out and singing, "I love you so much - I can’t get enough of your love!  I love you so much - I can’t get enough of your love!"

Fast forward to the present.  Last night, subconsciously inspired by the white-haired dude on "American Idol", I was in my room, belting this song out, "Idol"-style.  I mean, I was getting into it - holding the microphone, marching around the stage (my bedroom), giving a sexy lil’ hip shake now and then.  

I expect that you’d write that my roommate Brian caught me doing this, or some Midwestern tourists were outside taking pictures of me, but nothing like that happened.  I did, however, during my performance feel more alive than I’ve felt in years.  So I’m contemplating a return to performance art/show business.  I’ll keep you posted.

"I’m Pretty Sure I’m Over You"  Will Hoge
The only version I have heard of this song is the live one, so I can only vouch for that one.  A kick-ass song that I don’t have anything to add to, expect to say that I’m pretty sure that I’ve never fully gotten over any relationship I’ve had.  I’m what’s called a "slow healer" in this department.  I’m also pretty sure that if the first girl I ever kissed (three years ago) were to ask me to marry her, I would probably do so in a heartbeat.  But I think she’s already married, so I guess that’s out of the question.

(Unless she’s reading this and is dissatisfied with her marriage.  Kelly, you know you and I were meant to be together forever.  Drop me an email, won’t you?)