who knew?

i was at the optician's yesterday and there was a late-30s/early-40s ish woman ahead of me dropping off an order for glasses for herself and her husband. she asked that the store call her instead of her husband when his glasses were ready bc he's a banker and works unpredictable hours. the clerk commented, "oh, so your husband is a banker..." probably getting ready to ask how his job was going despite the economy, y'know. i was just surprised that a banker was still employed. the woman interjected with, "well, he's a banker but he also plays in a band."

of course, considering her age and the whole banking thing, i was sure this guy played in a jazz band or something, so i was definitely unprepared for her somewhat sheepish response to the clerk's question "which band?" get this, the butthole surfers. wha?

yup, his wikipedia entry confirms it: He is married and currently lives in Brooklyn, New York with his West Highland terrier X Donut. anyway, this dude's like a modern day wallace stevens.

great canadian heroes

obama's trip to canada this week made me think, who are some great canadians...who don't play hockey?

they need to rename vancouver after this dude.

america's restored standing in the world

whoa.

fffwhat?

baldwin 201

sure, an intro to baldwin class may end with that, c4ts, but those majoring in baldwin studies would probably suggest the following.

Can't Stereotypye my Thing, Yo

This is it. Now I am done abusing the Obamiconme service. And congratulations to America's favorite object of orientalist affection/Tamil Tiger, MIA, who had a baby boy.

Do I Have a God Complex?

Thanks to Anonymous Alex for pointing out the reference Jack Donaghy was making in last week's episode of 30 Rock when he confessed, "I once claimed I am God during a deposition." How I missed it I don't know since his scene from the 90's classic Malice is required viewing on day of the Intro to Alec Baldwin class we all took in college. Arent liberal arts the best! Okay, maybe not day one since that's devoted to Always Be Closing and Schweaty Balls, but still it's first week material. What did we watch on the last day of the class, you ask? What's the only a scene a survey class on the genius of Alec Baldwin can close with? You know the answer. Yes, you do. And it's right here.

"i got nothin'"

Sadness, Baby!

UNC 101, Duke 87.

Music Video of the Day -- Rumpshaker

For Thumbu Sammy and E., who wants more 90's references.

You Either Smoke, or You Get Smoked, and You Got Smoked

One goes through an underwater treasure trove of emotions on turning 30. This blog has been testament to that fact, but what they don't tell one (haha -- I am the butler from Remains of the Day) is that 31 follows and, no kidding around, that's for real old. There's no treasure trove of emotions to go through at 31. It's the real deal, and it doesn't even merit a blog post, but you know me, raging against the dying of the light and all that.

Next month I turn 31, and now I know for an incontrovertible fact, that I will never play professional sports and have the chance to inject anabolic steroids into my buttocks. I will never start a band, so if I mainline Jack Daniels, it's just a sad cry for help. And I have no business weighing in on the looks/existences of teenage starlets (hahaha -- just kidding; Miley Cyrus looks like a supremely caffeintated troll and has all the talent of a Speak & Spell; whereas Evan Rachel Wood is smoking hot and hates her parents like they were axe murderers). Anyway, 31, which I turn in a few weeks, not 30, is where the existential crisis ends. I am growing old, and I know it, but it's okay.

Still, this past weekend, as I took a walk around Oakland with blog reader Thumbu Sammy, my physical decreptitude was brought to my attention in a way that was, well, not so okay. We passed by a kid at at the bus stop, some sullen teenager, who asked me for 50 cents. I said, "Sorry, man," and as I walked away felt a torrent of rage: "You ain't got 50 cents?! You ain't got 50 cents, Rasheed Wallace bald-spot-having motherfucker?!"

I got clowned. I got clowned for being old and for suffering one consequence of age, but what's worse is that 'Sheed, picture of virility and all things manly, got clowned too. We got clowned by some kid who didn't even have bus fare.

Some Motherfuckers Are Always Trying to Skate Uphill

In the later part of last year, I unentertained you with my Paxil-starved posts about the plateau and fall of my legal career. Last I left you I had walked out of a dressing-down/interview with a temp agency, depressed and debilitated, only to be offered a reprieve from an ex-colleague, who was looking for some contract attorneys to review documents -- what I like to call white collar bedpan cleaning, except without all the actual hard work and poor compensation. Anyway, I seized on the job, and have settled into the humdrum of office life, and now it's time for an update.

So, the job sucks. Well, not really. It's actually all pretty hilarious, but more on that in a second. We -- the other three contract attorneys and I -- sit in an open office plan, amid the permanent worker bees of the organization. They are, to my understanding, in charge of gathering from the client the potentially relevant documents in the case, scanning them, and uploading them onto the document review program. Logic dictates this is what they do. Except they don't really talk to us, so we don't know for sure, and the two worker bees-- let's call them Abigail and Ira -- who are in charge of liasing with us are bizarre and incomprehensible for separate reasons. Ira is fairly nondescript, except for two things: 1) he hates Colin Farrell, as I learned the hard way and 2) he listens to Black Sabbath on his iPod in the break room. Also, he thinks he works in some sort of real professional organization and so insists on wearing neckties, and he likes to telephone coworkers IN OUR OPEN OFFICE PLAN, who are within voiceshot, and talk to them. On the phone.

Abigail, more important, is my new mortal nemesis. (As for my old mortal nemesis, there is not room enough in this post to recount the Benjamin Button-style epic hate story I have going with Sara Burnstein. Alas...)

Abigail's a raging megalomaniac who shuns personal conversation, saying hello or goodbye, and prefers to dress in a variety of perplexing styles. Here are my favorites: 1) Justin Timberlake fedora with knee-high boots and capri pants; 2) sailor outfit with beret; 3) Sigourney Weaver's business suit from Working Girl, though with enhanced shoulder pads. She also likes to bitch about our "metrics," but then makes us wait hours on end for new batches of documents. She's self-serious and ambitious and lusts for victims to throw under the bus in her singularly focused climb to the top, to the top of what I am not sure. I know I should just let it go. But assiduous readers know, I let nothing go. I hope and plot for Abigail's downfall, even as I've stopped communicating with her directly and relay all messages through Ira.

But hate is just one kind of medicine -- the affliction being boredom. The boredom of a job that has no future, no worth, no point. A job where one can make mistakes with almost zero possibility of consequence. I suppose I could inadvertently authorize the disclosure of an otherwise privileged document, which could then be the basis of opposing counsel's potential waiver of privilege claim. But that would take some serious fucking up. Mainly I decide if documents are relevant or irrelevant, and even the relevant ones are totally unenlightening.

Now, there's another kind of medicine for boredom. It's called distraction. This is why an innocent conversation I had last week with a co-attorney about his visit with friends in Venice Beach (obviously) led to a discussion of White Men Can't Jump, especially Wesley Snipes' outfits in the movie, and our sincere hope that one day Abigail will come to work dressed as him, painter's cap with the brim flipped up and all. This in turn led to another distraction. I challenged my co-attorney friend -- let's call him Adam -- to a shrine-in-Wesley-Snipes'-honor-off, and now our cubicles, once barren, save for a phone list of all the people who sit IN OUR OPEN OFFICE PLAN, within voiceshot, none of whom talk to us anyway, but whom we could telephone, well, now our cubicles are things of beauty. I have a blown-up picture of the interlocking hands (one black, one white) from Jungle Fever in my shrine; a healthy serving of Wesley armpit hair as he reaches for his blade in Blade; Wesley in drag; Wesley doing a funny dance with his wife; Wesley with a gold chain and medallion, looking all hard and matchy- matchy, in New Jack City. But that wasn't enough. Now we photocopy all official correspondence to include Wesley's image and distribute it to our two baffled fellow attorneys. Adam even found the letters of reference Woody Harrelson and Denzel wrote to the judge in Wesley's tax evasion case and put them up -- Woody Harrelson is a man who knows what kind of impression good letterhead can make. Also, I now subscribe to a "Wesley Snipes'" Google news alert.

All of this may seem like the stuff of, if not legend, then at least the subsidiary plot line in a mediocre episode of The Office, I am fully aware, but this is my medicine. This is what keep me not necessarily sane, but at least sane enough not to unload invective on Abigail for questioning my "commitment to serving the client's needs."

Thank you, Wesley Snipes.

Adam and I will be there to break you out of jail, should you finally be made to go there. And we are planning your comeback vehicle -- if Spike Lee doesn't beat us to the punch. Our movie poster is above. In the film you play a mild-mannered temp attorney, just trying to fill a discovery request so you can buy asthma medicine for your son. But little do you know you work in an office staffed by alien robots. You uncover a hot doc, which the evil supervising attorney tries to suppress. You review diligently and you deploy karate chops fiercely. In the final battle against the attorney controlling the alien robots, you snap his neck, and as his body falls to the ground, you say sternly, "Motion denied." I will be famous for putting these words in your mouth, and you will be famous once again.

This could be huge, Wesley. Call me.

Save me from Abigail.

And if you know Colin Farrell, tell him I've got a part for him.

ps -- Everyone should read this article on The Way of the Snipes. Do it for the children.