Beer Burgers

I meant to post this when it was actually relevant, but you get it now, because-hell I don’t know, I guess i had some reason not to post it, but here it is now, anyway-

So Howard Stern finally got pulled off the air. A lot of people who have never even listened to the show are probably happy that his brand of “filth” is gone from the airwaves. A lot of concerned parents have been making appearances on CNN talk shows and smarmily declaring a victory in the culture wars, while commentators make weak protests in the name of free speech, while desperately reminding us that they would never listen to Stern.

Well I listened to Stern. At least, I did before I moved to an uptight part of the country where he’s not syndicated. I started listening to Howard the summer after my senior year of high school. I was working landscaping for seven bucks an hour, and I had nothing in common with the crew I was working with at all. We could barely maintain a conversation, but we had Howard. We could listen to his show from six to eleven, which would take us through most of the workday, and once the sun got up high enough, no one wanted to talk anyway.

I was expecting Howard to be crude and obscene. I thought he would be racist, mean, and small-minded. Instead, I found him articulate, intelligent, and funny. A lot of what Howard does that offends people so much is that he asks questions no one else had the courage to ask. When he has some idiot supermodel on, he asks her about her sex life. He doesn’t pretend she has anything important to say. He speaks for the immature bastard in all of us.

Sometimes, he makes fart jokes. Okay, often. I’m no fan of fart jokes, but there’s nothing wrong with them. I can’t imagine anyone having a serious problem with them considering that 90% of humor directed at kids is based on taking a shit.

Sometimes Howard plays on womens’ insecurities. He has them on his show, and makes them perform demeaning or disgusting stunts. He makes them beg for breast implants, and submit to degrading rituals. But it’s not like the women don’t volounteer. It’s not like he doesn’t have a ton of female fans. To criticize him for demeaning women when women line up to be demeaned is both patronizing and dishonest. Do those women somehow not have the right to choose what they want to do? Are Howard’s female fans somehow not worth discussing? Are all the women who Howard has helped, with money and breast implants (it’s what they wanted), and a chance at fame not important? Is Robin Quivers somehow incapable of making her own life choices? Howard doesn’t hate women. He just wants to see them naked. His audience is as vast and silent as the audience for pornography.

If nothing else, you simply have to respect the man’s work ethic. Who else in entertainment broadcasts for five hours every day? That’s thirty-five hours a week of broadcasting, for God knows how many years. That doesn’t even begin to go into the amount of time that goes into the behind-the-scenes stuff that makes the show happen. It wasn’t always brilliant, but it was always at least worth listening to.

Howard Stern is an American institution. For more than twenty years, he has been making Americans laugh, and sometimes even think. I will miss him, and if he was taken away from you, you should too.

1. Work out in the gym at work. Lift weights. Do push-ups. Neglect to shower afterwards because the shower there is a disgusting swamp of fungus and disease.

2. Drive home. Become very hungry. Plan sandwich you will make when you arrive at home. Be sure to include at least three layers of meat, and various seasonings and garnishes in your plan.

3. Arrive home. Dash to fridge. Construct towering, monumental sandwich. Sink teeth into it. Relish it. Revel in its deliciousness.

4. Realize that you have not washed your hands since working out, and that, for all intents and purposes, you might as well be slurping the dried sweat of dozens of men off the freeweights you were just using, or licking the filthy rubber flooring you were doing pushups on.

5. Finish sandwich.

So I’ve been a little slow on the updating lately. So sue me. I have some ideas, but they need time to develop properly. In the meantime, we have some business to take care of

Some of you have probably noticed the cute, scampering character in the upper right-hand corner of this blog. Well that fellow is none other than the Whittlesea Strawbear.

The strawbear is a mysterious and deadly creature, rarely glimpsed by man, and easily recognizable by his coat of straw and eyes like windows into the abyss. He hates Marxism, saltwater taffy, and Linux, and he is now the unofficial mascot for this site. Evil shakes in its shiny red boots when the Strawbear is on the job. I can’t tell you how excited we all are to have the Stawbear on board here at Beer Burgers.

Anyway, that’s all for now, but prepare for face-rockage later in the week. Either that or rain. Actually, just prepare for rain.

1. The proper method for opening a beer with a butane lighter is to wrap your weak hand tightly around the neck of the bottle, lay the lighter across the index finger, and, using your strong hand, push down sharply on the top of the lighter, using your index finger as a fulcrum, and the bottom of the lighter to jimmy the top off the bottle.

2. Although a foolproof method for impressing women probably exists, staring and silently working your jaw while emitting vague squeaky sounds is definitely not it.

3.

You know, I may have to get back to you on this.

That’s right, bitches! This website has a brand new address, your new home for comedy and also unfunny attempts at comedy is
HTTP://WWW.BEERBURGERS.NET*. Bookmark it. Write it on your faces. Scrawl it on bar bathroom walls right above the urinals. Love it.

But with every good news, comes bad news, and there is some that I have to share with you. Some bastard is hanging onto www.beerburgers.com with a vengeance. I say some bastard, but I mean my new nemesis.

Yeah, that’s right beerburgers.com guy. I’ve got my eye on you. Watch your freakin’ back.

Bitch.

anyway, its

beerburgers.net

from now on. So gimme some love.

Also, I’m playing with the templates and such, so expect the site to be ugly for a while, and then possibly get prettier, or just the kind of ugly that I enjoy.

You have been warned.

*WARNING: NEW ADDRESS MAY CONTAIN DANGEROUS LEVELS OF KICKASS

Jan 6th continued

As we drive into Cape Town, I am struck by the ancient, immutable face of Africa. There is a feeling of permanence, of ancient customs. Cybercafes dot every corner, unchanged since at least the early ’90’s. Strange and unfamiliar fast food restaurants flash tantalizingly by as we drive down Long Street. It’s all so shockingly unfamiliar. I hardly know where to begin asking questions.

“So,” I ask my guide, whose name I have discovered in something like Helga or Rolf or something, “What can you tell me about your fascinating country?”

“Well,” he begins, “South Africa is a very troubled country. Although Apartheid is no longer with us, the legacy of terror and violence continue to loom over every aspect of life in this country, along with our economic hardships, and the terrible health crisis of AIDS. . . .”

Look, I have to be honest here. When people talk to me, I mostly just make up a bunch of stuff that sounds interesting, so after about thirty seconds of nodding and smiling, I found myself listening to s super-cool spy briefing, and Gordaboota or whatever was giving me what we in the spy game call “background” on my next “victim” who I would be “killing” with my “spy gun.”

“Anyway,” I interrupt during one of the pauses in his interminable speech, “where’s the target?”

“Well, we’re almost at the bed and breakfast where you’ll be staying.”

“I see. You’re planning on having a beautiful female Russian assassin trick me into a deathtrap with sex. Well, I’ve played that game before, Dr. Malafactor, and you’ll find I’m not so easily distracted.”

The rest of the trip passes in silence.

Jan 8th

I am going to be living with Evan. I know him a little bit from before this trip, and he seems like a good guy. I am looking forward to living with him. The rest of the people in the group seem like a miserable assortment of fat vegans and easily-enraged pc whiners, but Evan seems all right.

Feb 10th

That miserable pussy Evan has hurt himself during a sea-kayaking trip. I avoided his fate through my strict policy of remaining in our room and watching softcore porn on South African TV unless forced to leave in order to maintain the barely acceptable grades that keep me from getting sent back to America, which I have found so far to be an excellent strategy to avoid the dangers and inconveniences of African life.

Apparently, Evan hurt himself stepping in a shallow tide pool filled with broken glass and trash. One of the sharp, deadly, disease-infested things he stepped on left a deep gash in his foot. It will take some time to heal, and he will have to stay off it except when absolutely necessary.

Feb 12th

Evan is facing his injury with the craven whining and cowardice that I would have expected from him. Fortunately, I am able to remain courageous and completely indifferent in the face of this adversity.

Man, I hate that kid. Living with him sucks.

Feb 15th

This morning, as I eat my nutritious and balanced breakfast, someone asks me “How’s Evan doing?”

“How should I know?” I answer, cleverly, pausing to admire my rippling biceps in the breakfast room mirror as I cram a heaping wedge of sugar-toast into my mouth.

“You’re his roommate, aren’t you?”

“Am I? I thought I was his daddy the way I smacked him around last night! Boo-yah! Can I get a whoop whoop?” I look around. No whoop-whoops are forthcoming. Apparently, no one is impressed with my victory in last night’s war of attrition between my loud private softcore porn viewing, and Evan’s pathetic and desperate pleas for silence. My subsequent (and hilarious) imitation of Evan begging me to turn off the TV so he could get to sleep and forget about the stabbing agony in his foot for a few fleeting hours wins me even fewer friends. There’s just no accounting for tastes.

The room empties. I help myself to another peice of toast and another dozen sugar packets.

I look in on Evan on the way to class. He is sitting in the dark, smoking cigarettes, and writing in his journal.*

“Hey, I’ll see you this afternoon, ok?” I say.

He grunts, and returns to his work. I shrug and leave.

Feb 20th

Evan almost never leaves the room now. It’s starting to interfere with my appreciation of pornography. I don’t know how much more of this I can take.

Feb 26th

I return from class to find Evan slumped in his chair. His eyes are open, but he seems to be asleep. His journal is filled with page upon page of intricate scribblings. I glance at a few pages at random.

african primitives. . . . we, who must appear like gods to them. . . use our special status. . . the great work of civilizing. . . must continue. . .

I flip to the last page. Scrawled across the back cover of the book in an unsteady hand is a single sentence: “Exterminate all the brutes.”

“Hey, man” I say, shaking him awake, “Want a beer?”

His answer is two works, mumbled over and over again. . .

“. . . The Horror. . . The Horror. . . ”

“Yeah, whatever, man. I’m going to go get a beer.”

Man, what a queermo. I wonder if I can switch roommates with one of the fat vegans.

*Some of the more astute readers have probably figured out that parts of this account are fictional. This is one of them. Evan never worked on his journal.

It’s just a god damn boob. Calm the hell down already.

It turns out that there are other people on the Interweb who write “web-logs” chronicling their everyday experiences, and sharing their off-beat observational humor. Some of them are embarrasingly better at it than I am. Here are my three new favorites:

My Life as an American Gladiator
Bad News Hughes
Dong Resin

Enjoy.