Beer Burgers

1. Chemical castration as a lifestyle choice.

2. Whether or not I really have the stick-to-it-iveness to drink myself to death.

3. Entering the clergy.

4. Genocide.

Greetings, intrepid Internauts! Welcome to the latest edition of Beer Burgers. Like many of you, occasionally I grow weary of this futuristic computerNet in which we make our homes. Sure, I still jack my cyberdeck into The Matrix every day, and zip from node to node, soaring effortlessly among neon towers of scintillating data. And yes, like all of you, I still force myself ever further into the virtual world, eschewing the crass meat-pleasures of the masses. Indeed, I find that I seek solace in Cyberspace even more now that I find myself a broken, discredited wreck of a man, trapped in this seedy suburb of Neo-Tokyo, where all I see during the day is human wreckage scurrying amongst the ruins of a once-great civilization. It’s no life for a man, eating protein-mush and gazing forever up at the vast, corporate arcologies that dominate the skyline above my seedy coffin motel with their glowing billboards forcing neon coronas into smog that has the color and smell of a McDonald’s hamburger.

Still, for someone as jaded as myself it’s hard to escape the feeling that you’ve seen everything, even here. But then, as always, something happens to make me remember why I became an Internet Ninja in the first place. Something brings back the old joy of Websurfing Like In The Old Days. So here is my gift to you, a collection of links that you can enjoy.

The Most Awesome Headline of All Time. Seriously, kids, bring this in for Current Events Day at school and just totally blow everyones’ minds.

Many years ago, I picked up one of those Left Behind books, and, after reading a few pages, discovered that it was hilariously badly written, and deserved to be held up to universal mockery. Then I promptly forgot about it. Fortunately, Slacktivist has done a far better job than I conceivably could. He dissects the first hundred or so pages of the first book, bringing an insightful, educated, Christian perspective to the book, which explains, in an often hilarious way, just what is so wrong with these people. Start at the bottom and read up. You’ll thank me.

Maakies. Honestly, if you’re reading this, and don’t already know Maakies, you probably can’t handle it. However, if you have a high opinion of your own awesomeness, check it out.

See you in cyberspace!

Just a quick thing for you here. Watch Firefly. In case you don’t know about it, it was a show that lasted one season about space cowboys in space. It has some of the funniest, awesomest, and creepiest moments I’ve ever seen on television. It is completely awesome, and at a price of thirty dollars for fourteen episodes, if you ever buy DVD’s, you should buy these.

Also, if you don’t love a show where characters curse profusely in Mandarin Chinese for no apparent reason (typical translation: “Fuck everyone in the universe to death,”) then you HAVE NO SOUL.

Well, it was only a matter of time before I had a serious problem with living in Japan, and here it is. There is an infestation of ninjas in my appartment.

At first, I wasn’t particularly concerned about this. Ninjas are nothing if not unobtrusive. It’s what they’re famous for. After the first few times I was startled by catching a slight movement out of the corner of my eye and looked around to see a tiny figure in black pajamas clinging to my ceiling, I stopped even noticing it. Mostly, they’re not dangerous either. I went to the local hardware store and bought a couple of two-by-fours, and every time they try to kill me I just whale on them for a little while, and when they tire out, they leave.

Still, it’s become a major annoyance. My curtains are getting tattered from the constant assaults of shuriken, and I can barely go to the bathroom for fear of lifting the lid and seeing a bamboo breathing tube poking out at me. Not to mention having to step around the caltrops strewn all over the floor.

I decided to lodge a complaint with the local Office for the Regulation of Ninja Activity, but this turned out to be more difficult than I had anticipated. The office has a phone number, but when I called it, a foul-smelling green gas sprayed out of the phone and I had to dive out the window to escape. I tried to visit the office in person, but that had its difficulties as well.

It’s located on top of a mountain, about an hour’s drive from where I live. When I went by to see them, I found a large, ominous door set in a rock wall, with a small placard in Japanese next to it. When I knocked, a hail of poison darts rained down on my head, and a trapdoor opened underneath me and dropped me in a snake pit. Once I had escaped from that predicament, I found I still had to traverse a hallway full of spinning blades, collapsing walls, vicious dogs, tripwires, punji pits, and tiny catapults that fling scorpions in your face. At the end of it all, I had to fight two huge robots. Finally, I got through to the end of the hall, and I found a tiny old man waiting for me, sitting in a lotus position on top of a large rock.

Old man: Welcome. You have fought well.

Me: Do you have a bathroom I can use?

Old Man: I do not go to the bathroom. I subsist on three peices of sushi a year.

Me: That’s fucked up.

Old Man: You’re telling me.

Me: So, anyway, umm. . . about the Ninjas in my appartment

Old Man: I can help you, but first you must answer three questions.

Me: What if I answer wrong?

Old Man: I throw you in the scorpion pit and pee on you.

Me: I thought you didn’t go to the bathroom.

Old Man: I don’t. I just pee on people.

Me: . . .

Old Man: What is the highest technique you could achieve?

Me: To punch a guy so hard, I knock his head right the hell off and bright orange blood shoots out of his neck all over the place.

Old Man: Very Good. Now, how do you defeat a stronger enemy?

Me: I use his strength against him. . . you know. . . by shooting him with this gun.

Old Man: . . .

Me: Or, you know, running him over with a truck or something.

Old Man: That is the worst possible answer to that question. You have failed.

Me: What if I give you five dollars?

Old Man: Six fifty and a bottle of Night Train.

Me: Deal.

Old Man: (disappears in a puff of smoke)

So I finally got rid of the Ninjas. Now if I could just do something about the giant robots that keep rampaging through the yard. . .

SPECIAL BONUS THAT IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH TO BE AN ENTRY ALL BY ITSELF

I generally don’t post about music, I’ve been broadening my horizons a lot lately, and I feel like sharing, so here is a list of four songs that make me extremely happy, and one that makes me extremely sad. Guess which one I listen to most often.

“My Ancestral Homeland, New Jersey” by the World/Inferno Friendship Society
“Sitting on the Curb” by Pepper
“Older” by Slightly Stoopid
“Dracula From Houston” by the Butthole Surfers
“Soon We’ll Be Dead” by Leftover Crack

1. Cooked a meal of delicious yakisoba with tofu, bean sprouts, celery, and water chestnuts

2. Flew a helicopter

3. Bought a bright green Luchador Mask

I leave you to draw your own conclusions.

Beer Burgers: Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. I am very pleased to welcome you all to this latest in our series of debates. Our topic tonight concerns Intelligent Design, a controversial theory that is stirring up heated discussion in schools, and churches across America. Recently, theologians at Oregon State University have proposed an alternative theory to ID, the infamous “Flying Spaghetti Monster” theory. Tonight we will discuss the FSM, its impact on evolution and intelligent design theory.

Now, let me take a moment to introduce each of our panelists. To my left, representing the intelligent design theory, Dr Micheal J. Behe, of the Discovery Institute. Doctor Behe, welcome.

Behe: Thank you, I’m very pleased to be here tonight.

BB: Thank you, doctor. To my right, representing evolution theory, we are very fortunate to have with us Dr. Kenneth Miller, an actual scientist of some kind.

KM: Thank you for having me.

BB: And to his right, behind that curtain, representing utter cosmic horror, the mindless Deamon Sultan Azathoth, who writhes and gibbers at the center of the universe. Now I’d like to take a moment to note that since the slightest exposure to the incomprehensibly vast evil of Azathoth would be enough to plunge a human soul into an everlasting hell of unimaginable madness, we have found it necessary to have Azathoth’s comments relayed to us via an interpreter, so I would like to welcome as well The Crawling Chaos Nyarlathotep, Soul and Messenger of the Outer Gods.

Nyarlathotep: Thanks for having us. Do you mind if I get a couple of plugs in right away, just to get them out of the way?

BB: Umm. . . I suppose not.

N: Thanks, I’ll also be introducing several virulent new viruses into the world water supply this fall, and this winter, keep your eyes out for strange lights in the sky, as a few lucky humans will be getting a big surprise..

BB: Okay, great, moving to our first topic.

N: Sorry to interrupt, but I would just like to mention that I would just like everyone to know I’ll be appearing in the new Ben Stiller movie, Stiff Ones, about a guy who inherits a rapping funeral home where the manager is a talking dog. It will be opening this winter, just in time for Oscar season.

BB; Thank you, we’ll all be looking forward to that, now gentlemen, we all know about the flying spaghetti monster or “Noodly Savior” as he is more popularly known. His adherents claim that he has used his various pasta-like appendages to manipulate the course of evolution. What do you think, Dr Behe?

Behe: Well, on its face, the FSM theory is just a mean-spirited satire of a perfectly valid, yet widely disputed theory. Obviously, no such creature exists, but by positing such a preposterous notion, some people will try to mislead the ill-informed into thinking that ID theory is just as ridiculous.

BB: Indeed, and Dr Miller?

KM: Well, I would ask Dr. Behe what makes his theory less ridiculous. Neither the FSM or the so-called Intelligent Designer can be observed by any means available to science, therefore both are equally useless in our attempts to understand the world.

BB: Azathoth, Nyarlathotep, any thoughts?

N: Well, from where I’m sitting it’s kind of an issue of perspective, I mean watching you humans try to understand the universe, it’s just amazing. You crawled out of the ooze on this flyspeck planet a handful of million years ago, and you’re so convinced that if you just try hard enough, you can actually probe the secrets of the Cosmos.

KM: Well I hardly think that’s fair. We’ve learned more in the last three hundred years. . .
(crosstalk)

N: Are you serious? The only humans who came halfway close to getting the picture were the Australian Aborigines, and look what happened to them. Well, them and Abdul Al-Azad I suppose.

Behe: I’m sorry, I have to speak up at this point. I am a Christian and object to the presence of heathen deities in this forum.

BB: But surely, doctor, we can all agree that all voices need to be heard here.

N: Doctor Behe, if you would just look behind the curtain for a moment, I’m sure we can reach some common ground.

BB; No, wait. . .

B: Well, I don’t see what harm can come of it AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!

BB: Hmm, well. I did warn him.

N: Well that’s the problem, isn’t it? With humans I mean. You just don’t get it, do you?

Behe: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

KM: I’m sorry, can we do something for him?

N: Well, I suppose we could stuff something in his mouth.

BB: Umm, yeah, that might work.

B: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

N: Man, he really has a set of lungs on him, doesn’t he?

BB: Well, we seem to have run out of time. Final thoughts, gentlemen?

KM: Intelligent design, in my opinion, is a perfect example of willful ignorance. If you set scientific inquiry aside, you can find whatever you’re looking for. Look for an Intelligent Designer, that’s what you’ll find. Look for a Flying Spaghetti Monster, and you’ll find that too. But science doesn’t work like that. Science takes the world as it is and attempts to explain it using what we know, and what we can know. Only through science can we actually learn anything worthwhile that will help us understand that natural world.

BB: Thank you, Doctor. Nyarlathotep?

N: I’ll be coming out with a new line of designer clothing this fall, which will be available at both Sears and Target. Check it out. It’s going to be called “Horror,” and it will be made 100% out of kittens, and we’re looking into some very interesting ways to torture the third-world children who make it to death. Also, You’re all doomed, and unspeakably horrific beings will feast on the very flesh of your souls.

BB: Well, we’ll all be looking forward to that. Dr Behe?

B: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

BB: Well, that’s all the time we have. Join us next week when we will be debating Social Security Reform with the Robots from the Moon. Goodnight, and God Bless.

Cheer me up. This shit is getting me down. Seriously, throw me a link to something funny. I need it.

Good question. I have been here for a week and my impressions are still fairly confused. Dense, certainly. Full of low, concrete buildings that are built to withstand tsunamis. Also, it’s full of Japanese people. So far, ninjas are not in evidence, but of course, that’s exactly what I would say if I was surrounded by ninjas, so that doesn’t really prove anything, does it.

So, what have I been doing? I’ve been insanely busy. It takes more than a week to get set up in a new job and a new home in a new country. My living situation is pretty unsatisfactory at the moment, but I intend to remedy that in the near future. For now, though, at least my miserable room is close to work, so that’s something.

A quick note- the rest of this entry probably won’t be very funny, so if you’re just here for the comedy, well, this is just kind of some generic blogging here, so, you know, go away. Here, have a funny comic to read instead.

Anyway, on the plane over here I was pretty bummed out. I think that’s pretty understandable, considering that I’m leaving everything I’ve ever known, and that I’m doing this after spending a month with my friends and family just completely reaffirming how awesome they are and how much I love being around them, not to mention that it will certainly be more than a year before I can get any kind of visit home.

However, since I’ve arrived, I’ve been very busy, and I’ve had a lot of great support from my buddy Dan and his wife Val (who I had only met once before, but who has been kind enough to drive me around this island all week while I do pointless, endless bureaucratic rounds,) and from pretty much everybody else I’ve met. So I’ve been busy, and feeling pretty good. Also, I am very excited at how much stuff there is on this island. Once I get my car, I am going to be all about exploring the hell out of it.

Maybe this will change in six months. Maybe this won’t be the most awesome time ever, but I’m optimistic. After all, Pensacola, started out miserable, and although I had a good time or two there, it basically stayed that way. Meanwhile California started great and got better. So Japan has been good so far. Wish me luck.

Also, looking back through the archives, I see that even in what I think of as my best times on the site, I was only putting out about one really good entry a month. Right now, I am resolving to match that from now on. That’s not too ambitious for me, so come back every now and then, and see what I’ve got for you. Who knows. It might get even better.

Anyway, expect a photo entry later this week. I promise it will confirm what I have been saying all week, that this place looks exactly like Katamari Damacy.

According to my favorite Internet, the popular (and preposterously awesome) video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas contains graphic sexual images! How can this be? We must pull the game from the shelves before more of our our precious children can be contaminated by images of human copulation. After all, this is a game for kids, and a valuable learning resource as well. Where else can the little tykes learn about cruising the bad part of town and picking up whores, then beating them to death with a baseball bat? Where else will they learn to use the word “Fuck” gratuitously? Where else, I ask you, will they learn what happens to a human body when it is fed into a combine harvester? This just isn’t right.

Shit foks, what is there to say about a culture that is happy to peddle simulated murder as children’s entertainment, but freaks out at the sight of some titties? This is exactly why commentary is obselete.

Okay, so I don’t watch TV very often, because I am a brilliant and fascinating genius and I can’t be bothered to waste my time with the intellectual wasteland that is modern American popular culture when I can hang out in graveyards smoking clove cigarettes and drinking red wine and otherwise expressing my individuality and uniqueness. However, through no fault of my own, I was recently exposed to the trailer for the latest Adam Sandler vehicle “The Longest Yard,”and I saw something really amazing. Now we all know that every shitty movie can find at least one or two hack reviewers who will happily throw out a handful of cocksuckity quotes for the sheer pleasure of seeing their names on television, so any movie, no matter how much it stars Adam Sandler can have a few glowing recommendations. So why, in God’s name does this commercial feature a voice calling the movie “A Summer Blockbuster?” I mean, you could just as easily say “Come see the film reviewers are calling “A movie” Is this seriously the level of laziness Hollywood has reached? Are they even going to bother to name the next Adam Sandler movie? Maybe they could just call it “Crotch” or something. And the tagline could be “Are you ready for Crotch?”