iPood

I recently bought an iPod home for the back of my toilet, so that now I can listen to music while I take showers. Then, the other day while defecating, I had a great idea. Before I go into it though, I want to patent my other great idea, the toilet app for the iphone, so that I can sue Apple when they inevitably create it.

But my first idea has nothing to do with that. I thought: Wouldn't it be cool if I installed a motion sensor on the inside of my toilet so that every time I go to the bathroom I'll get theme music? The answer is yes, it would be very cool. So I started thinking about what music it should play. My first thought was that it should be something epic, like the soundtrack to 300, that way I would feel really accomplished every time I used the toilet. Then I thought, what about John Mayer, mostly because his name is John, but also because I like the idea of my toilet telling me that my body is a wonderland. But wait, maybe defecation theme music is a way to finally get some use out of that Creed CD I bought when I was 12! Yeah, and I could autotune a beat onto it so it would be Creed-rap... or Crap. I finally settled on not-settling and decided that I would go with 'shuffle.' That way, every time would be a surprise, like when you forget that you had a blue slurpie for breakfast.

So, soundtrack decided, I started to consider the technical specifications of my toilet music. Of course, I couldn't have it only play when there was movement, or I would get an irritating stutter-step of song that would sound like Lady Gaga's 'telephone' every time I dropped a sheet of TP into the bowl. No, it would have to start on motion and then play continuously, but for how long? It would be horribly disappointing if the music ended and I was still on number 1 of 2. I suppose I would have to find some way to connect the flush to the stop mechanism. And perhaps I would add some violin music to fade-out. So it would be like the orchestra that flushes away Mo'nique when her speech runs too long at the Academy Awards.

Of course the worst case scenario would be this. I go to a party and, to buffer myself against a barrage of heavy electronic music, I get completely wasted on Vodka and Cranberry. Later, I find myself somehow at home and realize that I need to return liquids to the Earth from whence they came. I double over the toilet, expel the alcohol, and BAM, heavy electronic music. Nothing to drink this time. Except...

Je Suis Jean Penn

First conversation: Stranger's camera is not operational.

Stranger: Hi Sean Penn.

Me: I've gotten that before.

Stranger: ?

Stranger: I saw you on Bill Maher last night. You looked pissed.

Me: Long day.

Stranger has disconnected.

Second conversation: Stranger is a teenage (looking) girl.

Stranger: Are you French

Me: No. Just the haircut.

Stranger has disconnected.

Really?! Would you have stayed if I was French?

Third conversation: Stranger's camera features his dick. He is masturbating. Note: This was not the first dick I saw on chatroulette, but generally they flashed by quickly to avoid being reported. This one lingered, so I struck up a conversation with it.

Me: So, what'd you think of Avatar

Stranger (reaching over with one hand): What?

Me: It was really good. Do you think it should have gotten Best Picture?

Stranger (dropping dick for two hand type): WTF? That's fucked up!

Stranger has disconnected.

You're masturbating online and you call me asking you about a popular movie fucked up. Wow, the internet.

20 or so guys 'next' their way past me.

Fourth Conversation: A girl

Stranger: Hi.

Me: Hey! Congratulations on not being a guy's dick!

Stranger: Thank you.

Stranger: Are you from France?

Me: No. Florida. It's the haircut.

Stranger: Oh.

Stranger has disconnected.

What the hell? Is there a find the frenchman scavenger hunt going on unbeknownst.

A couple penises, several white guys with guitars, and several asian guys wearing headphones later.

Fifth Conversation: A Guy

Stranger: Hey!

Me: Hi?

Stranger: I loved you in Fast Times at Ridgemont High!

Me: What?

Me: Oh, you think I'm Sean Penn.

Stranger has disconnected.

Damn.

Sixth Conversation: Another Girl

Me: Hey

Stranger: You mean bonjour?

I have disconnected.

So, in conclusion, my exploits on chatroulette have led me to believe that in order to enjoy the site, you must be a girl, naked, French, and/or Sean Penn.

Definitely a site geared towards liberals.

Chatcraps

I decided the other day that it might be a good idea to experiment with popular internet fad, chatroulette. I had already drank a bottle of Draino and peed on a cop car, so an uncensored, anonymous, video-chat site seemed like the next logical step.

For those of you who are unacquainted with this crowning capstone of technology, let me brief you on how, chatroulette works. You log in and click 'New Game' because, like Monopoly, Parcheesi, and Shoplifting, roulette is indeed a game. The program then accesses your computer's camera and automatically trades your video feed with some other user's somewhere else in the world.

Roughly ten percent of people you will meet are dicks, literally. They come in two forms, erect and in use, or flaccid and veiled behind some form of fabric. Most of the dick showers (I use this word to mean 'one who shows' not 'a rain of...' although that is in a sense what the site is) flash by your screen quickly. Why? Because there is a 'report' button which a dickee can use to report a dicker to the site. The penalty for being reported? Banishment from the site... for ten whole minutes! An erection could die in that time frame! So these people click next before you can click the penalty button or determine their religion.

80 percent of the people on the site are not naked, but are instead men flipping through person after person in the hopes that one of said persons will be a naked woman. They won't be. Contrary to popular internet sensibilities, naked women on chatroulette are few and far between. For one thing, there are probably four of them on the planet compared with over 20,000 chatroulette users, and on another note, when they do find someone to talk to, the person they find will never let them go. So anyway, most of the guys on this site are people willing to sit through lots of dicks, and even more other boring guys in the hopes of finding a topless chick. Basically, its the lottery.

So basically, I determined that this site is offensive and an enormous waste of time. And so I wasted five hours of my time offending myself on it. Stories to come tomorrow.

Liebrary Fines

My good deed for the day was finally returning my long overdue library books (on tape: what kind of a schmuck reads these days?). Then, I raised my karmic credit account still higher by engaging in the gift of giving, specifically giving to the OCLS (Orange County Library Something) an ungodly amount of money. This was primarily due to the fact that I have had The Host by Stephanie Meyers for roughly 34 years and was secondarily caused by the libarian's (not a typo; she pronounced it wrong) refusal to except my low tolerance for crap as an excuse for the extended check out. So I tried a few other excuses.

I showed her my library card, with account number completely walleted away, and explained that I had spent the past several months trying every possible permutation of letters and numbers on the online sign-in so that I could renew my books that way. Excuse rejected. I argued that I was trying to improve literacy in Orlando by preventing unsuspecting kids from engaging in the gateway drug that leads inevitably to Twilight. Rejected. I made some kind of strange argument how because I am unemployed and now in debt, the government should bail out my fine. Fail. I tried the truth, that my CD burner was really slow, and burning a twenty disc book can take several months. She threatened to contact Interpol, until I lied and said that I was lying.

Finally I tried another lie, and it worked. I told her that I had gotten the books to listen to on the ride back to Louisiana and that there had been a family emergency. I didn't explain the specifics, but if pressed, I would have told her that my parents discovered that their only literate son had become addicted to Stephanie Meyers and that they had immediately enrolled him in rehab. She sighed apologetically and waived half of my fine.

This wasn't completely fine with me, but it was halfway there, so I paid it. And thus did the public library on Alafaya become the single most profitable government subsidiary this week.

Once Upon a Crime

Today, while driving around Orlando, I encountered a store called 'Once Upon a Child.' I thought about stopping to check it out but then thought better of it because I didn't want to get arrested for supporting Child Pornography. Now, before I get sued, I don't think the store actually sells child porn, but the tripod, camera, turkey baster, and bag of candy in the back of my minivan would surely had made me look a bit suspicious to any passing police officers with strict legal mores and X-Ray vision.

Still, 'Once Upon a Child' does seem like a terrible name for anything, condoms and lingerie especially, but stores as well. Basically, any phrase that sounds dirty when used as an answer to the following questions should be prohibited from use in public: 'Where was the best place you ever went on vacation?' 'How do you go to Cleveland?' or 'What should we title our new fairy tale film about Prince Michael of Jackson?'

Also, the store's proximity to Party City makes it even more suspicious considering that the strip mall that contains them is in Orlando, a city with several colleges and more than enough elementary schools to go around. Also note that according to the internet, Orlando has 2,601 registered sex offenders in that shopping plaza and neighboring rooftops alone.

My point is, owners of 'Once Upon a Child,' maybe you should have thought a bit more before titling your store as you did. Perhaps consider changing it to something tamer like: 'To Love a Child' or 'Toys-n-Us' or 'TGIU12.' Just a few thoughts.

Twenty Twenty

Here is, in the form of 20 facts essentially everything I did during my twentieth year. I consider this sufficiently productive. I’ll see if I can’t one up every one of these statistics in my 21^st despite the sure to be increased influence of alcohol.

Watched 292 movies, 264 of which I had never seen before.

-Top 3: Rio Bravo, Man on Wire, Short Cuts

Read 22 novels, including 5 by Ian Fleming.

-Top 3: Shutter Island, How I Paid for College, JPOD

Completed the first draft of my first novel, Dynasty

Completed my eighth feature screenplay, Catalyst

Filmed four short films: Attempted Plagiarism, Stranger Stories, 6.0, and MAD vengeance

Worked on 30 short film sets, primarily in the capacities of Script Supervisor or First AD

-Top 3: Five Stages, Surf Dracula, The Forever Room

Worked as Script Supervisor for the feature film, A Beautiful Belly

Wrote or co-wrote 15 short films that have been or are being produced

-Top 3: Five Stages, Pleasing Pablo, Surface Issues

Wrote 25 original short film screenplays

Wrote 12 entries for my blog, Something Clever

Created the blog, Fifty Word Films, and wrote 33 reviews for it.

-Top 3: Star Trek, State of Play, Public Enemies

Added 119 songs to my itunes library

-Top 3: Wise Up by Aimie Mann, Get Back by Ludacris, The Fear by Lily Allen

Completed 14 original acrylic paintings

-Top 3: In Film, Spectrum, Mail Flower

In Film

Spectrum

and obviously:

Mail Flower

The Hand Froster

I saw The Hurt Locker the other day and discovered that, not only is it not about a method of high school torture, but it is in fact a powerful and exciting movie. What amazed me the most about the subject matter was the way that these men kept their heads about them in situations where the exact opposite was likely to happen. I wondered if I would be able to keep my cool while carefully defusing bombs in the trunk of a car, never aware of whether or not the bomber was watching me do it. Well today, I learned the answer to that question.

For those of you who aren’t Brazilian, a king cake is in essence a giant colorful cinnamon role eaten in February to honor the birth of the cannibal king Mangebebe, a monarch best remembered for his habit of baking children. Well, these cakes are popular in Baton Rouge and when Sexy (remember her?) most recently returned from said city, her mother brought with them said cake. The cake was wrapped in the sort of plastic bag that you might use to contain a hand once you had detached it from a corpse if you didn’t want to get your car bloody on the way to wetlands. Of course, this bag presented a threat.

After getting a knife and untwisting the tie-twist, I opened the bag and found to my chagrin that the inside was coated in colorful frosting. Now, I was wearing an incredibly expensive albeit bought on sale thermal long-sleeve shirt, and immediately realized the challenge. I would have to hold the bag open with one hand while sliding the other hand perfectly down the center, Operation style, without touching the edges lest I frost my shirt. Then I would need to cut off an adequate piece, and should I fail to use a surgeon’s accuracy, a small child might lose a limb.

I’m proud to say that I kept my head about me (as did the baby) and cut a piece off (of the cake). I then used a long pair of tongs to extract the cake, and was soon eating it peacefully nearby. I never once worried about whether a cannibal or baker might be watching me from a nearby tower (though now I’m a bit nervous about it), and it seems to me that, hotheaded though I may have been, the mission was a complete success.

So, explosive deactivation in combat situations can’t really be that difficult, can it? Right?