Disclaimer

For my 30th birthday, one of the many outstanding presents my wife, the delicious, pert little Mrs. Apron (who doesn't blog nearly enough to satisfy my salacious and voracious appetite) purchased for me was Seasons 1, 2, & 3 of "30 Rock."

This is a very appropriate gift, because I am thirty, and I fucking rock.

(I rock, right?)

We're starting all the way from the beginning, and we're at Episode 5 of Season 1, and I have thoroughly enjoyed Liz telling Saree she needs to wear a bra and Jack getting thrown out of the writer's room for interfering with the T.G.S. Show's creative process.

What I don't enjoy, however, are the disclaimers that appear before you're allowed to proceed to the main DVD menu.

There it is, in all of its obligatory, dunderheaded legalese, talking all kinds of shit about how the views expressed in the special features are those of the individuals and do not necessarily represent those of the employees, shareholders, overlords of NBC Universal and any of its conglomporates/parent/red-headed step-child companies.

And then, just in case you're French, or Canadian, or old school homosexual, it's repeated in French.

I hate disclaimers. I think they are for the weak and the spineless. Obviously, if Alec Baldwin's voice over narration says, "I love this scene where Jack McBrayer has to give up his NBC Page Program jacket in the poker game, he looks like such a constipated little ferret," I think we can all generally infer that this is pretty much Alec Baldwin's own personal view and does not necessarily represent the views of a bunch of needle-dicked NBC executives who stand too close to Ann Curry with little mirrors stuck into the toe-section of their shoes on days when she's wearing skirts.

I mean, we get it. We get it.

I realize that it's done so people don't get sued, but, really, do disclaimers stop anybody from being sued? Everybody gets sued-- you're almost a perverted freak of nature if you're alive in 2010 and you haven't been sued. Actually, come to think of it, I haven't been sued yet-- but I'm sure my time will come. I can't believe I worked over a year-and-a-half on the street as an EMT and didn't get sued by anybody. We dropped patients, provided inadequate care, mishandled paperwork, lost psychiatric patients. I mean, there are days where I still expect to get a certified letter in the mail from some attorney representing some patient I transported in 2006 who says that I tore her arm off or something.

I would have liked to have provided patients with a disclaimer regarding the transport they were about to undergo with me. It would have read something like this:

"Disclaimer:

The are about to place yourself under the care of an emergency medical technician (EMT) who is a former theatre major. Truthfully, he has absolutely no business conducting emergent or non-emergent tranports of anything of greater value than a half-dead piece of livestock weighing no more than 47 pounds, defeathered. If you flatline during this transport, know that the EMT in the back with you will perform CPR on you to the best of his abilities, but, in all honesty, he doesn't believe CPR is effective, so he'll probably half-ass it. Not only that, his abilities probably aren't very good, and it is doubtful that his tiny, brittle little fists will do a truly adequate job as they pound mercilessly on your xiphoid process. You are most likely better off in the back seat of a taxi cab. These views are my own and do not necessarily represent those of Joan Plowright, veteran stage and film actress and one-time wife of the late Sir Laurence Olivier."

I also can't stand the disclaimers that are aired after "Law & Order" episodes that are so obviously "Ripped from the Headlines" style scripts, and then they have the nerve to state that any resemblance between people living or dead is purely coincidental."

Yeah, and my ass is made of cotton candy. Come on, now, Stabler. Take a bite.

I was thinking, though, that maybe my blog might be in need of a disclaimer, because I'm not sure that everybody reading quite gets it. And I don't want anybody to not get it, and I surely don't want to get in trouble because someone out there with deep pockets and lots of lawyer chums doesn't get it. And I don't get it.

What would a My Masonic Apron disclaimer look like?

Well-- go on! Give it to me! And may the best disclaimer win. The best one will be posted. And, yes, this is a contest. But no prizes. No giveaways. Because I hate that shit.