Put Me In a Forever Bag

Recently, my wife went on an outing to the local Christmas Tree Shop. And by "local" I mean "over-an-hour's-drive-away," but, for my wife, it's like a pligrimage of sorts.

See, the Christmas Tree Shops are in her genetic makeup, they're in her blood. They're crack. My mother-in-law knows the I-95 exit, precise topography and geographical coordinates of every Christmas Tree Shop from Maine to Maryland.

Really.

The store's slogan is, "Don't You Just Love a Bargain?" And I really do love bargains, don't get me wrong-- I'm just longing for a store to give me bargains on things that I actually want. This is not to say that, at some point in my life I won't want a Seagrass Roman window shade for $16.99, or a beaded wire wall decor lobster for $2.99, or a goddamn garden gnome for $5.99. There may come a time in my life where I might want any number of these things in a non-ironic way. Now, if I bought all three of these items, I would proudly display the garden gnome on my front lawn with the beaded lobster shoved up its ass and the window shade cord wrapped around its neck.

Won't you be my neighbor?

My wife came back from the Christmas Tree Shop with news of a product called "Forever Cheese" bags. They're exactly what you think they are: bags that, apparently, keep cheese fresh forever. Because you're absolute horn-dogs for eye-candy, here's the pic:

Now, I could go in a lot of different directions here... false advertising, ludicrous and unsubstantiated claims (I mean, forever hasn't happened yet, has it?), or just plain wrongness. I mean, even if cheese could theoretically last "forever," can you really picture yourself in the year 2032 opening the refrigerator and being remotely interested in eating a piece of cheese that was placed in one of these bags in 2010?

For the sandwich-minded among us, there's also "Forever Bread" bags. Wanna ogle?

Mmmmmmm! That there's some good forever-food, grammaw! I can't wait to be the first one in the record books to consume a 74 year old cheese sandwich!

I suppose, if I had a sense of humor this early in the morning before coffee I could find these types of products harmless and maybe even slightly funny, but I'm not sure that I do. I mean, I kind of do. It's all a big joke-- keeping perishable food "fresh" or at least "edible" forever, or at least "for a very long time." We've jack up most of our food with preservatives-- Christ, our clementines are coated with shellac, for fuck's sake. That's supposed to be used in wood shops, kids. Wood shops. We're living in a culture, I think, where nothing's supposed to break, decay, or *gasp!* die.

Look at cars. In the 1970s, you were lucky if you got four years out of the average shitbox rolling off the line in Detroit-- maybe six if the car was a Japanese import. Back in the day, car companies wouldn't dream of offering you a warranty on a brand new car that was more than 2 years. Now, all of a sudden, when cars are more complex and computer-centered than ever, prone to all kinds of electronic malfunctions, we expect our cars to last forever. Kia is offering a 10 year, 100,000 mile bumper-to-bumper warranty.

Kia.

In this era, even though we know that material goods are from China and are made like shit, we are constantly befuddled and astounded when things break. OMG, you guys, like, the screen on my iPhone won't turn on! Well, holy shit, Paris, that's totally fucked up. We expect these items of electronica to be ever-reliant, never failing us, even though we tire of them within eight months and are lustily searching after the next big thing.

We want, of course, to live forever, too. And, how do we do that?

Drugs.

Creams.

Lotions.

Potions.

Clinque.

Pristiq.

Surgery.

Perjury.

Shellac.

Oh, and antimicrobial nanotechnology. That's, apparently, what keeps the bread fresh "forever."

Hungry?

Beautiful White Children Are Missing

20somethings amuse me, and I guess, as a twenty-nine-year-old, I can still say that and sound self-aware without sounding crusty. I often balk at the things they say and do-- the vapidity, the insipidity, the shameless vanity and unapologetic trendiness, the egomaniacal self-engorgement.

The overwhelming propensity to treat "The Daily Show" as an actual news source.

Oh, is this what being "counterculture" has become? Lame!

Then again, if you want lame, come join me, my snoozing wife, and the dogs on the couch for a round of "The Today Show." If you only got your news from "The Today Show," you would be convinced that the most pressing issues of import in our world are Tiger Woods' pink-seeking missiledick and Joe Biden proclaiming healthcare to be a "big fucking deal."

Which, by the way, it is.

Also, if all you watched for news was "The Today Show," you would be unalterably convinced that only beautiful white children go missing in America.

While I don't have real, hard-n-fast statistics to back up my claim (I don't need them-- this isn't a scholarly article-- I was never very good at writing those anyway-- far too much passion, you know) I can tell you that my anecdotal observance of "The Today Show" missing child content is overwhelmingly tilted towards photogenic white children. Just this morning, they announced that a girl named "Kayleah" was missing. Now, I admit that this is probably racist of me, but, when I saw the spelling of the name on the screen, I said to my wife, "Oh my God, are they finally profiling a missing black girl?"

My wife, of course, was asleep, her head thrown back on the sofa cushion and her mouth unceremoniously open, trying to catch another few minutes of pre-commute sleep. Needless to say, she didn't respond.

Then, a moment or two later, they showed a picture of the missing girl. White.

Living as I do just a couple of short minutes away from Philadelphia, I know that black children go missing-- because I sometimes watch the local news. The local news cannot possibly get away with singlemindedly promoting and publicizing the plight of grief-stricken Caucasian families whose children have been plucked from their grasp. In Philly-- black kids get abducted all the time: by perverts hanging around playgrounds and schools, by their parents or relatives, by their Baby Daddies, by criminals and by miscreants and by ne'er-do-wells, by, well, kidnappers. Sometimes they're returned safely. Sometimes, they're returned in bodybags.

Somehow, neither event seems to warrant the national spotlight.

There's an old news maxim: "If it bleeds, it leads." I suppose a mantra for the new age of news about abductees, and even murder victims could be: "If it's white, it sees the light."

When I had my old blog, I wrote a post that slammed the "New York Daily News" for repeatedly profiling the murders of young, attractive, white women. One was a former model, slashed to death on the subway, an inglorious end for anyone, one was found tossed in a dumpster like, well, like yesterday's "New York Daily News." One was stuffed between a mattress and a wall, killed by a jealous boyfriend. In the text of these articles, there was almost always some reference to the victim's physical beauty. The references were never in quotation marks, the comments of a family friend or a relative, but they were embedded within the text of the article, presented by the reporter as just another fact-- no different than the location of the crime or the description of the murder weapon. Words like "attractive," "beautiful," "very pretty" were all used liberally. And, after reading the fourth or fifth story like this, I started to think, "do ugly people get murdered in New York City?" and, if they do, do the reporters write:

"Silvio Carnacci, a foul-smelling, unshaven 54-year-old Italian immigrant with three real teeth and one hair-covered mole on his forehead was found dead in his apartment yesterday morning by two patrolmen from the 9th Precinct answering a distress call. One of the officers was 6'2" and handsome in a classic way with a Romanesque nose and broad shoulders, his partner, however, had chin acne and a slight limp."

Sometimes I think back to the night when Barack Obama got elected President of this country. At that time, my wife and I lived in the Germantown section of Philadelphia, and people were blaring their car horns all goddamn night, even banging on kitchen pots and pans with spoons in the middle of the street. I think maybe some of those people were heralding Obama's election as the beginning of the end of racism in America.

I don't know. I still only see pictures of missing white children on TV.

Like That at Home

During a rehearsal for "The Sorcerer" last night, as I was leaping, prancing and mincing about, inhabiting the character of John Wellington Wells, of J.W. Wells & Co. Family Sorcerers, throwing my voice, screeching, yelling and, occasionally, singing, a familiar event was taking place backstage.

Chrous members were grilling my wife about our home-life.

"It must be a laugh-riot in your house, twenty-four hours a day!"

"He must be so fun to live with!"

"Does he just prance around like that, singing and being funny all the time?"

"Is he always like that at home?"

--------------------

Am I always "like that"? I don't quite know what "that" is. Is "that" adopting effeminate, 19th century gestures and rolling my "r's" while discussing whether to have pasta or Gardenburgers for dinner? Is it speaking in a reedy, seedy, affected British manner and grimacing all the time while conversing with my wife about our respective days at work?

Is that "that"?

The truth is, as soon as rehearsal is over, the first thing I do once the car doors are securely closed is spit vile about how awful it was, everything from my own performance to the leaky church ceiling to the incompetent director. And I don't do it like a Victorian gentleman, if that's what they're wondering. It's a profanity-laced tirade where I happily fantasize with my wife about giving fellow cast members MacGuyver-style lobotomies with paperclips and car-keys.

In short, I'm not the very model of a modern Major-General once dismissed.

It's slightly disturbing to me to know that other people are spending their time wondering about what I'm like "at home." I mean, I come home, I drink Caffeine Free Diet Coke. I fart. I shove Glucosamine pills down my dog's throat till he gags. I enjoy me some good online pornage. I blog. Occasionally, I rehearse my lines and songs, or far less than occasionally, I practice banjo.

There's not much to it.

I mean, I suppose I'm a little fun to be around at home. You do never know when I'm going to run down the hall screaming with a pair of underwear on my head, or fall off the couch or perform a monologue from Dr. Strangelove in the kitchen. But these moments are fleeting, and they are perhaps overshadowed by my constant dilemmas about work and the intermittent times when I am convinced that I have somehow contracted some sort of wasting disease, initiating an endless string of visits to Web MD where I slowly drive myself and my wife crazy.

And there's the farting which is an act that, I believe, even Beyonce and Robert Sean Leonard perform at home.

There's often discussions on the 20something bloggers board about the mask that we bloggers wear online, and whether we are "in real life" the way we "are" on our blogs. Well, I don't really know what that means either. Some people inevitably turn this into a discussion about whether or not they swear more on their blogs or in real life, as if using or not using "fuckscum" in real life somehow defines how "authentic" you are on your blog. The fact of the matter is that we are never how we are, and we are always how we are, because how we are is constantly changing, shifting, and evolving depending upon whom we're with. My behavior is completely altered when I go home to see my mother and my father. My behavior here is different from my behavior at work, and yet, in some ways, it's the same.

I don't know that living with me is anything special, but you'd have to ask Mrs. Apron. She puts up with it pretty well, I think, although I think she was pretty much ready to suffocate me with a pillow the last time I brought up buying a forty-one-year-old Volkswagen Beetle.

We're getting some new windows for the house instead.

Men + Care = Stupid

I have a confession to make:

Recently, I've been experimenting with LUNA bars to see if their consumption will result in some sort of body-altering experience. For the time being, I have yet to grow a vagina.

I thought also that utilizing Dove Beauty Body Wash Go Fresh Energize (Grapefruit and Lemongrass), massaging it over my pigeon chest might possibly cause a pair of fresh, hair covered breasts to pop out, in lactalicious glory-- but this hasn't happened yet. Just like eating "Smart Start" breakfast cereal in the morning hasn't turned me into a sixty-one-year-old woman with irritable bowel syndrome, reading glasses, and frosted hair.

I may choose to take this experiment of mine to the next level, and attempt to shave my face with a Schick Quattro for Women Trimstyle Razor for Women. Maybe I'll make it into the Guinness Book of World Records for being the first man to successfully grow a vagina on his face.

I've always thought that marketing products to men or women was kind of silly. I, of course, understand that it makes sense in clothes. I get that women's underwear is supposed to be frilly, stringy, and go straight up your asshole, and that men's underwear is supposed to have depictions of beer cans or Sponge Bob or the Playboy bunny insignia on it. I get that women's shoes are supposed to be torture devices and that men are supposed to wear Rockports. I understand all this. But I don't understand why men have to have their own soap.

Ladies, welcome to the soap you can't have, and gentlemen, your soap has come in:

Dove's "Men + Care"

According to their website, Dove's "Men + Care" delivers "the refreshing, comfortable clean men want."

Is that so? Well, Unilever, Corp., this soap was obviously designed by women because I'll be more than happy to tell you that all men want is to not smell like crotch-rot, and we can pretty much achieve that by rubbing a stalk of celery around on our taints. Why do we need your special man-boy soap? Will it somehow support and affirm our virility? Will it make our dicks longer? Because that's the other thing men want, aside from not smelling like crotch-rot. Can it do that for us, your new extendick soap? If not, then save your marketing bullshit and keep spending money putting only semi-attractive "real" women in your commercials to make yourselves feel better.

You think men are stupid and that we will buy your ridiculous man-soap. You think we're so stupid that, on your man-soap webpage, there's even a "How It Works" tab. You think we don't know how soap works? Listen-- I know how goddamn soap works, and I don't need to read your horsecaca about "micromoisture" to know that you're jacking me off and telling me it's love.

Here's a newsflash for everyone: soap is soap. Cereal is cereal. Granola goddamn bars are granola goddamn bars.

That's right, you heard it here first: on My Masonic Apron, the only blog out there written by a non-breasticated man who eats LUNA bars.

Happy Monday. Make sure you think of me next time you're rubbing some ridiculous, gender-manipulated product all over yourself in the shower.

Noted Author & Recluse

When J. D. Salinger died, I realized that I didn't want to be a famous writer anymore.

When I read the article written about him in the local papers, an unfortunate mirror of other articles written about him in other not-so-local papers, all I could do was shake my head. Even at the headline.

"Salinger: Noted Author & Recluse Dies at 91"

Noted author. And recluse.

Why?

I suppose it isn't enough that he wrote one of the best-selling, most-beloved books of all times-- thumbed through by hundreds of thousands of middle and high schoolers for decades. Because he shunned the spotlight, he had to be "noted author & recluse." Because we didn't see him on "Entertainment Tonight" and on television endorsing Acme Brand Puppy Chow-- because he didn't choose to bust his ass and sell his soul giving corny-ass lectures at universities and book readings in front of the salivating masses across the country, we slap that label right on his dead, wrinkly ass.

"Recluse."

Oh, and then there was the part in the article where is daughter talks about him drinking his own urine. Well, really-- what literary genius isn't a little bit eccentric? I mean, Augusten Burroughs has a dog named "The Cow."

It was a thoroughly disappointing obiturary as obituaries go. It was split into two decidedly unequal parts-- the one about him being a tremendous writer of irrevocable influence on youth and the 20th century, and the one about him shutting himself away from the world in his little hamlet in New Hampshire.

Sipping blithely on his own pee-pee, apparently.

My guess is that, if J. D. Salinger had died thirty or forty years ago, his obituary would have read very differently. The press wasn't as salacious, we the public didn't have such a voracious, insatiable appetite for slander and filth and pornography, literal or figurative. The man would have been lauded as a literary great, a master of the pen, and maybe the sentence, "He was content to live his life apart from everyday society in his small home in New Hampshire."

And that probably would have been that.

I just don't understand what the point is in becoming a great, vaunted genius if, after you die, they're going to make you into some kind of perverted degenerate, as if he ate a constant diet of blue food coloring so he could throw up on himself every morning and shout, "THE FLOOD OF BLUEBERRIES IS UPON US!" into a megaphone to wake up the entire neighborhood. I mean, Jesus-- all the guy wanted was a little privacy from a socially retarded world-- the world that invented "Throw Mama From the Train," college football, "American Idol," the made-for-TV miniseries, sweaters for dogs, and Kentucky Fried Chicken.

Can you blame the bastard?

If you took some time to think very seriously about the world in which we live and function, trust me, son-- you'd go running for New Hampshire to some basement where you could sit, shivering, with a wool blanket over your head.

Maybe Salinger was trying to escape the ridiculous convention of the media. Well, it was abundantly clear that, after his death, it found him just the same.

They say that denying people something just makes them want whatever it is even more. This is probably true-- take a look at children. Tell them over and over and over that they can't touch the stove and watch how many of them wind up with coil ring-shaped imprints branded to their palms and the words "General Electric" on their faces. Salinger denied the world his presence, and his comments on day to day happenings, something that a megalomaniac like Mark Twain could never have permitted. Even when he was too sick and tired to walk, he summoned newspaper reporters to his bedside so they could record his daily dose of witticism. But Salinger didn't want that. And people sought it out anyway.

People like my high school writing teacher.

I think he was of Polish descent-- his last name was thoroughly unpronouncable, ending in wicz or some combination of those letters-- so we called him "Mr. O." Mr. O was a peculiar fellow, wearing his eyeglasses down on the very tip of his nose, with the lenses tilted down and almost pointed directly at the floor, so that the frames were almost always falling off his face. Somehow they never did, leaving me to suspect that Velcro was somehow involved. Mr. O had legendary pit stains and an bodily odor that bordered on the post-mortem. His hair resembled a graying birds nest, haphazard and sticking up in places and his moustache bore specks of food and tiny shavings of wood, presumably because he enjoyed gnawing on pencils.

I don't remember much of what Mr. O taught us, but I do remember a few anecdotes. He told us that, for one year, he stopped speaking-- to anybody. I remember a fellow classmate of mine asking if it was for any sort of religious reason. Mr. O replied no, that he just wanted to see if he could do it, and that he realized he didn't have very much to say to anybody.

I also distinctly remember him telling us (I don't remember, though, how it came up) of his unquenchable love for popcorn.

"If there was a bag of popcorn sitting right on the edge of a cliff, and my wife was also hanging off the edge of that same cliff," he told us one day, "I'd go for the bag of popcorn."

The only other thing I remember about Mr. O was him telling us about the time that he stalked his favorite writer, J. D. Salinger. Somehow he'd found out Salinger's address (these things were a lot harder to do in the 1970s) and he drove up to the town where Salinger lived. He stocked up on tinned tuna and chicken and other necessities, purchased camouflage facepaint, covered himself in it, and hid in Salinger's bushes.

For a week.

Finally, Mr. O told us, he couldn't take it anymore, and he summoned up the nerve to walk up the path and ring the bell of J. D. Salinger's house.

"I couldn't believe that I was about to meet my hero, J. D. Salinger," Mr. O told us. "I crept up the walk, slowly, slowly, and I stood in front of his door for at least ten minutes. And then, finally, my finger reached shakily for that little circle button on the side of his door and, I don't know how I got the nerve to do it, but I pushed it."

"What happened then?" someone in the back of the room asked. Mr. O looked at the kid as if he'd asked a very stupid question. He gave his answer in a manner that would suggest that we all should have been able to predict the outcome of this tale.

"I ran away."

The Privileged Few

Last night, I stopped at the local supermarket to buy goodies and snackies for the individuals with whom I rehearse. I'm one half of the hospitality committee and so, if I show up at rehearsals with, to paraphrase from the original Godfather, "just my dick in my hand" I feel somewhat embarrassed.

After all, nobody's going to snack, are they? At least, no one I'd care to invite.

As I tooled around the parking lot of the supermarket, aimlessly searching for the spot that would get me the closest to the entrance in view of the pelting, freezing rain, I pulled my car into a spot and was just about to put the bitch into "park" when I saw a sign that sent me into a fucking rage.

"RESERVED FOR THOSE PICKING UP ON-LINE ORDERS."

What?

"That's a new one, guy," I thought to myself as I punched the Chrysler emblem on my steering wheel. I mean, are they kidding me? Do the rotund schlubs sitting at home in front of their computers in their stinky, cheese-laden slippers and their tattered, careworn, Dorito-fart underwear, clicking away at pictures of boneless pork shoulder and dehydrated Knorr meals deserve a better spot than me, just because they condescend to pop by to pick up their order?

Why, might I ask, do they need a special fucking space? I'm carrying out bags of groceries the same as they are, aren't I? Do they just presume that, if you're ordering at home you're some sort of mental or physical degenerate, stewing in your own milky feces whilst slamming your bicycle-helmeted head into the corner of your desk? Do they assume that your aged mama is swinging by in your handicap-accessible Town & Country van to pick up your Veetavitagegimen and your Lactatortots while you rock back and forth in the back of the van, listening to synthesized children's music from the 1980s?

Believe me-- people who order groceries from home are not

...special.

...special (in that way).

...deserving of special parking spots.

...attractive.

And, if it's not the lazy shitbirds ordering ribroast online who get first crack at the good supermarket parking spots, it's expectant mothers. Or mothers with small children. I mean, where does this insanity end? I liked it better when there were just a couple spots designated for the handicapped/persons with disabilities, incessant dribblers-- whatever you're supposed to call them these days. I don't care-- give them their spots with the little man sitting in the big circle thing, that's fine. And, if some bastard in a BMW parks there and jumps out of his car wearing loafers and no socks, ambling with no difficulty whatsoever into the store-- then his car should be fire-bombed and he should have his legs broken by Kathy Bates-- that's okay with me, too.

But that's where it should stop. With the disabled. There's nothing wrong with goddamn expectant mothers that they can't walk another seven goddamn feet across the parking lot. What does ACME and Giant and Wegman's think is going to happen? That somebody's kid is going to be born with Kleinfelter's Syndrome because mom had to park her Previa all the hell way down by the shopping cart return?

Come on.

And mothers with small children? No offense, mothers with small children, but fuck them! Nobody forced them to have small children. If a clown car full of pygmies pulled into the lot of the local Shop N' Bag, everybody would expect those cute little fuckers to hoof it across the lot. What's wrong with being small? It's good for kids to walk, especially if they're small. Children, ladies and gentlemen, are portable, in case you didn't know. They're not heavy rocks or big lumps of iron. You can carry them, or they can walk. Fuck-- put them on a goddamn skateboard-- just move their asses and let them know that life is hard and sucking it up and growing up ASAP is the only answer.

We just want to coddle our kids and, as a fellow lazy American, I understand that urge. But remember the Puritans and shit. They would never have accepted the charity of a special parking spot. I mean, it would look ridiculous.

"Reserved for Puritans Only."

That's just silly.

I'm not saying, of course, that I don't think anybody should be permitted to have a special spot at the supermarket, and I'm certainly not saying that I think I should have a special spot. But I just don't see why assholes who order groceries online and come to the store to pick up, or expectant mothers, or mothers with small children should have treatment on par with people whose legs don't work.

I am, however, in favor of preferential parking spots to recognize people who are deserving of special treatment for one reason or another. Here are some signs I would like to see in the parking lots of local food marts:

"Reserved for Any Catholic Priest Who Has Never Finger-Banged a Minor"

"Reserved for Walmart Employees Who Come to Work Sober"

"Reserved for Telemarketers Who Have Attempted or at Least Pondered Suicide"

"Reserved for People Who Understand When to Use You're and Your"

"Reserved for Jewish Women Who Do Not Speak in a Shrill, Shrewish Tone"

"Reserved for Registered Sex Offenders Who Don't Have Three First Names (i.e., "Jim Bob Lee")"

"Reserved for Police Officers Who Do Not Have Crew-Cuts"

"Reserved for Attractive Women Who Consistently Display Cleavage, Even When It's Cold"

"Reserved for People Who Appreciate Peter Sellers Films"

"Reserved for Anyone Who Traded in a Hummer After a Religious Awakening"

"Reserved for Black People" (because, let's face it, they've had it rough.)

"Reserved for Men Who Have Women's Names (i.e., "Beverly," "Carol," "Stephanie")"

"Reserved for Anyone Who Thinks Fibromyalgia Is Total Bullshit"

"Reserved for American Who Isn't Currently 60 or More Pounds Overweight"

"Reserved for People Who Have Never Considered Writing Into Dear Abby"

"Reserved for Pennsylvanians Who Aren't Attracted to Blood Relatives"

"Reserved for People Who Can Quote Entire Episodes of 'Fawlty Towers' from Memory"

"Reserved for Civil War Reenactors Who Get That It's Just a Hobby"

"Reserved for Sex Workers"

and, of course,

"Reserved for Followers of My Masonic Apron"

This Just In: Old, Wealthy, White Guys Retiring

No, it's not the Onion Radio News, it's just real news, filtered through the piercing, un-cataractical, weary-of-rolling eyes of My Masonic Apron.

In case you've been sitting under your refrigerator playing with yourself or watching the Tiger Woods News Network twenty-four hours a day, the news that a couple prominent Democrats are retiring has gotten everybody else's panties (crotchless or otherwise) in rather a twisty-poo.

A Democratic senator from North Dakota named Byron Dorgan, whom none of you has ever heard of, will not be seeking re-election. Neither will Democratic Connecticut senator Chris Dodd, whom some of you might have heard of, but only because he ran for President in 2008, which I was unaware of. I guess I was blinded by the glamour and manly beauty of "Law & Order" stalwart and necktie-wearing bassett hound Fred Thompson.

The news media is going crazygonuts about this. What does it fortell for the Democratic party? They're calling it "another bout of heartburn" for the Democrats. Now, I'm not as stupid as you drunk I am, I know that people staying is better, image-wise, than people leaving, but I'm a little confused about what the BFD is here.

Chris Dodd is 66 years old. He's a lawyer and a career politician, being elected to the senate in 1980, the year I was born, for any of you who are curious about such things (May 12, send pickles-of-the-month!). That means that he's been a senator for almost thirty goddamn years.

Thirty, bitches.

That's rather a long time to be doing anything, especially in an era when people stay in one job about the average length of a rodeo bull-riding session.

Byron Dorgan is old enough to have been born in an era when it was acceptable, apparently, to name your child "Byron." Okay, okay, he's actually only one year older than Chris Dodd, but apparently his parents were big Tennessee Williams fans. "Lord Byron's Love Letter?" Anyone? Oh, nevermind.

Anyway, Dorgan's been a senator for 17 years. So, he and Dodd together have a combined 47 years experience (I'm doing math, Mrs. Apron, aren't you proud of me?) Maybe the two of them high-tailing it out of there isn't such a bad thing.

I mean, it's not like either of them are strapped for cash and need to keep working to make sure their families are provided for.

I don't think.

Dorgan was a big-shit corporate executive at a Denver aerospace firm before becoming a senator, which doesn't pay too poorly either. He was also briefly entangled in the Jack Abramoff money-laundering scandal, so he's probably not doing too bad from that either. Chris Dodd lives comfortably in East Haddam, Connecticut, which isn't a shabby little town and he owns a "vacation home" in Connemara, Ireland, which just sucks for him, don't it?

Now, granted, both of these men probably wake up six times a night to pee, and they have sciatica and the mumps and gout of the head or whatever the hell old, rich, white people are getting these days, but I'd say they're doing okay, relatively speaking. Relative to the 10% of their fellow Americans who are unemployed right now.

So, why shouldn't they be retiring?

Should they be there, legislating, pretending they're reading 5,000 page bills and falling asleep at their little desks until they're in their seventies or eighties or nineties? Is that what we want on the Hill? A bunch of crinkly motherfuckers who constantly have to leave session to put in eyedrops or get an open cardiac massage in the senator's lounge?

My point is: two old sonsofbitches throwing in the towel is not news, and it's not a goddamn case of heartburn for the Democratic party. It's just two old sonsofbitches throwing in the towel. Can you blame them? Maybe Dodd wants to spend more time in Ireland. Or Connecticut. Maybe Byron wants to have his name surgically changed.

Who gives a shit?

Frankly, I wish more of these silver-haired, crumply old bastards would hit the road, on both sides of the aisle. How about getting in some young people who don't smoke so they're not as beholden to the tobacco lobby? Maybe some guys who can actually attain erections naturally so they're not totally in Big Pharma's pocket, accepting free samples of Viagra and hoarding Levitra click-pens in exchange for pushing drugs through the FDA process before they're deemed safe?

Instead of criticizing and critiquing the decision of these two Pamper-asses to step aside, we should be applauding them for leaving while they still have more than two marbles rolling around in their skulls. Americans are notorious for not knowing when to quit. Look at how many years "Roseanne" was on the air.

Goodbye, Christopher Dodd.

Goodbye.... *chortle*.... Byron.

Have a nice life, you two rich, old, white guys.

And now you know why you rarely read about politics on My Masonic Apron.

What Do You Expect?

Last night, I got an email from one of my precious few readers who has the misfortune to know me not just as a blogger but as a human being. The email directed me to a post on a blog called "The Art of Manliness" and the post was called What Can Manly Men Expect of Women.

You can read it here, if you're the bookish, sensitive, intellectual type of person who likes to know both sides of a story before just blindly trusting me and letting me touch you in the dark while you're asleep.

What?

The post makes the argument that men ought to be manning up, in many various ways, but that women ought to be expected to follow suit-- by feminizing up, as it were, because that-- like the handlebar moustache and the word "hosiery" seems to have gone out-of-style.

The article even quotes some "professor" as stating the following:

"But the younger generation is looking at getting dressed up and making their mark,” Mr. Cohen continued. “It’s a real generation gap here. I teach at three different colleges, and I am amazed how dressed up some of the students are. Girls still come in their hoodies and pajamas, but boys come in their suits.”

That's funny-- I care way too much about my suits to come in them.

But seriously, folks-- where the fuck does this guy teach-- the Sorbonne? My freshman year roommate barely attended class and, when he did, he sported a wifebeater and track pants, if he was feeling chipper. The amount of smelly, unshaven, hair-across-the-eyebrows guys who came to class wearing flannel pajama bottoms and hoodies outnumber the amount of recall notices on the Ford Pinto.

The post then goes on and on to whine about the "double standards" that exist in this world that have heavily stacked the deck against men. Well, let's all just back away from our monitors and have ourselves a good old manly cry about that, why don't we? Of course, if you look at the media, you start to see that it's true. Look at any situation comedy. You've got a rail-thin, high-titted, intelligent, world-weary wife inexplicably married to some semi-retarded, usually obese fuckjob whose job makes inappropriate choices like it's his job-- if he has one. You want to rise up and say, "Hey, wait-- that's not fair!" until you realize that all of these fucking shows were created and written by men.

Oops.

The post then goes on to point out the following contradiction:

"Could we perhaps say that equality shouldn’t mean embracing and outdoing men in things that were traditionally considered masculine? That making out with other chicks for attention and lifting your shirt for beads and getting smashed and burping the alphabet and dressing in sweatsuits really has very little to do with being “liberated?”

Wow. Sounds like the writers of this blog (apparently a hubband-and-wifey team-- awww!-- almost makes them immune from critique, don't it?) have been watching too many "Girls Gone Wild" videos, or at least too many episodes of "COPS: Live & Tasin' at Mardi Gras" to me. What percentage of the population of 18-24 year-old women behave like this, I'd like to know? And, while we're on the subject: how many of them have webcams?

The article also makes lots of claims, presenting them as fact but without citing any sources or evidence, such as "did you know that 2/3 of divorces are initiated by women?" Well, define "initiated." Does that mean the actual legal proceedings? Does that mean bringing it up at the breakfast nook? Does that mean that she was the one who took her ring off first?

Oh, and does that figure include all the instances of divorce that began due to the husband's sticking his dick in a hole where it didn't belong at a Motel 6 during his lunch hour?

The post ends by asking a very simple question, though, and I think it's a question that I should be answering on this here blog of mine because, really, I have a big mouth and sometimes I feel like I need to use it for something important.

And the role of men and women in our society is important. Isn't it?

Here's what I expect from women as a whole:

Nothing.

And I hope to God they expect the same, or less, of me.

You know why? Because I'm a human being, and I fuck up a lot. I say the wrong thing and I use the steel wool on the bundt pan and I zone out at work and I can't spell "synagogue" correctly without really thinking about which vowels go where and I spend too much time fantasizing about owning some impractical, crazy fucking car like a 1973 Mercedes 220-D with tan leather interior and wood inserts on the dash and I have anxiety about dying all the time and I'll never play the banjo as well as Steve Martin.

We're all hopeless, even those of us who make it big. Especially those of us who make it big. Christ-- look at Steve Martin. If you think his Inspector Clouseau is funny, you can just un-follow this blog right now, because you're dead to me.

Actually, maybe I mis-spoke a while ago when I said that I don't expect anything of women. I guess maybe I expect them to not be assholes. You know what I mean-- the kind who feel they are entitled to things. When a woman budges in line at the post office or reams me out at work, she's a bitch. When a man does the same things, he's a dickhead.

But those are just words-- they're just names. Would I be some kind of kerchief-mouthed revolutionary if I started referring to annoying women as "dickheads" and annoying men as "bitches?" Look, I'm too tired and too insignificant to start reinventing the wheel. I already tried that with "LMT" and "Keep Fucking That Chicken" and I don't think it worked.

I just want people to be good to each other, for Christ's sake. Figure it out, people. Start fighting fair with each other. Stop accusing and blaming, take responsibility. If one of you doesn't like doing laundry, then make that your thing. She'll walk the dog or iron your pants. Who gives a shit? Stop looking for excuses as to why your life is so unfair and why your race is so downtrodden and why your gender is so maligned. Stop complaining to each other over cosmopolitans or coffee. Stop writing into Dear Abby. Actually, don't do that.

Today, my wife and I went outside three times and did battle against a foot-and-a-half feet of snow with a shovel each. First we dug out her car, and then we dug out mine. She shovelled the walkway, I shovelled the sidewalk. Why? Because we're goddamn partners. I didn't go out there myself because I felt the need to prove that I'm "the man" with my big dick and balls, and she didn't do it to prove that she's a modern, empowered woman with a clit of steel and a snarky New York-state-of-mind disposition.

Man-- fuck that.

Gender roles and gender stereotypes are what we make of them-- they were invented long ago and we insist on either inventing new ones or perpetuating the old ones. Either way, we do a disservice to each other when we do it. What do you expect of women? What do you expect of men? You have to start smaller, by expecting things of individuals. We wouldn't permit, as a polite society, reading a post entitled, "What Do You Expect of Blacks?" or "What Do You Expect of Jews?" would you? Let's just take each other one at a time.

And those of us who are lucky enough in this life to have partners, well, we can start there.

Traffic Court: A Postscript

I dragged my sorry ass down to Philadelphia's traffic court today.

There was no court, there was a tiny office with a desk and a chair.

There was no judge, there was just an examiner.

I was not found guilty, I was just found liable.

I was assigned #273. When I arrived, they were dealing with #54.

Needless to say, I had a lot of time to wait and think and observe while I was waiting for my 2.5 minute "hearing" with the "examiner" at her "desk." While I'm tempted to write off my combined 2 hours of sitting in traffic there and back and hour and fifteen minutes of wait-time a complete waste, really, when you think about it-- it wasn't. Because I learned a lot. And, when you're learning, it's never a waste.

Here's what I learned today at traffic court, Mommy:

* Being jailed does not necessarily preclude your vehicle from accruing parking fines.

*It is possible to rack up parking violations in excess of one month's rent for my first apartment.

* In traffic court, black people outnumber white people.

* The civil service clerks who sit behind the bullet-proof glass cannot hear, so please scream at them.

* Speaking of those civil service clerks-- mascara is mandatory. Teeth, optional.

* The Arab man named "Abraham" is not to be trifled with. He has come bearing at least twenty polaroids of the curb, the parking meter, his car's front bumper, a hand-drawn map of the intersection in question, and an attitude that could make a camel shit blood.

* Attractive people do not go to traffic court. They are far too busy in tanning beds, jogging, looking at books in Borders, sipping lattes in cafes, getting beauty rest, and enjoying candle-lit dinners and/or walks on the beach and/or curling up on the couch with a glass of wine and a book. If attractive people do get parking fines, they just pay them.

* Large black men with huge, gouging knife-wounds to their faces and necks go to traffic court.

* If you wear a neck-tie to traffic court, you are guaranteed to be the only one to do so. Except for the TSA guard sitting seven seats away. Reading the Qur'an.

* Your name will be mispronounced by the clerk if it's easy or moderately difficult to say. If it is next-to-impossible to say, it will be spelled aloud.

And, the most important lesson of all the lessons I learned about traffic court:

* Don't go to traffic court.

Dr. Who?

I haven't picked on Dr. Phil in a long time, but an article I read today in The Philadelphia Inquirer reminded me that he's still out there, being annoying and useless, and making big bucks whilst being so.

And he's not alone.

The article I read was about kids with autism managing their social defecits through communication workshops hosted by people who go by "Dr. Liz" and "Dr. Alex." They do have last names, like your gynecologist and your dentist, they just don't use them. You know, because going by "Dr. Liz" is cool, and going by "Dr. Laugeson" isn't.

Here's the thing, though, Dr. Liz: you're a clinical psychologist. You're not supposed to be fucking cool. Cars with spoilers are cool. New sneakers are cool. Vacations and blowjobs and roller coasters are cool. No autistic child is going to think you're cool and accessible because you call yourself "Dr. Liz." Want to be cool to a kid with autism? Stand really close to them and talk about trains.

I don't understand this kick that we're currently on in America-- our fascination with candy docs-- Dr. Laura, Dr. Drew, Dr. Oz. Well, fine, "Oz" really is his last name, apparently, but are we too stupid and immature to refer to Dr. Drew as "Dr. Pinsky?" The colloquialism of their reference kind of deflates the seriousness of the degrees they ostensibly worked so hard to obtain, and it certainly pours confectioner's sugar all over whatever information they might dispense to the masses, like pez. Of course, I don't know how seriously I'd take anyone who appears on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" dressed in surgical scrubs and doing squats with a champagne cork between his teeth no matter what he calls himself.

My primary care physician's name is Dr. Lander, and that's what I call him. He's eighty-four years old and, back in the time of Christopher Columbus, my great-grandmother used to apply rouge and lipstick in preparation for Dr. Lander's much-anticipated house-calls. Dr. Lander is an intelligent, articulate, thoughtful, competent medical practitioner who wears threadbare dress-shirts, bowties, pencil-straight courderoy pants and a stained white coat. The idea of referring to this man as "Dr. Bill" seems incongruous, idiotic and offensive. He is what I like to call "a real doctor." If he ever appeared on a television show or at some flashy conference, I don't think a lot of people would tune in-- they'd much rather watch "Dr. Bill." But that's their loss.

The Dr. Phil's and the Dr. Liz's of this world are here, I guess, for people who don't expect much from them. They're here to entertain, and they're here to make a bigger name for themselves, and to profit. I just hope that people out there don't forget that, and that, if they are really looking for serious advice or help, they seek out a doctor who has the self-respect and the dignity to refer to him or herself by their last name.

Caring for people, dispensing diagnoses, medications, theories or advice was never meant to be cool or marketable. If you think you've got yourself a catchy moniker for your new TV show, why don't you tuck your tail between your legs and return to your exam room or your office where you can look at the degree bestowed on you by the institution of higher learning that you paid a mortgage to acquire. Why don't you go actually do something useful or helpful? If you think you're making yourself accessible to kids by calling yourself "Dr. Liz" or "Dr. Alex," trust me, you're not. Kids can pronounce your last name, and they see through condescending bullshit like that with 20/20 vision-- even the autistic ones.

Prescribing Information

If you ever want to scare the happy shit out of yourself, read the "Prescribing Information" for any prescription drug you happen to be taking.

My mother-in-law was visiting this weekend, so, consequently, I spent an inordinate amount of time locked in the bathroom. With scant reading material from which to choose, I decided to open up a trial sample of Xopenex, my rescue inhaler, and read the prescribing information. I'll never feel the need to watch a horror film in the dark ever again.

First off, there's the stuff I didn't understand, which is good, because you can't be scared of what you don't understand. For example, the following:

"The active component of Xopenex HFA (levalbuterol tartrate) Inhalation Aerosol is levalbuterol tartrate, the (R)-enantiomer of albuterol. Levalbuterol tartrate is a relatively selective beta2-adrenrgic receptor agonist. Levalbuterol tartrate has the chemical name (R)-(x1-[[(1,1 -dimethylethyl)amino]methyl]-4-hydroxy-1,3-benzenedimethanol L-tartrate(2:1 salt)."

Oh. Okay.

My 10th grade chemistry teacher drove to work in a rusted-out Chevrolet Chevette, wore broken glasses held together with scotch-tape and opined regularly on the joys of "butt-bumping," so, needless to say the aforementioned jargon holds no meaning for me whatsoever.

If you turn the paper over, you'll read about the joys of drug interactions, complications, side effects, the ability of the drug to be excreted in breast milk and, now my personal favorite: "Carcinogenesis, Mutagenesis, and Imprairment of Fertility." Ready?

"In a 2-year study in Sprague-Dawley rats, racemic albuterol sulfate caused a significant dose-related increase in the incidence of benign leiomyomas of the mesovarium at, and above, dietary doses of 2mg/kg/day (approximately 30 times the maximum recommended daily inhalation dose of levalbuterol tartrate for adults on a mg/m2 basis and approximately 15 times the maximum recommended daily inhalation dose of levalbuterol tartrate for children on a mg/m2 basis)."

There are also discussions of this product being used on "Golden hamsters, mice, pregnant rats, rabbits and dogs." 5 out of 111 of the mice born to mothers who used my inhaler were born with cleft palate. They will be teased in school.

I also enjoy the side-effects portion of the informational packet, because now I think I have all of them, even though I use this inhaler maybe eight times a year:

"cyst, flu syndrome, viral infection, constipation, gastroenteritis, myalgia, hypertension, epistaxsis, lung disorder, acne, herpes simplex, conjunctivitis, ear pain, dysmenorrhea, hematuria, and vaginal monilasis."

Yes, I even think I have that.

Funnily enough, they also include "asthma" as a possible side-effect stemming from the use of this inhaler.

People usually think about "TMI" as your co-worker telling you about the time she found poop schmear on her thong bikini in Key West or the time you jerked off your high school boyfriend nine times in one weekend and his cock bled all over your parent's sheets, but TMI comes in all shapes and sizes, and, sometimes, it comes in a levalbuterol tartrate suspension.

I like to stay informed, and, as a former healthcare professional, I enjoy conversing with medical professionals on a relatively intelligent level, but, really, there's no reason for anybody to read their prescribing information, unless they're particularly starved for a way to pass the time in the bathroom. Just know that, after you read it, you may very well wish you hadn't.

I just hope that, the next time I'm in the midst of an asthma attack, I don't start thinking about chemical compounds or Smoot-Hawley rats with fucked up mouths.

Muckety-Muck

Here are some random thoughts/questions/observations to get you through your daily/nightly muckety-muck.

* What is it about being a Certified Public Accountant that somehow makes you qualified to observe a state lottery drawing on television? Do CPAs get time-tested on identifying ping-pong balls with black numbers on them?

* Why is it that white, dour, ridiculous-looking politicians in their mid-fifties can't seem to keep their dicks in their pants? I mean, seriously-- what the fuck? There's Spitzer, the South Carolina governor-- that faggot in the airport bathroom... Do black politicians boink people who aren't their wives? Doesn't seem like it. Do women politicians get mustache rides from mystery men in anonymous hotel rooms? Hard to imagine, isn't it? Well, maybe "unpleasant" is a better word.

* Why are people all-of-a-sudden totally obsessive about holding the door open for other patrons at the WaWa, but don't seem to give a shit about it at any other commercial establishment? Seriously-- this is a bizarre kind of chivalry I haven't observed anywhere else-- it's like WaWa is the Court of King Arthur. I have no idea what that's about-- but it happens to me, too. Then again, I hold the door open for people everywhere and, invariably, I get stuck there while Indian families consisting of a dozen or more members leisurely troll on through while my wife stands, grinning at me.

* Why does it always rain when I decide to leave the car windows open? On a related topic: God, why do you love kicking me in the schnutz?

* What the fuck happened to WHYY Channel 12? It was a victim of the D-TV Revolution. Che Guevera of the airwaves killed it. It is dead. No more "Antiques Roadshow" on Monday nights. We just don't get it anymore. I've tried rescanning the motherfucking TV six times now. It's gone. We get Channel 23, which is New Jersey PBS, and so we get to watch "Roadshow" on Tuesday nights but, seriously, one PBS station (from another alien state, no less) is not adequate PBSage for this household. The decrease in PBS stations can only be a bad thing for the already retarded American populous.

* I'm seriously over Paris Hilton. Even naked Paris Hilton gets on my fucking nerves.

* Apparently, people commonly stand in the aisles of Yemeni planes for the entire duration of their flights. Can you imagine that? I mean, it's one thing to do that on a subway or a trolley, but, seriously, on a goddamn plane? How the fuck does the stewardess get her little drink cart full of 8 ounce Frescas down the pike?

* So they're not going to bury Michael Jackson at NeverLand. Apparently they've decided that, since he's basically human, a cemetery would be more appropriate.

* The window unit in this room that came with our house is called "The Power Miser." At least it's not called "The Tight-Fisted, Conk-Faced Jew."

* My wife is attending a book lecture at the local library right now. When are we not going to be the youngest people at public events (folk music concerts, Gilbert & Sullivan operas, early music ensembles, the legitimate theatre, etc...)?

* Why is Al Sharpton on TV pretending he gives a shit about the death of Michael Jackson? I realize Jackson is black and dead, but, to the best of my knowledge, he wasn't shot by a white police officer.

* Why is there a zit on my upper left cheek? I mean, haven't we done this already?

* Why did I get that Master's degree again?

* Why does Pandora.com play three songs you love followed by five songs you like followed by sixty-seven you can't fucking stand?

* It's impossible to take the British seriously. I mean, "fairy cakes?" Come on-- you didn't seriously used to be the supreme imperial world power, did you?

* I don't know what I'm more afraid of-- collapsing all alone and dying with absolutely no one to help me, or collapsing in front of an idiot who breaks my entire ribcage at a completely inept attempt at CPR and I wind up dying anyway, or collapsing in front of a group of idiots who do nothing but watch me flop around like a fish on the floor.

* I love Gilbert & Sullivan, dressing up in fine clothes, and talking about my feelings. I think God forgot to install that Gay Pentium chip.

* I'm only truly happy when I'm eating food with a sodium content of at least 1000mg.

* Do you remember when Facebook didn't suck hogsdick?

* I haven't ever been seriously punched in the face. It's going to happen one day, though. I keep waiting.

* Sometimes I wonder if I'm ever going to write and publish a second book. I highly doubt I will, and I think I'm a failure because of that. Then I think of all the other assholes out there who've never published one. And I smile. So, I'm a failure, but a smiling one.

* Lots of times, I want to be on the street as an EMT again. I know it doesn't pay, but I don't care. Well, I do care, but I don't want to.

* I think iconography is funny. I can't stop making fun of it. I work in a church and they have these flags hanging from the ceiling and one of them depicts a book with a fish on top of it. I mean-- really? What the fuck does that mean? Do people pray to that? I'd feel dumb. "God bless you, book fish thing." Like, whatever.

* I know this young girl with the worst eczema I've ever seen. Her entire body looks like a lobster and she scratches herself incessantly, sometimes both hands disappear beneath the waistband of her shorts. I can't stop staring at her, I'm sure with thinly veiled disgust, and yet, I can't look at her without honestly wanting to vomit. Especially when she eats the skin flakes. I mean, isn't this what institutions were created for-- so we normal people wouldn't have to see that shit?

* I think the people who read my blog are the saintliest motherfuckers in the entire universe. Seriously-- you and my mom deserve a fucking medal.