“I’m James and I’m an alcoholic,” I was told to say in AA. “I’ve wasted the last several years of my life. I’ve lost my career, my family, and respect…all because I can’t stop drinking. I’d do anything to get it all back. But it doesn’t work that way. Yet today is a new day, and hopefully coming here will be the first of many steps towards getting my life back together.”
“Thanks for sharing, James,” the crowd said back.
Then my sponsor said “I’m Jack, I’m an alcoholic, and I hate k——— and ——— and fuck the Dutch too.” He then gave a 20 minute racist tirade in front of 50 people.
“But Jack”, I said “My kids are Vietnamese. Do you hate them too?”
“I hate anyone who ——— then ———- and ———- my penis!”, he replied.
With the crowd stunned, Jack yelled “this is where you can stick the Big Book!” Then he dropped his pants and exposed his anus.
Since I haven’t seen Jack in weeks, I have to find a new sponsor. And without a sponsor, AA bylaws don’t require sobriety 🤷♂️
Went on a date for the first time since 2003. With a woman. When she came to my house and noticed the pictures on the wall, a collage of all the important people in my life, she asked “is this your father?”
I said “No, that’s Coach Eric Taylor, molder of men. The greatest coach of high school football in Texas history.”
Puzzled, she then asked “umm, is this your brother?”
I replied “No, that’s Matt Saracen, the quarterback for the Dillon Panthers during their championship run. He was thrusted into action after Jason Street suffered a life altering injury. He wasn’t the most talented quarterback, but he had a lot of heart. Are you fucking stupid?”
Friday Night Lights is the greatest television show of all time. Probably always will be.
I have a lot of regrets. I spend a lot of time thinking about them. And it’s very hard to capture that feeling of reflection…of nostalgia…when you reflect on events in one’s life. Movies and TV definitely have a hard time capturing that that sensation.
This is where FNL excels. Watching it is like reaching back into one’s past. Complimented by its dreamy soundtrack, the cinematography is an achievement in its own right.
Honestly, the cinematography, music, and actors bail out what is occasionally terrible writing. I mean, one season is about how a character murders somebody…and amazingly gets away with it. It’s a misstep that any other television show could never recover from. But FNL did.
Also, after spending three emotionally charged seasons with an outstanding set of characters, we get introduced to a different set of characters that take over the storylines. Few shows can pull that off.
It’s brilliant.
It also changed my life. I couldn’t watch the series finale because I was crying too much because I was REALLY fucking high.
“But James, I don’t like American football.”
That’s horseshit and you know it.
As Coach Taylor says: “Everyone loves football, they just don’t know it yet.”
After crashing my 97 Geo Metro into a tree, my family staged an intervention. My mom cried the whole time, saying “your dead father would be disappointed in you”, and my ex-wife said that “if you don’t stop drinking, you will never see your son again”.
I sat there listening to this shit until it was my turn to talk. I said, “I recognize that I *might* have a drinking problem. But…and I’m just making a suggestion…have you guys considered that YOU might have a sobriety problem?”
The cops later arrested me for property damage and I was court ordered to attend rehab. They sent me to a Fort Lauderdale treatment facility where they told me that I’m a “manic depressive” and “have unresolved issues stemming from childhood trauma”. I told them to fuck off, that psychiatry has been proven to be bullshit years ago.
Nevertheless the judge told me to attend AA. My sponsor, Jack, said that sobriety sucks and that there’s nothing wrong with alcohol because it’s a natural product from completely artificial processes.
Besides, lots of great things were done under the influence of alcohol. Ever heard of World War II?
So no, I will not be taking my clozapine and naltrexone. Things like “mental health” and “science” is liberal bullshit.
So what if Randy “exposed” himself to an undercover cop or frequented massage parlors “owned” by known sex traffickers or “threatened” to shoot up a Home Depot or sold drugs outside of “middle schools”?
This is America. And in America we have this thing called free speech.
Ever heard of it?
But anywho, some of y’all make me sick. You keep saying that it “serves him right” that he’s been denied bail due to “being a flight risk pending an investigation into sexual relations with a minor and the disappearance of several women dating back to the 1990s” by the “Los Angeles Police Department”.
Do any of y’all have a heart?
I met Randy while hitchhiking on I-10 in 1992. He told me “Get in kid, I have something to show ya”. We pulled off into an abandoned rest stop and he told me there was “precious cargo” in the trunk of this Pontiac Firebird. He handed me the keys and told me to meet with a “Carlos” in Phoenix. He also handed me a Ruger 22 and told me to “get rid of the evidence”.
I met with Randy two days later in Barstow and I crashed on his couch. Then he gave me $1500 and said “you’re alright kid”.
So when I was down on my luck, Randy gave me a chance. He put clothes on my back and a roof over my head. Sure he came home drunk some nights and took liberties with my penis. Sure I cried about it every night. And sure it gave me a crippling methadone addiction. But come on! Every man has sucked off their best fried, right?
Randy is a good man.
So despite the numerous victims in the wake of his crimes and misdeeds, Randy deserves your sympathy. Stop being a heartless bastard.
Now as the Los Angeles County DA offers me full immunity in exchange for testimony, stop being a snowflake by moaning about “justice for the victims” and think of poor ol Randy sitting there in county jail. No man deserves that fate.
My buddy Randy got really drunk and started watching 9/11 videos.
“Never forget”, he told me.
“How could I?” I replied. “A bunch of people got trapped above the site of impact on the Twin Towers and either suffocated or leaped to their deaths. Can’t think of a worse way to go, ya know? Having to chose between choking on fumes or falling hundreds of feet to your gruesome death.”
But Randy forgot. And that’s kinda the point behind the “Never Forget” sloganing and the virtue signaling behind saying it, right?
The unfortunate thing about honoring and mythologizing tragedies is that it helps mask over the absolute horror behind such events. This is true for not just 9/11, but pick any war. I’m sure that soldier was really concerned about getting a posthumous bronze star after getting his legs blown off and bayoneted.
Sure, I can say that this due to some conspiracy from the government to feed us propaganda and keep their war machine fueled, which is true. But the fact is that it is much easier to focus on the mythos, revenge fantasies, and conspiracies regarding tragedy rather than on the tragedy itself.
To do so means recognizing that death is ever present. It can strike with no warning, no rhyme or reason. The universe itself is completely indifferent to our condition. In fact, it seemingly despises us. So love today, laugh when you can, because it can all be gone in an instant.
Anyways, started taking viagra today. They caused me to pass out in the Walmart bathroom, but at least they gave me a boner. Just can’t go back to Walmart anymore. 😩
A couple of punks were yelling at me the other day, saying “get the fuck outta here old man!”. I was about to pull out my .22 when the police escorted me out. I received a lifetime ban from the roller rink.
Of course this upset me. Apparently it’s no longer socially acceptable to “be intoxicated and yell obscenities at children in family establishments.”
But times are a-changin.
As a homeless Chinese man once told me: “The only constant in life is change.” And boy, don’t we know it…
Can’t even smoke at a gas pump anymore without someone bitching at me. And sexual harassment? My boss used to grope me all the time!
But those days are gone.
Perhaps there’s no such thing as “the good ole days” anyhow. Things don’t improve or get worse…they just change.
As I was told in Alcoholics Anonymous one time “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, and the courage to change the things I can”
There was this time when I got kidnapped by Marxist insurgents while on a drug run in Columbia. I was starved and sleep deprived for 72 hours, then afterwards came the long and torturous process of Soviet brainwashing. Those were the days!
Despite years of physical and mental therapy to overcome this horrific experience, I almost completely forgot about it until I started watching Dr. Phil and Judge Judy! After I finished convulsing, I suddenly remembered what those crazy commies taught me: the ruling class tries to control the proletariat through the means of “mental production”.
So I started thinking, “who the hell watches this shit?”
It turns out the answer is “a lot of fucking people.”
If the world is anything like me, which I presume it is, then we do a lot of self-loathing. We wake up each day, counting down the days to our inevitable deaths, when our bodies will rot and return to the earth, and we will be quickly forgotten…like we never existed at all.
So what do we do with the time in between? We waste it by interacting with meaningless products and services. One of these services is daytime network TV which feature the long running shows of Dr. Phil and Judge Judy.
Are they a real doctor and Judge? I dunno. They might’ve been one at one time, but they failed their way upwards into getting their own show.
It’s a pretty good gig if you can get it.
But because neither of them are current practitioners of medicine or law, their opinions are practically useless. However networks don’t really care if you were ever a “good” “doctor” or “lawyer”, they just want to know if you can mock and laugh at poor people and their problems. And Phil and Judy are pretty good at their jobs.
Occasionally we watch the guests on these shows and think “at least my life is not as bad as theirs.” But it is. It’s worse, actually. And we’re sadomasochists for watching. Not only are we sick for watching these people get embarrassed on national TV, but we’re disgusting because we secretly want to be chastised by two rich people for being stupid and poor.
That’s the entire purpose of these shows: so that the TV execs and the ruling elite can remind you that they are better than you and you should know your place.
People come up to me all the time and ask: “Jim, how did you get so good at writing?”
Which people? Mostly ESL. But still, the question needs answering.
My father would always tell me “Never trust a Spaniard”. Additionally he’d say “Damnit James, you’re 18 years old, it’s time you learned to read.”
So when I enrolled at Northwestern (State Community College) I went up to my professor and said “teach me to read.” So he invited me to his house, gave me a few beers, put on a porno and removed my pants. Afterwords, he took out a book. It was Hemingway’s “To Have and Have Not”. I instantly fell in love with literature and I’ve been reading and writing ever since.
“But what do you do about writer’s block?”
Easy. For most writers, the solution is usually a bottle of scotch. But a couple of quaaludes don’t hurt either.
“Are there any writing exercises that you can do?”
Hmm. Good question.
I can’t think of any. Usually the only exercise I do is get in my car, go to the local truck stop, and ask if any truckers need “company”.
But every individual is different, and you have to go out into the world and find what gets your creative juices flowing.
“Are there any writers you turn to to find inspiration?”
Like I said, everyone’s different. You can find inspiration almost anywhere. Bathroom graffiti, for example. Call up some of the numbers, see where it goes. But whatever you do, never call a number from the bathroom stall at your local library . That’s definitely an undercover cop.
“Are some people just born to be writers?”
Ya know, probably.
I spent years in the Navy being a seaman. I was just no good at being a seaman. I’d often be reprimanded for various things like lurking in the showers, taking payments for special “favors”, etc. It was all bullshit. I just wasn’t suited for military life.
But don’t let that stop you from following your dreams. Some people may “judge” you, saying “that goes against the nature order of things”. Maybe your ex-wife might say “James, I hope someday you find someone that will satisfy you and will be happy together. I am leaving you.”
World renowned sex pervert Woody Allen said that “80 percent of success is just showing up”.
He’s right.
Throughout my career I’ve just shown up and someone hands me a paycheck. Occasionally I’ll smile and nod and blow smoke up my boss’s ass, but mostly just being physically present has been the secret to my financial security (and occasionally lack thereof).
Now it could be that my bosses think I might become a workplace shooter if they fire me, but I’ve never been terminated due to tardiness (viewing porn on a work computer is a different story).
So people often ask me “you’re poor as shit! How are you not living under a bridge?”
Well let me tell ya: budgeting and selling unused prescription pain medications.
What’s the point of buying a $60,000 Cadillac if you can’t occasionally live in it? Now shoplifting is rarely a good idea. You’d know this if you’ve ever spent enough time in Clark County, NV. And it’s completely unnecessary. Why risk jail time when you can just sell butthole pics to some Saudi “businessman”? If they blackmail you later, just say that the joke’s on them.
But I digress.
Living within your means is easy. In fact, it’s easier than spending money. All you gotta do is nothing! Dumbass.
I told my ex-wife years ago that all I need are two things: my toothbrush and my Glock 19. She left me for a Saudi oilman and tried to extort child support from me. But I told her that I ain’t paying that shit.
I still love her though. Baby, if you’re reading this, I’ll take you back whenever you’re ready but I ain’t ever gonna stop drinking.
So prioritize what’s important to you. Because that’s the secret to financial success.
Orson Wells, John Huston, John Ford, Stanley Kubrick, Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, Steven Spielberg, Quentin Tarantino, Christopher Nolan….
Michael Cimino.
Legend
GOAT
The director of the Deer Hunter (1978), who immediately after hoisting the Academy Award for Best Director began work on dismantling a major movie studio by staring production on the Heaven’s Gate (1980)…the greatest Hollywood flop of all time.
The Deer Hunter, Cimino’s magnum opus, is without question one of the great American films. That is if we can call it a “film”. It’s more like a fever dream. Characters drunk as shit drive from Pennsylvania to Washington state, shoot a deer, and drive back…all within 48 hours. Robert DeNiro torches a guy. And the three main characters are forced by a bunch of racist caricatures to play Russian Roulette. It’s an undeniably powerful film that accurately captures the American psyche post-Vietnam.
With the success of the Deer Hunter, Cimino had carte blanche in Hollywood to do whatever he wanted. He chose Heaven’s Gate, produced by United Artists, a story about an obscure dispute in Wyoming in the 1800s and staring a hot, Hot, HOT Kris Kristofferson, Christopher Walken, and Isabella Huppert (John Hurt’s hot too I guess). It was to be the greatest western of all time, solidifying Michael Cimino as one of the great auteurs.
When production started, problems instantly arose. Doing his best Kubrick impression, Cimino demanded take after take from his actors. He’d delay production to get the perfect shot of the Montana landscape where the film was shot, or demand that sets be torn down and rebuilt to exact specifications. He’d also charge the studio absurdly high rent to film on land that he allegedly owned (respect). The budget soared and United Artist was getting nervous.
Was it all worth it?
Lol, no.
Heaven’s Gate infamously flopped. Critics hated it. And it financially ruined United Artists (the James Bond franchise, arguably their most lucrative property at the time, would ultimately bail them out).
Despite attempts by internet and European critics to say it’s secretly a “masterpiece” 40 years after its release, Heaven’s Gate simply…doesn’t…work. The film looks like shit (sorry Vilmos Zsigmond fans), scenes go on longer than they should, and obviously Michael Cimino was feeling himself a little too much. If wasting money and being pretentious is an art form, then yes, Heaven’s Gate is a masterpiece.
Michael Cimino changed Hollywood. Gone were the days when auteurs ruled Hollywood. It wasn’t until John Landis killed three people (later acquitted) on the set of the Twilight Zone that Hollywood finally put the kibosh on artistic freedom.
Cimino would go on to direct some crap in 1980s, but his legacy was secure. That’s not worth nothin’, and I believe that’s worth honoring.
Michael Cimino passed away in 2016.
While I regard The Deer Hunter to be his finest work, one can’t forget the time Cimino, horribly disfigured by plastic surgery, roasted and mocked the entire crowd at Locarno Film Festival.
The Internet Ruined Everything 