phosfate

john: do you think angry birds is actually anti-martian police officer?

me: Um...the hell are you talking about? Oh, the green pigs?

john: yes

me: Ah.I think it merely seeks to express the eternal conflict between bird and pig in a miniature format. A microcosm of the greater macrocosm, as it were. Much in the same way Wacky Races depicted the neverending race of evolution, a race that can never be won, yet is mandatory for all life. Or the way that Yogi Bear depicts the societal stresses that occur when authority defends the privileged class against those who have little legal means of obtaining necessary resources.

john: I thought Yogi just really liked picnic baskets

me: John. John. You've got to look for the bigger picture.

john: :( this philosophy is too deep for a hamster

me: You're gonna need more college if you really want to learn how to lay on the bullshit, son. Consider Rudolph, and its depiction of 20th-Century American masculinity. Donner and cohorts are depicted as the elite, but when it comes down to it, do they really have agency? They compete for a place in harness!

john: maybe it's a bondage thing

me: All right. Rudolph as a sexual text, then. The male reindeer see themselves as wholesome family men. But their real purpose is to be lashed together, 'pulling the train' for Santa. Their deepest, most important bonds are with one another, not their mates. But if one suggested such a thing, they would be horrified -- even murderous.

john: !!

me: Think of them as a pro football team.

john: ohhh

me: All their work time spent in intimate contact. Their off time concerned with demonstrating their heteronormative masculinity. To the point where society covertly endorses their acts of violence, especially those against women. Their personal power is harnessed and therefore acceptable. Though none of the reindeer will ever be allowed an administrative role, and reindeer who actively demonstrate awareness or difference are shunned and scapegoated. Santa is always in charge, John.

john: the man in red

me: The man.

sandfordpolice is currently running a Tony Fisher/Spider-Man art challenge. So I made, like, a comic an' junk:



Click for bigger. Ink on some bristol board manga paper I got on clearance.

Ink. Click for bigger.
crantz wanted Ponies jumping and firing guns, but for the moment he's got a Pony firing its gun into the air and going Aaaaaaaaaaaaaa. Fuckin' Ponies. THEY HAVE NO THUMBS! How can they maintain any sort of organized, tool-based culture? HOW CAN THEY PULL TRIGGERS?

I'll go sit down now.

One of those millions of Superman variants, repainted to his regular colors but otherwise left untouched.

So my sister Kim came to stay for a couple of weeks, while...you know. It worked out okay. She's good at cleaning, I'm good at sorting and chucking, and my big brother is good at dealing with idiots and paperwork. We're like the Galaxy Trio, only better animated.

However, Kim and I live on different planets. This is only to be expected, since there's 11 years between us. She likes Anderson Cooper and shows about people with extra heads who have multiple births of 750-pound men. I punish her with Aqua Teen Hunger Force and The Colbert Report (it takes her two days to figure out that the latter is not in fact a real news show).

Anyway, we have conversations.

(In the bookstore)
Kim: Camey Kay's Girls? What's Camey Kays?
Me: Uh...Kamikaze Girls.
Kim: Oh.

(In the hospice, she spots me yanking out an eyebrow hair.)
Kim: Stop that! What are you doing?
Me: Oh. Sorry. I've been kind of...worrying at my eyebrows, the last couple weeks. It'll stop when this is over with.
Kim: Oh Jesus. Well, stop it. (pause) At least you don't do that thing where you pull your hair out.
Me: Well, not anymore.
Kim: Oh, my God! When did you...
Me: Oh, y'know. Junior high, high school.
Kim: Oh, my God!
Me: Only a little!
Kim: Jesus.
Me: It was 25 years ago. Chill.
Kim: Jesus. What made you stop?
Me: Now that I think about it, Dad² finally died.
Kim: (pause) Oh Jesus! (busts up laughing)

(My niece and nephew have a band called Eux Autres*, so we're talking about their music 'n stuff. A pattern emerges. A pattern of DEATH! Sorry. Little melodrama there.)
Kim: [Her daughter] really likes [some band I've never heard of]. Do you like them?
Me: Who?
Kim: She likes [some band I've never heard of].
Me: I have literally never heard of them.
Kim: That's weird. You used to, like, know everything about music.
Me: Yeah. That's kind of gone. My musical brain stops around 1990 or so.
Kim: What happened?
Me: Kurt Cobain shot himself. Then my radio station went country overnight without telling anyone.
Kim: Oh.
Me: It was horrible. I woke up one morning, and there was Garth Brooks.
Kim: I understand.


*Google them. They're batshit cool.

Mom uncertain about the whole DVD player thing until I pointed out she can now watch any movie she wants instead of trying to track down the city's only VHS copy, failing, and watching its debut on TBS 18 months later.

Unfortunately, this meant having to go out and fetch (and watch) March of the Penguins. Now very depressed by frozen penguin eggs, frozen baby penguins, frozen old tired penguins, layers and layers and layers of frozen penguin shit at the penguin breeding grounds, and general filthiness of penguins out of water for three months. Reminded of time Samoyed dog ate two pounds of wild Morells. Sting taken off a bit when it turned out that Bugs Bunny in "8-Ball Bunny" ("HoBOken?!? OOOOOOOO I'm DYYYYYin' again!") was included as an extra.

Also it plays CDs, another first for her, and is a much nicer VCR than any we've ever had.

Live in fear of Mom now remembering existence of Phantom of the Opera, Richard Gere movies. But can retaliate with Suicide Club, various Ringu volumes.